Hello Santa Cruz

Well, we are settling back into our home. But first, the final shot of our beloved Big Island out our plane window.


As I have mentioned before, I love lists. So let me give a brief list of some of the things that make it so great to return to Santa Cruz, much as we loved Hilo.

1. The boardwalk. It is so sweet and such a well-maintained relic of an earlier time in America. And, the Giant Dipper is awesome.

2. Brown pelicans in flight. They are just my favorite thing in the sky by far. I missed them in Hilo.

3. Walking or riding down West Cliff. I just love this stretch of the ocean. Partly because it is beautiful and can be - during a storm - incredibly powerful. Partly because I see my beloved pelicans as I walk or ride. Partly because I run into friends as I go. Partly because I just feel that it is mine in a way that no other part of the ocean is.

4. Our movie theaters. What other town of 55,000 has 7 arthouse screens within 2 blocks of each other (plus another 9 screens for Hollywood fare also a few steps away)? The answer is no place on earth! (Hilo has art films on one screen on the weekends sometimes.)

5. The barking sea lions. They are the closest thing to coqui frogs! Well, they are the sound you can hear in the night even though they are more than a mile away. (Though, I admit, only when there is a fog blanket to reflect the sound, but then they do sound like they are only a few blocks away.)

6. The colors on my fireplace. This one is unique to our home. We have a leaded glass window in our door and it refracts colors into our house. It is just spectacular when the colors are on the rocks of our fireplace. I love to sit in my la-z-boy watching the ever-changing show.

7. The people of Santa Cruz. I just like being in a place that I will always run into someone I know where ever I go. I don't even have to like the person that much. I just like having a community small enough to constantly bump into people and say "hey". And, of course, it has been great to see my friends - coffee with Darien, Ian, Karen, Mindy, Mary, John, Joao, Brian; walking with Angela; running into Lynne on West Cliff; making plans to get together with Mike and Lynne, Larry and Elena; dropping by and saying hi to Claudia, Pam, Jesse, Jim, Adrian and Orin at their offices; waving to Luigi as I was riding my bike; getting yelled at by Geo for not wearing a bike helmet; Chris dropping by to welcome us back; Daphne - our mail carrier - knocking on the door to welcome us home; greeting our neighbors, and on it goes....

8. The Miramar hill. I live on Miramar (which means view of the ocean in Spanish). We don't have a view at our house. But, there is a spectacular view three blocks up. But, that last block is a doozy - very steep. Great exercise; great view.

9. My hot tub. Now, I hate cold but when I am cold, I love my hot tub. The feeling of jumping into hot water when I am chilled is probably my favorite sensual experience. (Ok, maybe rolling in warm sheets out of the dryer is equally great.) Though we have returned to spectacular warm winter weather in the daytime - it gets chilly at night. So, I have enjoyed this one a few times. (In Hilo, no chill = no hot tub experience.)

10. Downtown Santa Cruz. Just a great place to hang out.

I am now going to go on blog hiatus. (Judith - "hiatus" veut dire une interruption en français. And thanks for the comment on the last blog!) I have many things I must do now that I am back in Santa Cruz - classes to take, jobs to do, people to see - so I want the blog time for other things. If I know you read this thing, I will tell you when I begin it again. (Hey, Yemindra told me that John Shay reads it. John - is it true?)

Bye for now.

Bye Hilo....

Well, we head back to Santa Cruz tomorrow. Last night we had a lanai-warming and goodbye party. We thought it might rain, so we put up a canopy (thanks John and Adam!). It didn't rain but it did give the lanai the proper feel. (Without a roof, it is really just a deck).

Today we woke up to a glorious, sunny day. It was nice to see Mauna Kea one more time in all her glory.

One thing I haven't mentioned is the sound at night. Please listen to this 17 second video I took yesterday night. This is what we hear every night, all the night. It is the sound of the invasive coqui frog. There is a war on these little, horny guys (the sound is a nightly mating cry of the male coqui). They came in 1988 from Puerto Rico and completely changed the soundscape. Leslie and I like the sound, but others cannot stand it. Just a little warning for those who might want to visit us next time we come.

The last lanai post

It's essentially done. At least as done as I am going to do it this trip. Next trip, I will put a roof over it and build another section (that will not have a roof). But, it is now ready for use. Too bad we won't be the ones using it. (Well, there is our "lanai warming" party on Sunday.) But I am very happy that our tenants, John and Jessica, will be able to use it. Anyway, here is a last construction picture from Hawaii:


And, a little video surveying the new lanai:

Adam blogs on enlightenment and us...

Our newest guest blogger is Adam. Voici:


He submits this blog post: (colon supplied by Leslie; I'm drunk but can do semi-colons.)

I am reading a book while I am Hawaii called Awakening The Buddha Within by Lama Surya Das. This reading is helping me look at Robin and Leslie in a new way. According to what this book explains I believe that these two have already become aware of their inner nature and are enlightened. They are Buddha (not Buddhists, but have found their Buddha within) whether they know it or not, but in western more modern sense. How do I know this you may ask? Well first of all, Leslie tells her friends when introducing me that, I am possibly the most talented artist alive. Since any Buddha (one who is enlightened to their inner nature and the way of things) should realize this if they really are enlightened. Second, after obsessively reading over “Robin’s Blog” last night after the two had already gone to sleep, I realized how aware of their surroundings they are and what they need to enjoy life to the fullest. Of course I am trying to attain a similar sense of myself, but it doesn’t happen overnight. It will take a while before I can utilize thrift stores to their full potential, and learn to enjoy and think it is cool to have a syndrome like ASPS. Be capable of making good found art, like how they converted a cheap rectangle of cloth into a beautiful piece of artwork worthy of their living room.

Leslie with the cloth:

So I am on a journey to attain a similar sense of my true nature. The first task will be about making something from nothing. I will start by making a sculpture for the yard that doesn’t cost anything. Might I add that Leslie and Robin have wanted me to erect a sculpture for their Santa Cruz home for years. Sorry but by agreeing to have me stay in “The Hella Cool Hilo House” the sculpture will be in Hilo. OK my mind is rolling off to find and utilize some of the free things this island offers for this project. Eventually I will enter Buddha hood just like them, happy without excesses.

(Note: One shouldn't drink and blog, I believe...)

I'm all wet

With only five days left here, I have to work in the rain when it comes. It came. I took the following picture after of about 15 minutes of rain... But, I am making progress with the lanai. Really. I think I will finish the thing tomorrow. So, please await the final pictures. And, yes, I will be getting my hair cut when I am back in Santa Cruz.

Here is what my hair looked like 3 1/2 months earlier (with a slightly fuzzy photo ...) I think shorter is better. (Update: Adam says I look like Bill Clinton here.)

Banana face fireworks

Well, it's different.

95% of the lanai is done

Voici:


I just have to install rails for the stairs and and trim out the railing on the lanai. I am so glad that the rain held off long enough to get this, essentially, done.

Leslie is on the deck with our friend, Adam, who just flew in today. Yesterday and this morning, we had a great time with two other friends, Jill and Dave. And, later in the week, our friend Enda and his dad are coming for a night. Just a whirlwind of activity for our last week.

So, where is the damn lanai?

I know I keep saying things like, "time to work on the lanai." But, I have shown no proof that progress is being made. I am sorry. I have had to work around a lot of rain - which has finally abated. Also, I really have no secure idea of what I am doing. I sort of feel my way along. You know that old adage "measure twice, cut once"? My variation is "measure six times, cut two or, at very worst, three times". So, I am very slow. But, I have made progress! Leslie is doing the painting while I do everything else necessary to prepare for the steps and railings. I promise they will magically be on the lanai soon (rain notwithstanding) and I will be really done. I better be as we only have a week left on the island. Plus, we are having a "lanai warming" party on the 11th. That is more motivation, don't you think?

Voici the bulk of the railing parts.

Voici the stringers for the stairs. (I didn't know the word stringer before I started working on this thing which proves, I believe, that I have no idea what I am doing.)

Voici some holes in the ground for railing posts.


And, I do have a long list of other tasks that I continue to work on. In this case, I caught an hour between rain to re-glaze the basement windows. (I do know what I am doing here, by the way.)

I have ASPS!

I just found out (while reading a book review) that something I "have" and rather enjoy is a condition, a syndrome, a medical problem but, lucky me, can be treated. It is called Advanced Sleep-Phase Syndrome (ASPS). To wit, people who tend to go to bed around 7:30 pm and rise around 3:30 am. While I was an early riser in Santa Cruz - usually around 5:30 am or so - since I have been in Hawaii, I have fairly closely followed the ASPS model. Cool! I love having a syndrome - particularly one that I enjoy so much. (I am pretty sure that I have enough "symptoms" to also fit on the obsessive-compulsive syndrome spectrum. That, too, is quite enjoyable for me if not so much for Leslie and my friends.)

Apparently, it has a genetic link and is common in post-menopausal women (C'est moi!) and the elderly (I don't think I count yet, though certainly the evil folks at AARP keep pleading with me to join.) And, yes, there is another syndrome for night owls. It is called - you guessed it - Delayed Sleep-Phase Syndrome (DSPS).

I personally think the world has TMDS (Too many damn syndromes)

The oldest living person died (again)

Did you hear that Marie de Jesus of Portugal just died? She was the world's oldest person at 115. Now, she obtained that title on November 28th when Edna Parker (115; from Indiana) died. I am thinking all the stress of the title might have led to Marie's premature death. The oldest person title has been passed back to the USA. Her name is Gertrude Baines (114; from LA). Good luck to her. I hope the publicity doesn't kill her.

However they are all youngsters compared to my favorite title holder, Jeanne Calment of France. She died at 122, living longer than anyone before or since. She believed the secret to her long life was lots of olive oil, wine and chocolate. Sounds about right to me. She didn't credit cigarettes, though she didn't give them up until she was 117.

Ok, off to eat a candy bar…

The year-end web (and tripping down memory lane)

The on-line magazine Salon offered their take on the viral videos of the year. They embedded multiple videos in an article analyzing the changing web video scene.

The website BuzzFeed, which is dedicated to tracking "viral web in real time" offered a list of the 12 biggest web stories of 2008 (through the Huffington Post.) I myself included some of these obsessions in my blog. But, I had missed some of these phenomena as they happened and I, for one, am happy to have caught up on things such as disaster girl. Who knew?

Speaking of the Huffington Post, they also have a "Big News Page" of lists for 2008. Now, I love lists. Their best youtube video list isn't my favorite. But, I did enjoy #5, "Star Wars according to a 3-year old".

And about Huffington, do you remember Strange Bedfellows? This is when Arianna was still conservative. She and Al Franken did commentary for the election of 1996 as a feature on Bill Maher's old show Politically Incorrect. She wasn't able to get her ex husband Michael to be Senator or herself to be Governor. But, her old buddy, Al, is on the edge of becoming a Senator and she finally has a real home with her very cool on-line news site. They really have come a long way, baby. What a long strange trip it has been. (Sorry for going to one ad cliche to one song lyric cliche....)

(But speaking of a strange trip), the link to Bill's old show was to my favorite episode on Timothy Leary and LSD. He gathered up three psychedelic users (plus a token non-druggie) who are non-repentant fans of the drug. It was this sort of show that led to him getting the ax from mainstream TV and landing on HBO. And, yes, Maher can be obnoxious but he can be wonderful, too.

Happy New Year!

Voici the finished snowman

Aren't those girls with their slippahs so cute? (Slippahs = thongs, flip-flops, go-aheads, zories, rubber sandals - what word did you use growing up? I used thongs.)

This morning, this is what was left. Note the firecrackers surrounding our melted man.

Last night was a semi-bust at Coconut Island as the rain came back when we got there. I held on outside with Valerie for a bit.

But, I headed under cover soon after. I am talking here to our tenant, John. He and his wife, Jessica, are moving in for a year as soon as we leave. Actually, John is moving in today. We thought a period of overlap was a good idea since we are leaving him a furnished house, the car and other things. He is a swell guy and the co-head brewer for a local brewery. But, his wife doesn't come in until January 13th, the day we leave. So, we won't get to meet her - at least in 2009.

I couldn't hang on for the big fireworks spectacular that is the Hilo New Year. I just conked out at about 9:00 pm - late for me. I was semi-roused at midnight as the sound did penetrate my deep sleep, but really I missed the whole thing. Leslie, however, was forced to tend to Rosie. We had given her a chill pill that the doctor prescribed but it didn't work. Leslie then tried to get her a bit drunk with a concoction of vodka, milk and honey. It did work, eventually, but Leslie had to spend about a hour on the floor with our traumatized dog. Sorry, Leslie, that I am such a bum, sleeping through it all.

The storm seems to have finally passed and we are back to normal here on January 1, 2009. From the back yard, looking toward Mauna Kea's snow. Yes I am in my shorts and tank top and knee pads and heading off to work on the lanai....