Entries this day: James Puddle_jump hostel_kauai shower swimming zach_dog_cat zzzz

James

8:35am HST Sunday 9 February 2003

Met a cool cat named James and his girl (didn't get her name) on the shuttle bus from Waikiki area to the airport. They were en route to check out the Arizona; they had seen the Missouri yesterday.

James drives trucks across the country in 2.5 days from New York City (where he grew up) to LA. Takes different routes depending on the weather. He's seen the white buffalo in Colorado, which Janette assures him is good luck. "It gives you good luck and good looks."

He really pimped Germain's Luau, saying it was really pimp and his girl had gone parasailing which was quite fun, especially when the boat driver would slow down and let her feet dip into the water. Crazy!

Puddle jump

10:11am HST Sunday 9 February 2003

We're in the airport now, and there seems to be no proof of electronic confirmation of our tickets. We paid $72 cash for each ticket. The cat here at the airport desk is trying to get us hooked up.

10:54am

On the plane now. Made it through the ticketing process; the cats at Robert's Hawai'i tours were having problems with their e-ticket stuff. Then Janette's bag didn't have a routing ticket. blah blah anyway my bag got examined through the security gate thing. Lalala who cares; we're on board.

hostel kauai

3:49pm HST Sunday 9 February 2003

Whoooooo hoooooooooo.

The hostel is phat funky awesome and allll that excellentness.

We paid for five nights. Reenie is off looking for her son, who works at a restaurant that turns out to be in walking distance from here. Amazing cause it's not a small island. Maybe it's only really populated on this side.

Most awesome pimp ass situation.

shower

5:57pm HST Sunday 9 February 2003

There's a shower with three walls and no roof on the roof of the hostel! I showered there and dried off in the sun, watching the water pour down into the gutter. I wonder if they process the water or if the soap just ends up on the ground..

swimming

6:00pm HST Sunday 9 February 2003

Janette and I went swimming. The water is a bit cold and way clear and the ground was SHARP coral and rocks and ouch ouch ouch to walk across, especially in shallow water, cause the waves would keep me off balance and not very bouyant. buoyant. floatatious. Anyway, I have stab marks on my hands and feet from walking crab walk across the pokey sharp rocks and coral and such.

It was so much fun! Janette and I were all "ow! ow! OWWW!! ow!" a lot and laughing a lot more at ourselves and our respective noises. Quite entertaining.

Met a cat named Rick out on the coral (wearing shoes) and his daughter Taylor? No, it started with a C. Camper, Cooter, Maybe it was Taylor. Anyway she had shoes on too, and they were snorkling. (not the shoes, the cats.) I definitely want to do that so I asked if we could borrow his stuff once I found out that he lives next to the hostel. I shoulda asked if he knew where we could rent some; I felt immediately embarassed for having put him in a situation where he couldn't easily say no. But whatever; it's all good.

They came out of the water a bit after we did. Rick and Kimberly marveled that we were barefoot out there.

Kimberly lives in the hostel, gets free rent by doing all the cleaning. She was kickin' back on a towel so I chatted with her a bit. Never sat on her towel though. She used to live in Seattle, but found herself depressed in the winter so she moved out here where it's super sunnier all the time. She's an editor for a local author, but her real love is dogs and wants to set up a business grooming, sitting, boarding dogs.

Dolly is Rick's dog, possibly a border collie. Dolly was chewing on a fallen palm leaf (and by leaf I mean the big ass entire 7 feet stalk with the little flappy leaves on it). I threw it and she retrieved it several times before she chewed through part of it and the piece that I was throwing kept getting smaller and smaller. I'm amazed that she doesn't have shredded bloody gums after all that chewing of 'sharp' palm stalk.

zach dog cat

8:50pm HST Sunday 9 February 2003

Went to dinner at Lotus Blossom where Reenie's son Zach works. The most beautiful things: it's within easy walking distance, and Janette had no conscious idea of that when booking this awesome hostel; Reenie peeking toward the kitchen, "Zach??" and Zach coming out all huge smile, "Hi Mommm." and big big hug and then back up to make sure it's really mom/Zach and then hug again. So beautiful to witness.

We each had uber-unique foods: I got flax seed things with sunflower seed paste; Janette got miso soup and awesome vegetable pizza with huge slices of vegetables (roasted garlic, pineapple, grilled onion (as the base), tomato, summer squash) and crust that was better than Star Pizza!!!!! The crust was made out of spelt (I hope I spelt that correctly) and olive oil. Actually I think Star Pizza's crust is better in large quantities of consumption, but on first and second and third taste this crust *ruled!*

Oh and Reenie got something called Samosas, which I'd never heard of but she apparently has eaten before. Potato turnovers with corriander, tumeric, and cumin seasoning. And pineapple chutney (I'm typing as Janette dictates what it was) and puff pastry.

And I got a sample of some nutty soup (and I don't mean it had nuts in it) but it was onion/apple/black bean soup. Such a weird flavor!! I'm glad the cat named Dog suggested that I get a sample instead of a whole bowl. Weird weird flavor. I told him later that I'd like to try it again on a different day and work my way up to a full bowl.

So there was a cat named Dog there! His real name is some variant of David, but I never caught it. He has bangs but the rest of his head is buzz cut. Deep clear eyes when he shook my hand with a genuine pleasure to meet someone that runs in the same circles as Zach's mom.

Great great great restaurant.

zzzz

9:12pm HST Sunday 9 February 2003

Going to read journal entries to Janette and then sleeeeeeeep.

9:39pm

Done reading. Janette giggled a lot at today's entries, especially the part about James pimping Germain's Luau.