Happy New Year!

or Hau'oli (happy) Makahiki (year) Hou (new), as they say round these parts. I am happy to be ringin' in the New Year with WIRELESS INTERNET, which means that it no longer takes me six hours to upload one stinkin' photo. So for those of you who are still actually looking at this thing, there may be more frequent updates. if there aren't, i don't have a good excuse.

photo captions: there go my christmas tree. my mommy got it for me at the farmer's market. and the seal you'll hear about in a moment, and my favorite new objet d'art. (thanks summer!)

So i hope everyone had a mele kalikimaka (*the* catchiest christmas song EVER, in my opinion. damn you bing crosby! get out of my head). I certainly did. Kaari came on the 14th of december and mom and pop arrived the 16th. we played in Kona and in Hilo, and I got to do my favorite thing -- play Tourist on my own island -- and i saw all kinds of neat stuff. including a monk seal. there are an estimated 1200 of those buggers and they mostly hang out on the remote and unpopulated northwest islands -- and i saw one chillin at Onomea Bay when the folks and I went to the botanical gardens there. good stuff.

we also hit laupahoehoe point where there is a tsunami memorial to a whole bunch of people that got washed out to sea in 1946, including a McGinnis lady from NC (any relation, Leah?), a schoolteacher who'd arrived in Hawaii one month earlier. she lived to tell the tale, and married the guy who rescued her. she'd had a date with him scheduled the night the tsunami hit but never made it because, well, she was swept out to sea by a tsunami. all's well that ends well, i reckon.

we also checked out Waimea, the headquarters of Parker Ranch, where they have a store with the most fabulous cowboy gear ever. i saw a blue spangly cowgirl shirt that i know belle would die for. i mean. i'm going back there when i need some new duds.

what else is goin on. work's still good, got a glowing 6-month performance review (especially in the areas of Communication and Safety, ha) but I'm a little anxious because not only am I on soft money, but so is my boss. so i'm looking for something more secure/long-term, and if I find that here, great. but if not, i may actually hit the mainland again. don't tell the doodle. hopefully i'll find something here. but it's all about the green in '08. tired of bein po'!

well that's enough babbling for now. but can i just say that No Country For Old Men has *still* not come to theaters here? i am so behind the times....

xoxo,

k