My Dana Point Yoga Studio & Gym

DDF recently got a very nice job as director of research & development at a moderately sized bio-medical firm in San Diego, so we'll be saying good bye to the lovely environment of Orange County in the next few months after the house is sold.  As I type this late March blog post, I am sitting in my home's breakfast nook / drinking area that has glass on two sides and looks out over the back & side yards, where I can see all 8 hummingbird feeders, 3 hummingbirds drinking from various ones, and

an adolescent (and vociferous) mocking bird exploring one of the feeders under the white guava tree. The sun is setting behind the trio of king palms, and I am well rested after 90 minutes of yoga and 2 hours of stair running and beach parkour.  Started off the work day early, ended before 2pm, and made a bee-line for the beach.  4 and a 1/2 hours later I am feeling reflective and somewhat pensive.  The hummingbirds - who are chasing each other all around the 8 happy hour dusk feeders - are not pensive at all.

But I digress...  this post is supposed to be about my Dana Point Yoga Studio & Gym...  so we'll move onto the collection of photos I've taken in the last several weeks to help illustrate these abodes.  These are in contrast to the earlier locations I've illustrated here on JustJoeP, like Arizona Back Yards, Arizona Blue sky environments, Pool Sides, Group Pool Sides, Hawaii, Hotel Rooms (French Hotel Rooms, and Chicago Hotel Rooms), Mountain tops, grassy beach fronts (my first introduction to the Dana Point Beach) and next to Tide Pools.

There's usually lots of flowers and floral arrangements all around the studio & gym.  It's especially nice when laying on the yoga mat and looking up to see this brilliant coral tree, contrasted with the beautiful blue sky behind it - no gray pall here, typically.  Sometimes a California Phoebe comes up and proclaims his loyalty to K-Mart: "Cheap!  Cheap!" and then dives down towards the grass to snatch up some insect or another.  Other times an Anna's hummingbird male alights and flits all about the coral tree, claiming it as his.  Other times and ornery crow squawks at me: "get off my concrete pad!!!"  from one of the two symmetrical coral trees.   (I am fluent in Crow now, having observed them closely for 2 years in California)

My gym has showers...   which one can use to remove the sand from one's feet, if you've gone down to where the water meets the land.  People in wet suits frequently rinse off there - not something most gyms have (wet suits).

There's lots of very large whales who frequent my gym.  They're almost always on the move, and many times bring their small (10 feet long and a 1000 lbs...  if you call that "small") children with them.  Lots of grays, some sperm, blue, fin, and occasionally a humpback comes to the gym as well.   I wouldn't call them "obese", but they are very Big folks indeed.

And then you've got all the skinny white folks, who are always looking at food, but apparently never eating any of it.  They're down by the water's edge, gazing at their own reflections.  They're up on inclined slopes, tip-toeing through the succulent ice plants.

And there's those who try and hog all the equipment, and sing while they're doing so.  They don't sing too loud, even if they're trying to be fierce and menacing...  it's still pretty adorable.

And there's the flashy dressers...  in bright green & fiery red magentas.

There's a wide variety of equipment in the rock parkour area.  Big ones, little ones, solid ones, smaller ones that rock when you push off, sandy ones - but like most gyms, you have to be careful about those who don't clean up after they've used the equipment.  A little bit of Bird poop on rocks is still better than MRSA though, any day.

You don't have to have status to work out here... but there's lots of +$100K vehicles in the parking lot.

So I am going to miss my coastal gym that I've grown so fond of here in Dana Point.  It's a short 15 to 20 minute drive (if I get out of the house before the high school kids get out of class), and the parking is free, or nearly free.  The breezes are amazing.  The scenery, unparalleled.  Every Wednesday they do cut the grass and that makes it a little itchy...  - grass in Arizona was never really an issue as it was all burnt by the orange fiery ball in the sky.  I'm sure I'll find some kind of studio & gym equivalent in San Diego...  but Dana Point was nice while it lasted.

Contrasting Yoga Environments

In the Winter here, I typically do yoga on a yoga mat, poolside, in the sun. The vitamin D is refreshing, gives me a chance to see hummingbirds, smell my lemon tree, and humans are inexorably drawn to bodies of water. It's sort of the "standard" to which all other yoga venues are in my mind. On the pool deck, I use an old, clean, twin bed sheet - that doubles as a painting drop cloth - to keep the dusty pool deck from contaminating my mat.

In the summer here, when the sun's rays bake the yoga mat to a burning 130F+, I have to move inside, or in the the shade at least. When it is not noon +/- an hour, finding full shade can be difficult in the Arizona summer. Doing yoga indoors is not as refreshing and satisfying as it is doing it outside.

When we went to Hawaii last October for a genetics conference, we had a wide ocean view 16th floor balcony on which I practiced yoga almost every day. The breezes and view were invigorating, but the humidity made it a sweaty endeavor. It's the 2nd best place I've ever practiced yoga.

Last August, for our anniversary, Dr Desert Flower and I went to Sedona for the weekend, and there was a balcony there as well on the small Hilton Hotel room I got with HHonors points. Same low humidity and climate as home (a little cooler) but the view was not as good, over-looking a parking lot. (We Did see bats at sunset, which was really cool)

Last month I traveled back to my company's headquarters, and did yoga in the Hilton & Hampton hotel rooms where I stayed each evening. Same sheet barriers used, but Ew! The smell of hotel carpet permeated the sheet and my mat, requiring a thorough cleaning. The softness of the carpet also lead to a "sponginess" that took some getting used to. Watching the Olympics on the TV while doing yoga was also somewhat surreal.

Earlier this month, I attempted to do yoga in St.John US V.I.. The villa's downstairs where we stayed was too tiny to facilitate rolling out a yoga mat, so I attempted to do it on the pool deck just after dawn one morning. Lots of no-see-ums and tiny biting insects appreciated my close proximity to the bougainvilleas at the edge of the pool deck, and enjoyed feasting upon my flesh & blood. That made for a not-so-relaxing experience. 2 days later, I did yoga, pool adjacent, far away from the shrubbery, and this helped to dissuade the insects from biting me, but, it began to rain 15 minutes into the session, sort of spoiling things.

On two different St.John beaches, I practiced yoga. On Cinnamon Beach, I did it at the mangrove tree line, where the sand was firmly compacted. This worked well for standing poses, but seated poses were not a good idea, with the number of crawling insects busily carrying away mangrove fruits and various foliage. For the seated poses, I did those on the towel, in the softer sand, closer to the shore line. I don't like to do yoga in public, and prefer to have some privacy... except after drinking, and then I throw privacy to the wind and my don't-give-a-dern factor tends to multiply.

On Trunk Bay's beach, on our last snorkeling day, I tried to "compact" the sand near the high tide line, a few feet from the end of my towel, with my feet. Gradually, pressing down with my heel and ball of my foot, I tried to "flatten & compress" the sand, in 3 areas about one foot square - one to stand in the middle and one to do spread-leg downward poses for each foot. This was a failure. The sand was not fully compressible via the weight of a 92Kg man. While the venue was lovely, with gently crashing surf behind me, tropical mountains, palms, and soaring pelicans abundant, the shifting sands caused me to pull several muscles and strain connective tissues in the upper legs and lower abdomen. I paid for this on the long flight home the next day, and for 2 days afterwards, hobbling a little - in conjunction with my stubbed toe from 10Mar10.

I cannot recommend anyone taking a yoga mat that they want to keep to a St.John beach, with blowing sand, salt, very soft surfaces, and the impossibility of minimizing contamination. It's really impractical. If you do attempt to do yoga on a sandy beach, be very careful about "extreme" poses that could cause you any strain. Stick to simple seated poses on a large beach towel, and avoid over-extension.

Once, about 30 months ago, I did yoga in business class in a Delta 767-ER on my way back from Barcelona Spain to Phoenix via ATL. No one was seated behind me or beside me in my middle row seat (sparsely populated that flight, 2L, 2 middle, 2 right seating - only United tries to Cram a 3rd seat int he middle of a 767 in the US). The seats reclined to about 170 degrees. Dark cabin lighting gave the illusion of being "alone". The seated poses were easy. Lack of turbulence provided extended opportunities to do the standing poses without being in the aisle. As the passengers disembarked, and elderly lady asked me how long I had been practicing yoga, and that she'd never seen someone do it on a plane. It was only at that point that I realized, the 'illusion of being alone' in the plane's cabin.

As the sun's radiation continues to warm my pool, I plan on swimming in early April - il faut voir. Pool temp is 69F as of yesterday. More sun, and it will continue to climb. I documents last year the beer-pool-yoga, and I intend on renewing that. Wine-pool-yoga may be a lower carb alternative that needs to be explored this year.

Hawaiian Health Care - John Oliver Reporting

Did anyone besides me see the Daily Show report last week, that John Oliver did from Hawaii where he interviewed Republicans who were having a convention there, asking them what they thought about state provided Hawaiian Health Care? Beautiful, amazing, poignant. Blatant Republican stupidity and hypocrisy.

Ciao Mein Honolulu

While in Honolulu last month, Dr Desert Flower's boss took out all of her employees and their spouses attending the ASHG conference to Ciao Mein, at the Hyatt on Waikiki. I have to admit, I was initially skeptical of the concept of a "fusion" restaurant, and all the 'trendy' implications that can be conveyed in that label, but I was more than pleasantly surprised with their "collision cuisine". Ciao Mein had a warm welcoming atmosphere, with a comfortable large dinner party central room. The service was superb, exemplary, highly attentive, experienced and discretionary - cautioning our party that we had perhaps "ordered a little too much" when we'd placed a mix of individual and family style orders. We had, in fact, ordered too much as there was a bounty of left overs.

The wine list had excellent variety, and I was able to locate and recommend a relatively inexpensive Prosecco to go with Appetizers for our party of nine persons, and a delicious reasonably priced Sangiovese for the meal - each approved by DDF's Sr VP of course, who had not previously dined with us. The head waiter doubled as sommelier and kept our glasses topped off quite nicely.

The menu was an eclectic mix of Italian & Chinese, and was flawless. I sampled more than 1/2 a dozen dishes, and as we were 2/3rds through dinner, I asked the head waiter "do you have anything that is not delicious on your menu?" It was one of the best meals I've had all year. I highly recommend, if you are in Honolulu, it's worth the walk over to the Hyatt to indulge, whether you are a foodie, a skeptic, a fusion lover, or just curious.

Don't believe me though, there are other reviews that concur with me here, here, and here.

Obama Ts

One can get 6 Hawaiian t-shirts for $20 at the ABC stores on O'ahu and in many gift shops as well. Since my work-out shirts are getting stained, ratty, and some are more than 20 years old (Michelin Engineering, Intramural volleyball team, Spartanburg SC, really... still?) I got 4 Obama Ts - they love their native son.. even if the tea baggers believe he is from Kenya! LOL! - and 2 Hawaiian shirts.

If they shrink / don't fit (some XLs are not really XLs) I know our son will enjoy wearing them back to Charleston at Christmas.

When I wore one earlier this week while riding the stationary bike, Dr Desert Flower came home from work, saw me in it, and said "now, you're a nazi socialist commie liberahl, you know!"

Last Word, on Hawaii Vacationing

After this rant, I will try not to mention anything about Hawaii for a while.

- Wifi STILL should be free. As I posted earlier from Reno, if I am paying $265 a night for a hotel room, provide Wifi damnit. $16 a day, to get a wired connection, really? And $7 for 2 hours of Wifi in a lobby? You must be kidding. There was a unsecured network, labelled mysteriously as "07FX####" (the #s changed daily) in the lobby, that could handle all of 4 or 5 squatters before it crashed. That's what I used in it's entirety while staying in Waikiki. When droves of cheap scientists all started hunting for the free connections, and the lobby bar was full of patrons, my fragile connection crumbled, but I still had alcohol to turn to! =)

- Work out fitness rooms at hotels should be free. Again, when I am paying $265 a night, it's insulting to me to have to pay $20 to work out at the "World Renown Mandara spa". Bite me. If I want to work out, I'll run down the beach, swim in the surf, do yoga on the balcony of my 21st floor room (as I did on 4 of the 7 mornings we were there), or run up and down the stairs (as I did on 2 occasions). I over-heard a remark at dinner one night "there's very few people at the spa fitness center" - yeah, for $20 they should be handing out complimentary t-shirts, bottled spring water, or having a shapely woman in tight white shorts and a thong use the treadmill or stair climber directly in front of you. $20 to work out, each day, I don't think so. Just another way that the resorts want to gouge the tourists.

- Pool Capacity: If you combine all 3 pools at the Hilton Hawaiian Village lounging /seating areas, or water capacity, it is still less than the single main pool at the Vegas Casino Paris. Yes, the Pacific Ocean is right there, but the ocean doesn't have a hot tub, sometimes you don't want to get all salty, and sometimes it's nicer to just be able to lay on a chair instead of the sand. Good luck getting a chair at the Hilton after 11am.

- 24 hour Xerox Business Center... sounds like a nice place to print a boarding pass the night before leaving the island, no? No!!! Unless you want to pay 50 cents a minute to log in, minimum 15 minutes, plus $5 a page, and wait in line for the 3 computers available to the paying public. What a joke! That's the first hotel "business center" that I've ever seen where you had to pay to use it. Epic failure, Hilton.

OK, I feel better now. =)

Honolulu Observations

-the coastal parks are for the homeless, to reside. Each park containing dozens of tents, or leean-tos, or tarps, and associated shopping carts

- the coastal parks are DIRECTLY across the street from the wealthiest shopping areas I have seen outside of Milan's fashion district, Hong Kong's Pacific Place, or Monaco. Cartier, Gucci, Versache, Yves St.Laurent, Kate Spade, Donna Karan, Prada, are less than 100 yards away from tent dwellers

- HPD are still as laissez-faire today as they were in 1999 when Dr Desert Flower and I last visited Hawaii. At that time, a man approached us on a street corner offering to sell us cocaine, which we refused, crossed the street, and ran into 2 shorts wearing, on-duty, HPD officers, who we promptly reported the attempted sale, just seconds earlier. The officer on the left looked at us, and remarked to his partner on the right "you're on a tropical island in paradise with a beautiful woman, of course they offered to sell you some drugs" and patted his partner on the back, laughing, and walked off. This trip, the HPD was more interested in standing in the shade (in the day time), surveying the beach with binoculars, and helping the Hilton rent-a-cops to keep the homeless shopping cart pushers off the grounds of the resort. The city ban of smoking on the beach, prohibition on ball & frisbee tossing, and "no parking" ordinances were equally unenforced (which was fine with me).

- the Honolulu bus system (thebus.org) runs pretty well. You can get from Waikiki to the AZ Memorial in just under an hour (an impossible 10 mile walk through industrial and economically challenged areas) For $2.25 you can go anywhere, and get a transfer pass that'll last you between 2 to 4 hours - depending on the driver, the driver's ethnicity Hawaiian/Polynesian bus drivers give longer transfers, and often turn off their bus to walk around and make phone calls or use the rest room at a public toilet. Asian (primarily Vietnamese, but also ethnic
Japanese) give minimalist 2 hour transfers at most. The buses are clean, and well maintained. Not once did I hear city bus brakes squeak or squeal while in Hawaii. The cabs are 10 to 20X more expensive, but only about twice as fast.

- The disgusting practice of Asian spitting on public sidewalks is alive and well among the Asian tourists who visit Hawaii. Outside of Hilton resort hotel elevators, in malls, at bus stops, on board walks, side walks, everywhere that there are Asian tourists... it's just as disgusting as Chengdu, Shanghai, Beijing, parts of San Francisco, or other places in the world that don't have enforced fines for expectorating in public. Being a blond Pole, I'm prone to all sorts of respiratory allergies and nasal mucus production, and not once have I ever felt the need or the social acceptance to hock up a lugee in a public place and openly spit it where people walk. At least Singapore has laws against such a disgusting habit.

- Tourists are inexorably curious about my Asus Eee notebook. I was approached no less than a dozen times in the last week, when I would be surfing or typing away on it in the lobby or poolside or at a bar, asking me how I liked it? that their son had ordered them one, or they
were considering buying one, or that what I had was Exactly what they wanted to get. My buddy Matt has one for tuning Subarus, and it seems to work fairly well for him - until his son downloads nasty mal-ware onto it while surfing online gaming sites. My main complaints about the Asus 1) the keyboard does not fit my fat old fingers, and so 2 finger typing is frequently needed (a becomes s, l becomes ; ... etc) 2) the over-sensitivity that the touch pad has sends the cursor to bizarre areas of the screen while typing, EVEN WHEN the touch pad is not being touched. Plugging a USB mouse into the notebook seems to alleviate this very annoying jerk / drift / unintended cursor movement, but one must always remain watchful. The Eee boots up quickly, finds wireless networks MUCH BETTER than my company Dell could ever hope to do, and has a battery battery life much better than the Dell as well. Sure, it's a graphics wimp, but it's better than any computer I've had prior to 2003 or so, it's alot smaller, lighter, more portable, and I don't have to type with my thumbs (for you iphone / pda / i-connect / blackberry fans) and it was only $200.

- Hawaii airline food sucks, but the service is very nice. You can buy a $10 meal (taco, greek, or Caesar salad) or get a free meal (breakfast "burrito" [mine had one piece of french-fry sized chicken-possibly], turkey & swiss sandwich, or pasta dish). On the way home, I wanted the Caesar, but was pleasantly told that is only on Westbound afternoon & evening flights - sigh. The HA flight attendants actually seem to enjoy their jobs, unlike US Scaire's who universally appear to loathe theirs (and nearly a 1000 will be laid of in 2010). One not so good aspect of Hawaiian Air, is that they make you pay $5 to use YOUR OWN head set to listen to the in flight programs. WTF? $5, really, to use my own? What a piss poor licensing agreement. I did not try a stealth headphone insertion (I had an old pair of Delta head phones) but I think if I had, the crew would have adopted the HPD "sure, whatever" mode of enforcement.

- while walking to the falls in the Lyon arboretum, Dr Desert Flower got strafed by a fruit bat. She was standing right under a guava tree whose ripened fruit was littering the path all around her, and I being 10 paces ahead of her disturbed (I think) the flying mammal from it's secluded daytime slumber. The strafing temporarily startled, but did not endanger the sweet Dr Desert Flower.

Ouch!

...sounds painful

(I took this at the lobby bar in the hotel in Hawaii on 3X ZOOM)

Islands Take Global Warming Seriously

In the ride to the Honolulu Airport, you can look out to the north over a sea of residential roof tops, each sporting their own pair of solar panels. Most appeared to be the black box solar water heater types, but a few reflected in a photovoltaic sense.

Googling a Hawaiian Solar legislation, I found a few interesting links (here and here and here) that show the Island State of Hawaii is taking global warming seriously. A 3 foot rise in water levels would submerge most of the beach front around every island and displace people and businesses, so they are trying to lead by example.

Red State Republicans and short sighted me-first fundamentalists will do their best to burn extra fossil fuels, offsetting any energy conservation savings the 50th state is able to muster.

HFD Surf Boards

While sitting at breakfast at Wailana's one morning, we saw a large HFD yellow hook and ladder truck turn through the intersection. On the back, was a large yellow long board.

I wonder if the San Diego or LA FDs require surf training as well?

Kawabonga dude. =)

Beware the Penguins

Why the Hilton Hawaiian Village has penguins, is impossible to know. The Japanese tourists, and children (yea! let's take our toddlers on vacation to Hawaii! They won't remember it!!) appear to enjoy seeing these flightless birds.

In the tropical heat & humidity, their feces do give off a pungent smell, even though an unfortunate Hilton employee gets to hose out their pen each night. mmmmm

Cuisinart for 2? Nope

Our Hilton hotel room had this little Cuisinart coffee maker, it's supposed to be able to do 2 cups at the same time. We'd seen this type before in Sedona at the Hilton there where we stayed with "Hhonor points" back in August for our 22nd anniversary, and it didn't work so well, but hope springs eternal.
As you can see from the attached photo on the left, the pathetic little pump could not put out enough water to equally fill two cups, making one cup of coffee to the left and one sad & weak "espresso" to the right. The next day, when I went to make a single cup of hot tea, it overflowed the single cup with the residual leftover water, making a nice mess, despite switching the little toggle on the top of the maker to "1".

If you're looking for a cute, inexpensive, little dual coffee maker, avoid Cuisinart. This made-in-China model is junk, sample size n = 2. If you encounter one in a hotel room, be wary, and expect it to malfunction.

Clueless Japanese Hipsters in Hawaii, part II

Last week, I began to recount the asinine / random / bizarre sayings that I noticed on Japanese tourist's attire in Honolulu. The photo to the left does in fact say
- "RED HOT CHERRY LITTLE WOLF NUTS" (don't Google that)

Other sayings, that we saw during the rest of the week there, included:

- Sugar and Spice and Mysterious
(on a 50-something year old Japanese woman)


- Blue Bird Product (the kind you don't want squirted on your shoulder?)

- Love World Colors Happiness (that was at least a pleasant one)

- Black Black Black (on a pink T-shirt worn by a 30-something year old gold digger)

- Nothing Like Sexy Little Sunset (seen outside a Versace store on a decked out Japanese female shopper)

- Keeps Running. Me Do Not Defeat. Cold Town. (Seriously, did they pull these out of a hat??)

Since I am no longer in Hawaii, I will not start my own blog dedicated to mocking these misuses of language, like Hanzi Smatter has done <-- very funny stuff!

Breakfast reflections, coconut Syrup, mmmm

Since embracing Ron & Steve's low carb / high protein mode of eating, I've begun savings the egg cartons - ostensibly to "sound proof the torture room I am building in the garage"... living in a red state, I keep hearing how torture is the best way to keep the country safe, and I always put "country first" like my diminutive Sr. Senator's campaign slogan stated. Never know when you might need a few dozen cartons, and relatives and co-workers' kids are always having school projects.

However, when traveling to Hawaii, getting a omelet at the hotel cost $26 - Ouch! So Dr Desert Flower and I found Wailana's Coffee House, the Best Place to get breakfast on Waikiki, in my humble opinion for breakfast.





For less than an $18 bill, Dr Desert Flower and I could get all the coffee & pancakes we wanted, bacon, eggs, french toast, awesome service, all just a short walk across a busy intersection away from the Hilton Hawaiian Village. Oh, but for $26 each, we could get the 'international buffet' at "Bali by the Sea, Paradise Cafe", and for another $6 each, we could get coffee OR fruit juice. Give me a break! Breakfast at the Sheraton was $55 a piece, in 1999 dollars, but that included Mimosas & Champagne.

At Wailana's I learned the joy of coconut syrup on pancakes. Yes, I know it is Not low carb by any means, but WOW is it delicious. I've not seen fresh coconut syrup outside of Hawaii. I think it's even yummier than the white powder sugar based frosting we used to paint onto cut-out Christmas cookies as a kid, and that stuff I used to lick right out of the bowl until I got a head rush (akin to the white frosting that toaster strudels come with). If you ever have a chance
to try fresh coconut syrup, don't pass it up. Or, if you're prone to addiction... maybe you should =)

University of Hawaii Lyon Arboretum

University of Hawaii Lyon Arboretum
Thanks to our friend Paul Rodes for sending us this Amazing gem. The Lyon Arboretum at the University of Hawaii is AMAZING! A tropical rain forest, with palms, and orchids, and ferns as big as a car, and centuries old fig trees, and Macaws and McCalls and parrots and Cocteaux that sing to into the forest sounding like children laughing, children screaming, sometimes sounding like small animals being eaten... a wonderful hike up into the volcanically contoured tropical country-side. We would have NEVER found it without Paul's awesome directions and links, here (first), here (trails), here (brochure) and here.

Mosquito repellent is Strongly advised. I dosed myself in factor 60 SPF, but it was un-necessary as you are below canopy for the entire hike. Paul did it with a toddler in a backpack. Dr Desert Flower and I did it with less than an hour to spare before the garden closed at 4pm (she was being a responsible scientist, and attending afternoon sessions at ASHG on cancer & personalized medicine & such... so the arboretum was a bonus. Dress for sweating, getting a lil muddy, and seeing some of the most amazing plants (some Dr. Seuss like) ever!

Merci M.RODES!!

To keep the rats from climbing the trees...

near eateries, and public entrances, and nicer establishments, many of the palm trees have metallic collars.

I was not sure why, so I asked a bartender - he told me it is to keep the rats from climbing the trees. Ew. Not wanting to believe him, 2 days later, I asked a group of 3 cops (the ones watching the beach with binoculars), and they told me the same thing. I've not seen a rat, but near Arizona Memorial I DID see a fully laden palm that had at least 2 dozen coconuts on it - lots of places to hide and succulent fruit to eat, if the rats can gnaw off the nuts, get them to fall on the concrete & break open. The large holes in he collars are from the professional tree climbers who keep unsuspecting tourists free of the danger of falling coconuts.

More photos t0 follow later... trapped in my camera without my adaptor in-pocket to download.

Things I Learned, Boogieboarding on Waikiki

- the Hilton's waves are all protected by breakwaters, and the HPD doesn't want you to go out there (they watch with binoculars from shore) so its best to walk down to the Royal Hawaiian (the Pink one) and the Sheraton, where there's no breakwaters, and the waves are better.

- when looking for someone on shore who can watch your "stuff" while you go out in the surf, and you're a middle aged man, opt for the 2 heavy set mainlander women who are sitting under an umbrella with a cooler nearby and a pile of Coors Light empties around said cooler. This is, as opposed to, the 2 young ladies your son's age who were speaking French and smoking, while sunning themselves in suits they last wore in St.Tropez. The older mainlanders will be happy you stopped to talk to them, and they ain't leavin' before the cooler is empty.

- coral is sharp. Wear the Columbia Footwear velcro'ed all-terrain trackers you brought, that you absentmindedly left near the Coors light cooler and umbrella.

- those 3 scientists, standing in knee high water, 100 yards off shore (the Indian guy, the pasty hairy (probably Jewish) guy, and the mom in the one piece, who are talking about patients and mouse models) are strangely enjoying the 8 foot waves that nearly knock them over as an out-washing rip-tide wave meets an incoming wave, and they crash above the heads of the Indian and pasty-curly-black-haired guy

- when you try and catch the next 6 to 8 ft wave and ride it on your boogie board, you will be invariably knocked sideways by the same type of rip-tide cross-shore wave that was bludgeoning the 3 scientists, 20 yards away

- when there's a huge tropical storm a few hundred miles offshore, it whips up some hellacious waves

- when you head back to shore, after an hour, you'll notice that you're now more than 200 yards down the shore away from the umbrella and cooler and (now) crocked heavyset women who have nearly emptied it. Your glasses and room key and swim goggles are still there.

- when you are walking back to your hotel, and you get stuck in the middle of an English Garden Club ladies' vacation tour, the word "Bugger" will be heard from these ladies' mouths, approx every 30 seconds, as in "Tell him to bugger off", "if he doesn't appreciate you, he can bugger himself", "Oh bugger!" etc. ...sort of like "Keeping Up Appearances" meets "South Park".

Remole Tuscana - eh

When you're stuck at an Over Priced Hilton Resort, and your wife is at a 7 to 9pm genetics meeting with her boss, so you eat at the so-so Italian Restaurant in the Hilton Village, get the $26 bottle of Remole Toscana. It's a weak blend of cabernet & sangiovese that will not wow you, or present strong tannins or berry flavors (as the wine list promised) but it will be a good friend as you drink it the rest of the night, attempting to futile connect in the humid 85 degree F (and 95% RH) air at the lobby bar to the over-worked, poorly resourced wireless connection that every scientist in a 100 ft radius is trying to camp upon. It also serves as a good primer for the rest of the evening. I'm on vacation, I'm not going to bed before 10pm again!

The Remole, is a mediocre wine, reminiscent of a mild Loire valle French red that I'd recommend to those who hate red wine and who dont want to get a head ache or have too strong of a wine. Who ever wrote the wine list at "Salvadore's Table" should be fed to the sharks after being drawn quartered with city buses, Oli Oli, Lea Lea, and Polynesian Tour buses, tied to each limb. Don't get me wrong, I Love the Loire valley, it produces alot of good, mild, red wines. That's just not what the Remole was promoted as, by the wine list. They did have a 1998 Chateaux Margaux, but I am not a sr vice president of anything... nor is Dr Desert Flower, to be able to afford $600 a bottle. '98 WAS a VERY good year... but $600 is a 'bit rich for my veins'.

At least the lethargic waitress recorked it, wrapped up the bottle and let me take it out of the restaurant 1/2 empty. And we got to see a sunset, without a table reservation, and it didn't cost us $99 a piece for a lack-luster Luau ("we've got roast beef, pork, fish, and roast beef, and your starches" ... the manager described to me.. mmmmm can I splurge, and pay $100 instead? No thanks!)

Having given up on the humid open air lobby impotent wireless, I'm back in the room on the company provided ($16 a day, cha-ching) wired connection. Remole is almost finished... time for a $10 hula girl!!

(was meant to be posted 12 hours ago, but the wireless lobby network and the wired room cnnection both epically failed last night)

"Mo" Disappointed

Today I intended to make a WWII Hawaii memorial tour, visiting the USS Arizona, first sunk on Dec 7th 1941, the USS Oklahoma Museum (capsized and sunk Dec 7th) USS Bowfin Submarine Museum that sank dozens of Japanese ships, and the battleship USS Missouri, where the Japanese surrendered ending WWII (and where Steven Seagal was a cook too!). I fully expected to spend the bulk of the day on the Mighty Mo... touring it's many decks... only to find out.. she entered dry dock on October 14th and will not be open to the public again until 2010! The Oklahoma museum is also closed, while the Missouri is in dry dock.. ugh!

Note here, on the page that tells you when the ship is open, how obvious it is, that she's in dry dock and closed. Grrrrr.

The Arizona was a somber memorial, and the visitors to it, lo and behold, were 98% non-Japanese - as opposed to the rest of the island, where it's 60 to 75% Japanese. One of my distant family members went down with the ship on Dec 7th when the forward magazine was penetrated by an armour piercing dive bomb. I did not know I had any extended family members aboard.
The Bowfin was a roomy, spacious sub, after visiting the U505 at Chicago's Field Museum many times. The Germans sure knew how to pack-in a ton of equipment into a tiny space efficiently. The American Bowfin, co missioned in 1942 and LOADED with GE gauges, lights, control panels, and motors could have easily displaced two U505s.

Drinking in Hawaii

Dr Desert Flower is busy working today. I am not. I AM sick of Dewars (white label). If I never drink Dewars again, that'll be fine. It's not made me sick or anything, I am just "sick of it" after 3 days of sipping it through a Kelty water bottle, poolside, on ice.

Here in Hawaii, there is NO SHORTAGE of cool drinks, and ways to separate tourists from their dollars. Sunday night, a helpful & enabling bartender introduced us to the HLS "Hawaiian Leg Spreader" - Stoli 100, Chambord, Pineapple juice, sour mix, it was yummy. Monday night, it was the Chi Chi - coconut creme liquor, vodka, and pineapple juice. Tuesday night, was my favorite so far - the Hula Girl. A "Hula Girl" is, one shot vodka, one shot Couvoissier, on ice, passion/orange juice, grand marnier - DAMN tasty! Shaken, not stirred. There's no shortage of rum drinks here as well (Arrgh, pirates & rum!) but rum tends to give me a bolt-gun-to-the-forehead head-ache afterwards.

On the Dewars comment, I am somewhat of a Markers Mark fan (note, Christmas approaches) but here in Hawaii, they want like $20 for a lil pint of it at the ABC store. $20 a pint? And $60 for a 750ml of Hennesey cognac... more than 2X what I am used to paying in Phoenix . Remember, whiskey has ALL of its calories BOUND to the alcohol, so it is actually zero carb!! =)

OH - and to the VP of Caris Pharma stuck in Phoenix, your "crew" misses you (Dr D.Flower asked I insert that here).