I'm on a roll with these great weekends. Keep your fingers crossed that this trend continues.

Saturday morning Kevin & I went down to the main part of Waikiki beach so that he could go surfing. The waves were decent and it was crowded, but not horribly so. I set myself up in the usual spot near the water next to the catamaran people and embarked on a bit of people watching and sunning.

The couple who owns the catamaran had with them two of their children, a boy about 7 and a girl about 3. The girl, Malama, is fearless and just a joy to watch. (I've written before about how much happiness I get from watching little kids at the beach.)

If you've ever been to Waikiki, you know that the boat owners blow their conch shells and call people to the boats for a ride. This guy, a local guy with a huge afro like a halo, has this amazing deep voice that he can project probably back into Manoa Valley from the beach. "BOOOOWWWWWT RIDES. ONEHOURSAIL. BOOOOOOOOOWWWWWWWWWTTT RIDES." Malama thinks it's a hoot when her dad does this, and she echoes him in her little-girl voice: "bowrise! bowrise!"

Her brother set down one of his surfboards on the sand, and she was playing at surfah girl, moving up and down the board like a pro. I told her father about the little girl I had seen in a keiki contest about two years ago, who caught a wave about 100 yards out on a longboard that had to be 12 feet long -- herself being about 3 feet tall -- and rode that sucker all the way in to the beach. (I'll find that picture later today and get it scanned and posted.) He said he'd been working with her a little bit, and will probably get her started surfing for real in the water this winter when the waves are a little smaller.

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I spent Saturday afternoon lounging around the house doing nothing in particular -- most notably NOT working on this page or cleaning up the back room or straightening out my filing or pulling the stray grass out of the flowerbeds. I love having those kinds of afternoons, when it's just me and the couch and a book or magazine to skim through and a kitten to snuggle with while Kevin got ready for work. He took off midafternoon and I headed out to Safeway and Blockbuster.

I wish we had some other decent video stores nearby. All the mom & pop places are out of business or have gone over to strictly "adult" videos. Blockbuster has a decent selection, but they are outrageously priced and so overly corporate that I hate to have to do business with them. New releases are $4.79, which is a good dollar more than on the mainland and more than a matinee movie in a real theater. The stuff on the new release shelf is not necessarily all that new. Kids came out in the theaters before I moved to Hawaii four years ago -- it's still on the new release shelf.

The only redeeming factor is that I have a bunch of gift cards and free movie cards that I've received through MyPoints and Discover Card Rewards, so my movie rentals don't cost me anything at all most of the time.

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Yesterday was another good day. We ended up sleeping in instead of going to the beach, but after a big breakfast headed down to the beach at the Hilton Hawaiian Village to watch the end of the men's Molokai to Oahu outrigger canoe race, called Molokai Hoe. One of Kevin's coworkers raced for Rai Tahiti, which came in third out of 106 canoes. (He's on the right in the picture accompanying this article.)

The race is 41 miles across one of the roughest channels in the world. They were reporting swells up to twelve feet yesterday morning, and the sun was blazing. We watched the first half of the boats come in, including teams from Hungary, Germany, Japan, Canada, and New York, in addition to the usual local culprits and the obvious non-Hawaii boats from California and Tahiti and other Pacific islands.

We ran into my friend Jackie from bookgroup, who paddled the women's race over the same course two weeks ago. The fact anyone can paddle 41 miles across open ocean and not completely collapse upon hitting the beach amazes me.

After the race, we ended up back home long enough to decide we wanted to see a movie, so it was back to Waikiki to see Almost Famous. (This link was not working as of posting time, but is listed on the Dreamworks SKG site as being legit.) I saw it a couple of weeks ago with Sharon, but wanted to see it again, and Kevin hadn't seen it yet. I highly recommend it.

We rode home in the rain and made some pizza for dinner and watched Dark Angel, which I had taped last week. I'll say again how good it was, considering that the Fox promos made it look pretty dopey.

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Of course last week we had the season premiere of That '70s Show , which was every bit as good as I expected. The most fun for me is watching the sets for things my family or people I know used to have in their houses and on their persons. The wallpaper in the Foreman's kitchen is strikingly similar to the wallpaper I had in my bedroom when I was three. The wallpaper in the Pinciatti's kitchen is just like that my friend Lora's parents had somewhere in their house -- either their kitchen or Lora's room, I can't recall, but I know I saw it there.
- posted by Lori @ 4:33:00 PM | permanent link | |