Tuesday, December 29, 2009

Final Post of 2009



It has arrived, dear reader, the hour, that me quits blogging for the year. Not that I have to refocus all my energy tending the pakalolo farm. Not that I'd be too busy fishing for the Hawaiian salmon in our city's glorious Ala Wai canal. But the other kind stuff. From the staff and management of Hotel Waikiki, aloha, with a huge mahalo, and until we meet again....

The Eye of the Beholder


Since I'm all pau (finish) with the end-of-the-year plumbing repairs, I'm able to direct my full attention to prettying up the computer and its accouterments. Minus well start off with the computer monitor. I bought these cleaning wipes at Office Depot and the monitor is now so spanking clean that it befalls upon me to issue an all points bulletin alerting visitors to not visit this blog nakid because I can now see your every pimple on the other side of the monitor screen in more detail than a full-body imaging machine at the airport.

Speaking of full-body imaging machines for homeland security, there are 40 of these mechanical peeping toms located at 19 airports nationwide. There might be nothing to fear from the machines themselves, but fact that humans operate the machines is something to be wary off for obvious reasons. When would the screener of nudes transform into a pervert, or on the other extreme, sue homeland security for their impotence. Also, how if a terrorist bundles up his explosives in plastic wrap and swallows it as drug mules have been known to do except here with a ticking detonator intact? I surmise that full-body imaging machines haven't been stationed at every single airport yet because our legislators would have to endure the same explicit screen checks and that just won't do. Susan Hallowell, director of the TSA's security laboratory, volunteered to be the model in the well-known image below. My own suggestion is that they limit the security photos from the passengers' necks down to retain a semblance of anonymity as that's where explosives have been hidden in past incidents. What's that old joke that if you're ever caught naked in front of a camera? Don't panic and cover your genitals with your hands, instead hide your face.

    




Here, help yourself to some kleenix.

Monday, December 28, 2009

Monday's Tub Overflow Plate


Alan writes:

How did you get a plate with one (screw) hole to affix to an overflow designed for two screws?

The replacement plate with its single hole comes with an adapter in the package. The adapter has two holes which you screw onto the tub with the two old screws. Next you screw the new plate to the adapter through the adapter's third center hole and that interfaces the old with the new. A single show screw keeps things more sanitary and easier to clean, since debris and mold tend to gather in the indentations on the phillips screw heads which is almost impossible to scrub out without using a toothbrush. Btw, the screws I use are stainless steel and will never corrode and bind and end up breaking off. I've done that already. They actually get stainless steel overflow plates which last a life time at a plumbing stores but I'll get there someday.


Unlike you, I don't have a whirlpool jacuzzi in the master bathroom, so the overflow drain on my tub is a necessity of life as much as the tub itself. Then a female guest of Hotel Waikiki misplaced the rubber plug for the tub's drain. There went the pleasure of soaking my aching ass in the tub. I simply wasn't able to find the right size rubber drain plug at the hardware store. My tub doesn't have an internal stopper. The mistake-proof method is to take your worn out rubber plug with you to the store and visually match it up with it's replacement. All the rubber drain plugs that I purchased were either a smidgen too large and wouldn't fit at all, or a little to little in diameter to effectively seal off the water in a filled tub from receding which when you thunk about it is kinda stupid lying in an empty tub with your fleet of toy boats moored at low tide. On occasion, I've even tried utilizing a malleable cellulose sponge to plug up the tub's drain. Then finally....screw this. Too much trouble. As you can see by the photo above, the tub's old overflow plate has deteriorated with age beyond repair. Last week I had to snake the bathroom drain and this is done through the overflow valve. You can't thread a plumbing snake through the drain on the floor of the tub unless your coiled snake is the narrower guage. When I tried to refasten the overflow plate, the screw went right through the old plate.

Sunday, December 27, 2009

The Duomo of Waikiki

8 AM and Slightly Voggy


It looks like vog from the volcano. Then again, the haze might be residual smog from all the extra driving people did for Xmas shopping.

Saturday, December 26, 2009

Furloughed Elfs

December 26th


*a few snow flakes but other than dat.




I ran into David again at the beach.



It's been my experience that these beach lockers are difficult to come by. I've applied for a rental on a few occasions in the past, and as always, been told in an almosted irritated voice on the other end of the phone line, that there's absolutely no vacancies available. Perhaps there's a lively sublease market. Dunno. There's several locker stations located under the pavilions that front the beach. Originally, meant for chess players to store away their equipment which replaced the wooden lockers where renters provided their own locks and keys. I surmise as a reflection of the down economy, renters have been delinquent with the rental fees and the City has resorted to posting  impoundment notices onto just about every locker station. 



I dunno about the coffee (Seattle's Best) or the WiFi reception, but the seating section provides more leg room than most outdoor cafes.



This part of Ohua Avenue, adjacent to the Seattle's Best coffee shop, happens to have one of the most spacious sidewalks in the entire Waikiki town.

Thursday, December 24, 2009

Snow Storm


I usually take a break from blogging during the final 2-weeks of the year during the holiday season, but for some reason I went pass the deadline this year. However, today's post might represent my final post for 2009 and thus prepare yourself for the inevitable and cataclysmic end of the world that is sure to follow in its wake. You heard that right. If I stop blogging, the world ends, for everyone, including you. You have been officially forewarned.


Before I forget to mention, I was on TypePad for 4½ years which bestowed upon it's paying subscribers, a "new and improved" blogging editor software, which proved to be the equivalent of wisemen bearing a gift of a mango, barely washed off after the fruit dropped from the tree onto a steaming heap of dog shit, but why waste a perfectly ripen mango. Thankyou, TypePad. Subsequently, I'm now on Blogger having unsubscribed from TypePad due to the resident glitches entrenched on the TypePad's compose-post page.

Wednesday, December 23, 2009

Traffic Advisory


They're resurfacing sections of the Ala Wai Blvd. this week, and there's bumper to bumper gridlock as far as the eye can see. I stopped by the apartment over an hour ago, and it's still not worth leaving at 11 o'clock. If the traffic jam doesn't subside soon, I just might have to dock myself a few hours of pay. Would you happen to know who it was that said never do today what you can do tomorrow? Did they know what they were talking about or were they drinking 40-ouncers at a bus stop.

Wednesday on the Ala Wai



I just signed up for this feature from Google Maps, so you're on your own as far as navigating abouts.

*Oh, oh....there's arrows (chevrons) on the "yellow beacon line" and double-clicking on the arrows will drive you further back or further forth from the reference point (will it?? Seems so.)   It turns out that you don't have to click on the yellow beacon line or the arrows (chevrons), themselves, for a virtual drive through....just double-click on the street as far back or forth as you're able to see. An oval graphic should appear, but if not, move your mouse around until an oval does appear, then double-click. Street names labeled onto the yellow beacon line will block this feature on the section they're on, however. I'm getting better at it already. It's better if you align the camera angle of the street in the general direction of how you would drive down it, but you could just as well adjust the angle to passenger view, or for that matter, hop on the bed of a pickup truck. Why stop there, you can actually take yourself for a personal tour around greater Waikiki by "driving" through the side streets, after first lining up the side street, by rotating the window the usual way. You will have to left-click on the window for the "yellow beacon line" to appear. But you already knew that.*

How to Toast Bagels

For lack of a toaster, I tossed these cinnamon raisan bagels into the oven because I've heard bagels aren't as tasty eaten at room temperature, and if your toaster doesn't happen to work, then it's 400° for 5-minutes in the oven. At 1 AM in the morning, btw. Why at 1 AM in the morning? Because at that hour I'm the leader of the free world. Insomina, you know. If they had their act together and shipped enough christmas trees to hawaii, I might be baking up bagel ornaments for the evergreen. At any rate, it seems like every toaster I've ever owned over the years start to malfunction after the 200.5th toast. Buy a new toaster, and the same freakin thing happens all over again. For that matter, the same thing happens with all my electric can openers as well, at least, that's been my experience. However, talk about delicious. The bagels.

Tuesday, December 22, 2009

Santa for the Ages


via Odds and Ends

Morning Photo


I just peeked outside and I'm glad to report that there's no snow to shovel off of the driveway. Have you ever taken notice yourself that some dogs walk along sides their owners in unison, while other dogs play lead dog and pull their owners. For the lead dog type of personality, the owner should have brought a skateboard and receive a free tow. A sled would work. (more later) No, really....

via Small Reflections

Sunday, December 20, 2009

Senate Live

Odds are that you're not watching live the vote on the health care reform bill as I am, 1 AM Washington DC time, or for that matter, would entertain the slightest notion to do so on a Saturday night. FYI, I just happened to have the tv tuned to a station that was broadcasting the vote. "The motion is agreed upon," proclaims the Senate proclaimer, for all the health insurance reform bill's humanitarian motives and lofty ambitions. The greater of jubilations is that the Senators can get ready to adjourn the final congressional session of the year and hop on the next flight back to their home states and commence their winter recess, and perhaps read the 2000-page bill that they just passed, talk about pre-existing conditions.

That said, ma fellow americans, senators are only human, who entitled to health insurance for life, are doing their bestest looking out for the welfare of the people of our great nation. WTF, the entire 40 Republican member contingent in the Senate voted against the health care reform bill. Am I incorrect in assuming that had the same bill been a Republican sponsered legislation, written word for word, 40 Republicans would then have voted, just as vehemently, in favor of it's passage. Don't get me wrong, the Democrats are no slouches in their own right either and deserve credit where credit is due especially in allowing a lone senator, Joe Libeirman, to hold the health care insurance reform bill hostage. This brooches the question, doesn't it, of whether Santa is a Democrat or Republican? See, if you're a Republican and Santa Claus is a Democrat, you don't get a present, and vis-a-versa. Just having some fun.

Random Thought

Just wondering, but is there still anyone who surfs the World Wide Web without using "tabs" on their browser page? While using Opera below, the first tab (yellow arrow) is active which is my homepage, while the four other tabs to the right are on standby with four other websites already loaded. If a given webpage takes forever to load up, I simply switch to another "tab" and check back later on the slow poke site. If by chance you're unfamiliar with "tab browsing," you might want to enlarge the photo.

Saturday, December 19, 2009

Friday, December 18, 2009

Since There Weren't Any Snowflakes to Eat

Thin crust as usual. ®Red Baron brand. On sale for $4.00. It's not meant for dinner. Just pupus (hors d'Å“uvre). Is it only with me or do pizzas always appear larger in the freezer section at the store. Then after you get home and take the same pizza out of its box, it somehow shrunk in size upon closer examination? Apparently, there's no truth in packaging. The pizza's box isn't oversized but the glossy photograph of the pizza printed onto the front of the box is twice as large as the real pizza's actual size which is what's misleading to the misleadable.

R.I.P., Universal Health Care


It defies belief that Joe Lieberman was actually the Democrat's vice-presidential nominee in 2000. Had the 2000 presidential election not been stolen from Al Gore, Joe Lieberman might have been the president today.

Lieberman told Senate Majority Harry Reid that he’d join Republicans in filibustering the Senate health care reform bill if it included either a public insurance option or a provision allowing people ages 55 to 64 to buy into Medicare.

Thursday, December 17, 2009

Ketchup Bottle on Lanai Railing


While I'm practicing my photography skills, I might as well shoot a subject that accomplishes something instead of just sits there. "Waste nought, want nought," is the secondary theme.

Big News: The Simpsons celebrates its 20th anniversary today.


da Ohana....and would you believe it, the longest-running prime time entertainment TV show in America.

Wednesday, December 16, 2009

Global Warming

Fear not, dear reader, for I've been tracking the global warming situation with the device below strategically placed on my lanai railing. If I detect dane gah, I'll issue a worldwide alert, and I know, there's no lack of street prophets on the Internet.

You know the temperature knob on a gas oven. I scrubbed the numbers off of it. The knob's clean.  However, setting the oven temperature without calibrations is pure guesswork. If you remember when I tried to dry off my wooden knife block by tossing it into the oven and it warped and ended up separated at the seams. My brand new oven temperature guage might reduce re-occurance of things like dat. Also, I've been seriously contemplating getting into baking. Cookies and pies for snacks. What prompted the endeavor was the high prices of potato chips and even tortilla chips at the grocery store if you haven't noticed yourself. For what you pay for a bag of chips nowadays, you could use the same money to buy lobster.

Voggy Sunset

Do You Like Mountain Dew?

Santa Ornament

Tuesday, December 15, 2009

These Kids of Mines Forever Forgetting to Tie up Their Pet

Irrelevant, LOL


Before the advent of Twitter, there were diaries. *How was it, if a huge tree falls in the middle of a forest with no one around, does it still make a sound?

By 2015, healthcare costs will hit $4 trillion and account for 20 percent of the US economy.


This political cartoon applies aptly to Congress in general, and they're bungling of health care reform bill in particular.



It's almost childiss that the issues of public option and abortion funding could stall the health care reform bill in its tracks. I say remove abortion funding from the bill with a stipulation that health insurance companies still offer separate abortion insurance, together with free birth control pills and rubber cocks to Americans who might need coverage for unplanned parenthood. That is, make abortion coverage an add-on item. On the other hand, if the objections to abortion funding is due to abortion being offensive and contrary to religious beliefs than the constitutional guarantee of separation of church and state should be invoked to settle the matter.

That said, IMHO, the public option (universal coverage) should remain intact in the health reform bill. Here's my own reasons: There are plenty people on disability or gov't assistance living in my building whom receive free medical among other of life's necessities. If they scraped together enough money to buy themselves a car, they would be then entitled to free car insurance with their purchase paid for by the state. Meanwhile, everybody between billionaire and disability recepients are at whim of the health insurance providers. Spending as a whole on health insurance will go up. However, that fact is a bit decieving. The reason why the total goes up is that mathematically a larger number of people will be covered under a gov't option and overall there's more premiums in the kitty. People will be universally covered for catasthropic illnesses that otherwise would lead to bankruptcy, the same protection legislated in a health care reform bill with it's for members only policy. Theoretically, the individual's bill for health insurance should drop because like anything and everything else where there's a higher volume involved, for example, like the price of a Jack-in-the-Box hamburger.

Harnesting the Sea Breezes

I wasn't aware that there were wind generators stationed in the ocean. The windmills below are off the coast of Denmark. An obvious advantage is that the windmills don't take up land space. In all likelihood the same people who build offshore oil drilling rigs construct the sea-based windmills, I surmise, utilizing the same method of towing the upper structure to the site. The only difference is that I don't think the wind generators could be moored in very deep water.

Monday, December 14, 2009

Random Internet Photos


*Just another example why you shouldn't believe everything that's posted on the Internet. This picture originates from a doughnut blog, but the contents in the package are cherrios instead of minaturized doughnuts. Yeah, it took me a while.*


Dress Rehersal


*Video taken by Cloudia of Comfort Spiral. What's amazing is that she took the video with a Fuji FinePix A220 ($89 at Walmart) which has been described on camera review sites "as barebones as it can get." "Barebones" might be meant for a limited range of adjustment options on the camera, but obviously, it doesn't apply to the cability of the lens, itself. Also, the camera allows you to zoom in while in video mode which is not a feature available on all compact cameras as far as I know. I still can't get over the relative high resolution of the video on a YouTube video even without enabling the HQ option. My compact camera cost me over twice as much as Cloudia's Fuji A220 and its videos were never as sharp. Goes to show you that price doesn't always equate to "better." And you're correct that perhaps I really don't know everything about using cameras, but that's for another post.

Sunday, December 13, 2009

Saxophone Guy on the Ala Wai canal


On a quiet Sunday afternoon, why not entertain the neighborhood by playing your saxophone? Christmas songs? "Is it christmas time?" Yea, it is. I guess the saxophone player wasn't aware.

"The fireworks show at the start of the Honolulu Marathon will be twice as long this year." (Honolulu Star-Bulletin)

Saturday, December 12, 2009

Pre-Race Day for the the 2009 Honolulu Marathon


da finish line for tomorrow's Honolulu Marathon from about a 100-yards away. Whew.



And the Winner of the 2009 Honolulu Marathon is..... Tomorrow's race participants hamming it up.



Just look at the size of the lens on this guy's camera.



Late afternoon.

Surfing the....

*video updates to latest recorded heats. Just hit your browser's refresh button.

*video has sound on.

it's amazing how they're ripping Sunset Beach waves....in a later portion of the video.

Friday, December 11, 2009

Then, There's....


more here.

Bears Are Going Bald at German Zoo


story here.

Are We There Yet Honolulu Marathon's Arch de Triumph

When a marathon is shown on tv, for example, the NYC marathon, you tend to focus on the mass of participants as they are on the day of the race. In contrast, when the marathon's run in your neck of the woods with the finish line just a few blocks from your house, at least, I, start to feel their pain. That is, the pain of preparing for a 26.2 mile marathon weeks in advance. Perhaps months in advance. What's it amount to, logging in 2600 miles pre-race practice mileage? How many miles before you have to retread a running shoe. Then the runners have to catch a plane all the way to Hawaii for the Honolulu Marathon. Thereafter catch the plane back home, and as a bonus, work the next day, if there's no balance remaining of their vacation days, because naturally they have to start saving up for next year's Honolulu marathon. Same place, same time? "Time," as in, race time.

Did You Do This?


Lazy asses, just leave their shopping carts in the parking lot.



Instead, they should lay the cart down on its side so that it doesn't roll around and ding nearby cars.