Hoppin' Friday night in Waialua

Hi All,
Well, it's a hoppin big Friday night on the N. Shore. All the local kids are congregated at the one light on the bathroom building of the beachpark 3 doors down. Probably just waiting for the cockfights to get going. Tom, i'll try to restrain myself from throwing down a benjamin when I hear the bloodthirsty crowd send up a cheer for the victorious fowl.

We just got back from "town" (Honolulu) where we went to Gordon Biersh for dinner.
Not bad. As a cultural diversion we went to the top of Aloha tower which, though thrilling, pales by comparison to many of the towers in the world you probably have been on or in.
All in all, the girls were not that impressed with the scene at Aloha Tower Marketplace.
My takeaways from today:
1) The Euro is strong, I think a german speaking tour company would do well here these days, though that is probably not news to you if you have been skiing already this year.
2) Although the Yen is not strong, all the shops still cater to the Japanese tourists and are therefore completely empty. Some poor old store clerk lady who spoke only broken english looked really pissed when we didn't buy a super ugly one piece bathing suit that would have fit Shelby that was only $40. It was kinda like, "Well, I walked all the way from around my counter over here to this rack with one girls size suit on it, pulled it off the rack AND held it up for you in all it's pink out of style ugliness, so the least you could do is buy the damn thing you selfish haoule's." Well aloha to you too, sweetie but no thanks. (oops, i'm channelling Dennis Leery now, sorry.)
3) Gordon Biersch can still make a decent hefeweizen.
4) The Island is crowded once you get out of Wialua.
5) If Weatherstone lost it's rep per Steve's note, then the rep was sadly undeserved in the first place.
6) KoKee frogs suck. In fact, a buddy of mine that lives "in town" sells for the YellowPages here and lives in Hilo once a year for two months. Apparently the place is completely infested with those little buggars, and Jim was 100% right. Like every unwanted "foreign" pest here, it will surely someday make it's way around the islands and ruin someones sleep very near to here. Until then, I have the roosters, doves, finches, crickets and geckos to sub-in for them.
7) Everything is expensive here. Milk: $6.49 a gallon; Life Cereal: $6.89 a box (on sale!) Charmin Toilet paper: $6.49 for a 6 roll bag. Yes people, it's even expensive to crap in Hawaii. I for one, will be engineering an extra fold into my routine somehow and will have to have a chat with the girls about the ginormous wads that they have become accustomed to. Consider it my contribution to curbing global deforrestation while not completely depleting the college fund.
8) Bottled water (unbranded) was 5.99 for a case...not too bad. But then, I look at the receipt and there's a $1.20 charge for HI Bev. deposit and another $.24 for Hi Bev. fee. Whatever.
9) Male hula dancers working a welcome line for a booze cruize look like they would give almost anything to not be male hula dancers doing that. One of them actually did a giant YAWN in the middle of one of the girls' routines. I guess it was kinda like the farm team for Germaine's "too good to miss" Luau or something and let's just say that it was clear that they were already out of the playoffs.

and FINALLY

10) Its 80 degrees, the sun shines here and it sets over palm trees, the turquoise water laps at the golden sand and it makes everything else OK.

Oh, and I found a fishin' buddy. He's got a little boat, which will be nice on the fuel, works for Avaia one month on one month off (sounds like a pretty good gig to me) and hopefully we'll figure out a way to get out and get some fish.
G-nite.
B.