Busy Sunday

 I got my practice in but with all the futzing around and then practice, I didn't go to bed until 7AM. This is going in the wrong direction entirely. 

I woke up around 2 and for some reason the temple doesn't have their service on YouTube. Maybe they'll put it on later. It's really nice when I'm up early enough to lie in bed and listen to it live. 

I'm really glad I got that shelf cleared and the plug-ins cabinet re-organized. I always feel good when I get something like that accomplished. 

I took a look at Reddit and someone mentioned the Berger auditorium as a vaccination site. I looked it up and it's really close to here. I planned an itinerary... 

First, I rode over to the Berger auditorium where some workers in front told me they're vaccinating 8AM to 4:30PM. They said I need to make an appointment but I said I hadn't been having any luck with the programs and might come around at the end of the day and see if there are leftover shots. 

Then I rode on Oakland Road to the golf course and on a whim went in. I rode up to the end where the pro shop and snack bar were, but I looked over the very limited menu and decided I wasn't quite up to paying $10 for a hot dog. Two guys were at a nearby table with a dog. "Hold the leash" one guy said, and walked away from the table, and the dog followed. "Good job of holding the leash...." he said to his friend. Friend said he didn't hear him. I piped up and said he had indeed said "Hold the leash" but he had said it very casually so it may have been hard to hear. We all had a laugh and the guys play-bickered as friends often do. Something about the one guy fitting in everywhere and with everyone. "Like a puzzle piece" the other guy said. 

I rode to H Mart for sake, a package of egg rolls, and got a tall can of Stella Artois and stashed things away in the bike bag. I rode over to Fry's and locked the bike up and went in. I had to sign in/out and didn't see many names on the sheet. I looked around and it was pretty comical. They had the pots and pans and stuff from their little cafe, that had been used for years. All kinds of used stuff. The prices were not great and in some cases barely lower than the new price. The place was really picked-over too. 

Then I went over to the storage because Ken wanted me to look at and list some amplifiers he's put in there. But when I opened it, there was not room to go in at all. I ended up picking up a bunch of gauges and valves, putting them in bags hanging off the bike handlebars, and locked it up and got out of there. 

I went over to the old building and knocked on the door. Tom Price was there and I offered him half a Stella Artois (I hadn't thought to get two of them) and he was up for it, producing a small Tupperware type container as he didn't have a cup or mug, and we drank beer and talked about stuff.

He'd gone over to Fry's and bought some things and a couple small tool boxes, "one with some tools in it" and spent about $40. He told me they have a couple of those little Red Bull coolers and wanted about $700 for each one. We laughed about the ridiculous high prices on some of the stuff - typical Fry's. 

We talked about his kid, who's 24 now and doesn't work, is dropping his college classes, and is living in Tom's apartment and not helping with the rent. We talked about how ridiculous that is. I mentioned that by age 18 I and my four siblings were all on our own, working etc. I told him about working at the Blue Cross Animal Hospital and how much I hated that job but I knew I had to work. I told Tom maybe he should just move the kid in with him, or evict Joel, the guy who's renting the back half of building and paying $500 a month rent, and move the kid in there and charge him $500 a month rent. He could go to San Jose State or to a trade school. Tom just gave me a look showing how likely he thinks it is that his kid will straighten up and fly right. All he's good at is video games. 

Tom's depressed about the thought of retirement too. It's about 5 years out for him, and a little more than 3 for me. "You must be counting the days...." and I said since I resolved myself to move back to Hawaii it's been weighing on my mind a lot. I told him about when I planned to convert to Judaism and retire to Israel. I named the many advantages of Israel, and thought it might be a match. But we then talked about "You have to kill the Arabs!" "And hate the black immigrants!" and so on. I told him that I'd realized it would not be another Waikiki. It gets hot there, like 115 degrees, a real Phoenix-by-the-sea. And I'd be living in a poorer area so I'd be right in amongst the black immigrants and that's not a good scene. And the whole having to believe in God and the whole mythology thing, and that it's a "hustling" culture even more than the US. "And who wants to live on a postage stamp in the middle of countries that want to kill you?" he concluded. So that, I'd decided, was right out. 

And I even, for a short while, considered retiring in New Orleans. I could play trumpet there and it's cheaper to live and all that. But, it's the South, it gets hot as hell, and New Orleans is one of the top few most dangerous cities in the US, year in and year out. And well, it's not home. 

And thus, I'd concluded I'd move home to Hawaii where I grew up fishing and foraging and doing all kinds of local stuff. Where I can point out my elementary school and high schools and where I worked and where I lived, where I first surfed (Waimea Bay) and so on. I told him we were kind of like the kids in the book "The Mosquito Coast" where the dad really tried to be "local" to the area but had this weird first-world obsession with bringing ice to the people living inland, and in the end, not only fails but dies. His kids, though, still growing up as they are, become as home with the jungle and living in nature and can get by OK. They'd become "local". My parents, for all the years they lived in Hawaii, were still mainland people.

I guess Tom's just going to live in his building there. I don't think his property tax is more than 5 grand a year so it's practically free to live there. He told me he recently had a break-in attempt. Someone had cut the chain to the side yard with bolt cutters and then tried kicking in the side door in the side yard and, Tom thinks, hurt his foot and went away. I told him I've got a big thick piece of chain just like my bike chain that I paid a guy $10 for, so I'll sell it to him for $10 and will bring it by when I find it again.

He gave me his number so if I see any sign of a break-in or anything I can tell him. It's good to have some kind of a mutual aid system set up. In fact if I find that chain during the week I might just go over and install it, as I know the combination for the lock. He'll have a nice surprise when he comes in on Saturday.