Don't worry, they'll tell you! (This applies to people who did CrossFit, or who went to Punahou....) It turns out my old pal in Hawaii is a vegetarian and I'm not making any points with him by telling him how much I miss fishing.
This probably explains his health problems. Having to fly to Oahu to see a dermatologist, having some kind of operation that left him with a difficult recovery etc. I may be a Buddhist but the sect I'm a member of lets vegetarianism be an individual's decision. And in the old plantation-origin Hawaii culture I grew up in, vegetarianism really wasn't a thing. You were damned happy to get an egg or two for breakfast, and to get a bowl of saimin with that little strip of Spam and a thin slice or two of fish cake, and that was only if you went somewhere fancy or Mom was having guests over. Vegetarianism was/is almost totally a mainland haole thing.
I moved more things around, re-did my tiny ziptie fastenings with the large zipties, and put a 2nd coat of paint on that first strip of floor (and some wall and railing) of the loft. It's hot up there and I set a fan running to stir the air so it's probably really hardened well.
I also took a big optics gadget apart and that ate up some hours. I put the scrap metal out and sure enough, Crazy Chrissie came around and took some, and then someone else took the rest.
I practiced a little bit, and don't know why the octaves exercise is so hard, so maybe should try to just do lots of regular playing.
I got out of here a bit past 4. I took two bags of trash to FedEx's dumpster just to get 'em out of here, and rode over to the Amazon hub to pick up a book (Get Tough by W.E. Fairbairn) and go some bubble mailers too. Then I went over to Dai Thanh for a few things, took $30 cash back, and went to Wal-Mart for the week's diet soda and a few thing. No luck with the Coinstar though.
I was cautious about parking my bike because there were a couple of bums hanging around. One guy, once I was there, looked at Big-5's front door and it seemed to take him a while to calculate that it was closed. A guy even came to the door and motioned that they're closed and I said, "They're closed". That bum rode off. I noticed there's also a notice in the door that Big-5 is applying for a license to sell "concealable" firearms, which means pistols. The other bum was hanging out, but at least didn't rob my bike.
I went into Wal's and got my things, went out and loaded the bike up and got out of there. It was really hot today so riding was tiring plus I kept sweating so I doused my whole head with cold water a few times through the ride.
I rode back to Japantown and locked the bike up at my usual place for Obon, around the corner from Sushi Kazoo, and picked out some chicken karaage, little package of cucumbers, a near-beer and a can'o'coffee, and of course a package of Black-Black gum. I ate some of the chicken but it was kind of dry and I was not *that* hungry, having had a "Chinese donut" from Dai Thanh.
I went into the festival area and learned something: On the 2nd day the lines are next to nothing for the food, so next time I'll get my Obon food on the 2nd day because I could have gotten some tempura if I hadn't spent all but $2 of my folding money. I spent that last $2 on the ring toss.
The dancing was fun to watch, with some people good at it, some almost too good at it (trying a bit too hard) and some awful, and a few really awful. It was all good fun. I made my mind up that I have two more Obons before I leave under my present plans, so next one I'll go to the practices and dance, get at least a basic hapi coat and a fan and kachi-kachi etc. And I should be able to play some decent shinobue by then too.
I ran into my old friend, Ben Yep, too. He was there with his family. He said he'd led "the band", I guess at a different Obon, because the piano player was sick so he'd led somehow with his ukulele. I mentioned playing trumpet and making good money but changing to flute because back in Hawaii where I intend to return, the trumpet is considered .... "Obnoxious?" he helpfully put in. I said that was pretty much it and told him about the local saying, "No make tantaran" which is like, don't blow your trumpet, be a braggert or a blowhard etc. He said he'd played trumpet for 5 years and it was, indeed, "obnoxious".
After talking with him I wandered over to my bike to retrieve my can'o'coffee and just hung out until the raffle. I didn't win anything, big surprise. All in all it was a very good time and assuming the various plagues and diseases will allow it, I intend to take part in the next two Obon festivals as thoroughly as I can.
The Fairbairn book is interesting. I've gotten a bit of a bug to get a Fairbairn-Sykes fighting knife, but since I want to travel as light as possible going back to Hawaii, I think for now I can do without. Hawaii has such good pawn shops and military surplus stores that there's a good chance I can get one there. Or hell I can make one.
My Hawaii pal is still talking to me - I told him about my discovery that if you take a mallow leaf and trim out the center vein and fry it with a little oil and sprinkle on some salt, it's a better chip than any potato chip you've ever tasted. I told him how, when I lived at the survivalist place, that plant was griped about and the guy there never realized what a neat plant it can be.
Of course there were zombies out there on this hot day - it wasn't terribly windy (wind makes them hunker down and hide more) and the warmth makes them more active, so they were definitely out, yelling and gibbering and lurching around. Even after getting in here at the end of my time outside for the day, the zombie car drove by, reconnoitering, and a zombie on a bike with a trailer rode through, fast so as to not be noticed perhaps, but probably also a scouting mission.
I reflected while out riding today that if things get bad, it's going to be very dangerous to be a zombie. People aren't just going to close their doors and gripe on the internet. And they're not just going to shout or start locking their trash enclosure. They're gonna shoot, and to keep the uncleanliness of having a zombie body rotting from being anywhere near their own house, they're going to head the problem off by going into the zombie camps. Chatter on the internet is that the well-dressed zombie in a zombie camp carries a machete, large knife, improvised weapon of some type. Hence Big-5 applying for a license to sell "concealable firearms".
Oh let things just hold together for a couple more years ...
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