On my way back from hanging out above Hanauma Bay watching for whales, I saw HFD 1 buzz by and head over to Koko Head. What is with helicopters and that point on the other side of Hanauma Bay? I have some pics about a month ago of another unidentified small helicopter hovering & touching down there. This time though, HFD 1 headed on over to Koko Head District Park. If I were at home I’d be thinking, oh geeze, HFD pulling someone out of Koko Crater “Stairs”, again? Looks like it was a couple & small child, the mother was the victim. Didn’t seem to be too bad as when the male & child arrived in the second trip on HFD 1 they didn’t look too distraught. 
Hope all is well.
Archive for the 'Uncategorized' Category
Despite the steady drizzle, I stuck it out after the Honolulu Festival parade to watch the Nagaoka fireworks off Waikiki Beach. Figure I smooched some free sake off them, I better watch the show! Forgive the crooked video, I did this with a monopod propped against an uneven rock wall. I have to say the display was impressive, one of the best fireworks displays I’ve seen here. I can only imagine what it’s like back in Nagaoka! In hindsight, I should have recorded the whole show, but oh well.
United canceled our flight and there are no available flights via anywhere today so we be driving it! 10 hours baybee!
OK, I barely got up in time to rush up to Koko Head District Park to snap some hatsuhinode pics. When I pulled in I was greeted by an almost full parking lot, WTF! When I last did this, I think it was two or three years ago, the place was deserted. This trail has become too popular. I’m thinking something is going to come to a head, last I hiked about a month ago, the trail is taking a pounding. Anyway, I got set up just in time. I’ll post up the pic later, have to go through & process still yet.
OK, updated with my pic of this year. I unfortunately didn’t have time to properly set up the GoPro time lapse, oh well, next time!
Widber Brothers’ seasonal appropriately enough is the Okto this October 1st. Pours medium dark red brown with moderately strong head that quickly dissapates. Carbonation is not too strong. My nose is once again really plugged up so I can’t get the aromas too well, a bit of smoky and nuttyness. Medium smooth mouthfeel, a nice moderated bitter. Nicely drinkable. I’m glad autumn is here. 3 out of four Oktoberfestive monkeys.
Hm, I’m not sure if this counts as another life down for Musubi cat, but I took her into the vets on Wednesday to have them take a look at a scratch she got on her face from some other cat. I remember how the other scratch she got became an abscess and her first -1 life. Vet prescribed some antibiotic and since it was a long time we decided to give her some vaccination shots. All seemed good and I was able to feed her the antibiotic pill hidden in a food treat packet with no problems. Then later that night she vomited, not a happy cat. She didn’t seem to be in any extreme distress though, so I waited until next morning. Wondering if the pill was reacting badly. Called the vet office next morning and made an appointment. Musubi didn’t seem to be showing a serious allergic reaction, but she wasn’t eating. That afternoon took her in and vet examined her. Her temperature was running high, high enough to be of concern. They immediately worked to cool her down by applying alcohol soaked towels & ice pack which she didn’t really take to. I think administering subcataneous saline to her is what really helped.
On life -2 Musubi had received the same antibiotic with no problems, so it was determined that she was having an adverse reaction to the vaccination. She’s doing much better now, but still hasn’t eaten all that much. Trying to restrict her to wet food as she really needs the hydration.
Oh them gremlins! They’re having a field day now! Walked to my favorite parts store, Checker/O’Reilly (not) and then to McCully Bike to meet up with Ckucky and Kev. Went to where the FX was parked and pushed it to Young Street amid crowds of flashing blue lights possibly involved with one of the myriad homeless at that baseball park. We formulated the tow plan and hooked up, and for SnG I tried starting the car. Lo and behold it cranked right up. WTF? So the plan was changed that Ckucky would just follow me home. Made it all the way with nary a stumble. This was good in that it saved the stress and trouble of flat towing the FX, but bad in that I was left guessing on what was wrong. I did not have a multi-meter with me at the time so I couldn’t test for power at the pump, which would have been pretty good evidence of a bad pump. After checking the wiring diagrams I’m still fairly confident that is the problem. If the EFI relay was bad, then the ECU wouldn’t have lit up the diagnostic light. There is a possibility the Circuit Open Relay that is a safety for the fuel pump was bad. Jumpering the fuel test connector bypasses the airflow safety that triggers that, but still relies on the relay. What I needed to know was the wires I needed to bypass the relay entirely. Oh well, I’m going to change the pump anyway, perhaps that will cure the slight rough idling I thought I still detected. I’ll get you yet, you gremlins!
A Guinness brew I hadn’t seen before? Had to try it. Pours opaque black, moderately heavy head that dissapates. Moderate carbonation that persists. A fairly light and clean mouth feel. There actually is very little bitter, just a bit of roastyness that lingers a bit through the middle and leaves a tiny bit of astringentness on the tongue. Easy drinking. Nothing horrible about this beer, it’s certainly nice enough to drink, but if I want a Guinness, I want a Guinness. Guinness is synonomous with stout. It’s like poser Guinness. All the look, none of the substance. So as a beer to drink I give it 3 monkeys, but as a Guinness I give it a 2 out of 4 monkeys. Hm, seems to pack a buzz, but it’s not teh al content, it’s Speights syndrome, it’s easy drinking so you find yourself downing them rapidly.
So since learning that pastrami is smoked corned beef, we got together for a Saturday food project that we haven’t done in a while. This process is hot smoking, which should have been easier that the cold smoking that we’ve done previously for smoked salmon and bacon. Should being the operative word. So you see here the contraption that was created out of a water heater box and other large panels of cardboard, wood dowels, cooking racks, and inside a cheap single electric element burner and wok. The pieces of pastrami and other meats we decided top try smoking were placed on the rack in the upper section. On the bottom was placed the burner with wok. The burner was turned on to high and pieces of wood chips loaded into the wok. The burner was to make the chips smolder and smoke and provide enough heat to cure the meat. Alas, the heat inside the box seemed to get too high and the burner thermostat would trip before the internal heat could rise enough. Continue reading ‘Pastramification’
Major quake off east coast of Japan. Its a bit unclear about magnitude, news media here is saying 8.8, but from other sources that may be Japan scale. From media footage, looks like bulk of damage is tsunami, which was significant size, so sounds like we do need to pay attention to the warning that was issued for Hawaii. Of course the gas stations are a mad house when I was driving home, the line from Koko Marina almost reached our street. I’m sure people are running like mad to buy cases of bottled water. I’ll just go run out and fill the jerry can. I guess I should have restocked the food in a bag stuff, all my MREs have long since expired and been thrown out. Anyway, batten down the hatches and watch the run on bottled water, Spam, and toilet paper!