Today I worked outside with plants. It was muggy and I worked my butt off, sweat a ton. I raked, pruned, cut down huge bamboo chutes for the horses. It felt good though. So then me a Jeremiah went to go see “The Crazies” the newest zombie flick, a mix between Cloverfield and every other zombie movie, say 28 weeks later mostly. So we get on the bus to go and at the stop up at the hospital the driver goes into the parking lot and backs out, where usually they just use this little turn around. It must’ve been a new driver. Anyway as she is backing Jeremiah is sitting right at the window over where she is dangerously close to a car, I can’t see but I think she clears the car and then there is a loud thump I think is her hitting the curb, so does everyone else. I ask Jeremiah did she hit? Yeah she did and there is a guy standing there watching. So then we get quite a bit further in the route and she gets a phone call saying, you hit a car the police are there. Jeremiah saw the guy run after the bus to get th license plate number. So she has to go back to the hospital and we all have to get out or go with her, I felt bad for her. Anyway we get off and start hitching, but another bus comes not three minutes later so all was well. We get to the K-mart movie theater area and have some pizza. As we finish up our meal I swear at least seventy, like two school bus loads or something, of Japanese tourists come through the entrance. I just sit there with the most dorky uncontrollable grin on my face the whole time. We still have time to kill so we wonder through the store in sheer joy just watching them pick out souvenirs, so creepy I know, but they’re so adorable and amazing. Then its time for the show. I really really liked it, even though there was tons of stuff popping out. I just really like these particular actors though so that helped. I don’t know, it was just good, I loved it. Then we catch the bus hoe noting we see the same people everywhere, its really a small world, small island actually. I can see how if you lived here a little longer, or your whole life, you eventually get familiar with everyone and everything. So we come home and I pet Pignic on my way in. I have my Keds on so she unsuccessfully tries to eat my feet, I think its her sign of affection? She falls on her front legs then rolls onto her side so I can rub her tummy so cute. I come tell Jeremiah and then go back. I think I pet her little tummy for ten minutes while she took a little nap, this pig is the best. At one point when I was trying to get her to lay down she rolled over and ended up between to roots and stuck on her back, she squealed real loud then flipped over. She still tried to eat my feet and will not leave my shoelaces alone. I have to find some Pignic proof shoes. I love how any time I walk in to the arena she comes running over to me, I think she likes me, its not just food, I didn’t have any today. Okay so that’s pretty much the general picture of today, movie, bonding with little baby pig, bus accident. Oh also Rachel refuses to acknowledge I exist except when she has to and then she gives me the death glare. I can’t believe someone her age could be so petty and evaluate and react so badly to a minor situation, circumstance. I’m mildly annoyed at most, just because I really am a nice person and avoid conflict and try not to do anything that could even be misconstrued as vindictive or mean.
Friday, February 26, 2010
Thursday, February 25, 2010
Day 75
Um cleaned rooms today. Got chewed out by Rachel after work for not taking the information she gave me when she said she was pruning some plants in the driveway and helping her. She was all “what the hell”. I mean I knew she was not having fun pruning some bushes like Marianna asked, but she said I was supposed to do it too? I wouldn’t have minded but there was plenty else to work on and I so did not get that vibe or whatever hint she was trying to drop. I barely got done all that I needed too. I think she is just pissed because she had to work semi harder then walking around the kitchen and scrubbing a toilet for once. She is always whining this isn’t farm work like she wanted to be doing when she wwoofed, yet she hates being outside, I’m so confused. I just don’t’t like get yelled at when I am obviously oblivious to what was going on in het head, she cant tell me what needs to be done around here anyway. Ugh, grr, I was just having a nice lovely day and she gets all up in my face after work and I am left going “huh?”. I don’t even what to try and smooth it over and apologize and kiss butt, because I really don’t get what she was going on about. I just hope she doesn’t tell Marianna I’m a terrible awful nasty girl. Oh well she is only here one more week, thank goodness. Hmm so then me and Jeremiah went for a now kind of daily sugar run to Chevron, so bad! We get ice cream, soda, candy, doughnuts; you know a convenience store sampling. This must stop now! It’s very cloudy out. I haven’t been to the beach for like a week or more! This evening I plan on reading, drawing, watching TV, bathing, playing with my computer, nothing much is what I’m saying.
Day 74
Um I painted the bridge between the two new houses with primer. Um, Jeremiah and I went to pizza and I mailed some letters. Nothing to interesting really, that I can think of. Oh I found those amazing dollar bag candies that are pink tablets that taste like pepto bismol, mm mmm, Brianna know what I’m talking about : )
Day 73
Hmm so I am back to somewhat regularly working at Reiner’s house, painting the porch. So after work Jeremiah did something together we haven’t for a long while, cooked a good meal. We had spaghetti and a fresh green salad, even with greens from our little vegetable garden. Once it was all prepared we realized, someone had thrown out all our salad dressings. We had quite a collection between the last wwoofers and the guests always seem to leave one or two. Then Jeremiah remembers Rachel saying she threw them out. Oh I am so sick of people messing with or getting rid of our food. Its either missing, half used, or in the wrong place. Oh so every morning we sweep tiny shredded bits of newspaper form the breakfast deck because the grey African parrot, Lani, makes a mess every night. So this morning Marianna takes out all the paper and says enough his enough, we’re not cleaning this up anymore (a little late in our stay but I’m still glad). Well she didn’t shut the cage door and Lani flew away. The whole reason she is in a cage is because when she gets out she like to chew holes threw peoples screens, at one pint causing hundreds of dollars worth of damage on a neighbor’s house which Marianna paid for. They said if she ever gets out again they’d shoot her. So It was quite sad and stressful, she has yet to return. Okay so we have no salad dressing for our awesome meal. We do have red vinegar, sugar, and olive oil. Hey remember the napa cabbage dressing recipe, so yeah we whip something up real quit and its actually perfect and delicious, yay! So about three hours after dinner, we have been whining for dessert the whole time, we break down and go to the chevron for some goodies. We get donuts, ice cream, candy, soda, its disgusting but we’re so happy : ) We see the little pig on the driveway yet again, we now know his favorite place so I definitely want to give him some foodies. We also saw the corpse of the dead baby pig, so gross and sad! Oh so in that crazy science and nature book I read yet another amazing article. It was about how you see about ten percent and your brain fills in the other 90 of your perceptions. Like when you see a dog walking behind a slatted fence, you know what the rest of the dog looks like, your brain does, even though you see only a few slices of it. It was also about how when we have an itch many times its because we think we do, and if its persistent it gets even more to be in your head then actual itch. There was also this thing about perceptions and people with phantom limbs. They could often feel the missing limb not because of nerves, but because the brain imagined it in pain or deformed. So this one guy figured out if you hold up a mirror across half the body so someone can see himself or herself and their missing limb as normal and not missing it resets the brain to think the missing limb is fine and eventually the pains go away, amazing! I hope that made sense, I thought it was fascinating.
Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Day 72
Today was fun. So first thing this morning when me and Jeremiah step out the door Jeremiah stops me and says look. We see six to eight full-grown wild pigs and a few babies walk form the banana patch up over the hill and into the neighbors. It was all mystical with the sun just coming up and critters in the dawn. Work was painting the porch, cleaning the boat house, laundry. We found two new major egg laying spots, success at last! I knew they had to be somewhere, they lay eggs everyday. The spot Rachel found had seven and mine had five, crazy! Then after work Jeremiah and I took the bus to the Banyan Tree condo where Rachel and Marianna were cleaning and hung out at the pool for a while. Marianna wore pants today, which his crazy and I barely recognized her at first, she always wears some crazy hippie skirt or dress. I had trouble feeding the horses and sheep this morning because Kohala (the evil little black horse) was stomping away everyone else form the food trays, she is so mean. It took me a good ten minutes and some gently persuading with a stick to get everyone in on the food action. Okay, I digress, so we went swimming, it wasn’t sunny but still nice, enjoyed the hot tub a bit as well. Then us Wwoofers went out to pizza. We walked to the nearest bus stop and almost caught the trolley, we were twenty feet behind it running and it left, so then we waited half an hour for the bus. We had Marianna meet us because we wanted her to hang out with us but she got there the same time we did at that point and she had to go home. It was goat cheese, red peppers, sun dried tomatoes, mozzarella, whole cloves of garlic, just amazing. We had to catch the bus but we stopped by this little shop and got ice cream and you could have free access to the topping bar for just a dollar more, amazing. We wolfed that down and caught the bus. Also waiting for the bus was a character from earlier in our journey, anyone remember the drunk guy from the bus stop (see Day 3, wow, long ago)? We had had to wait with him for half an hour while he talked about vog, women, weed, in an obnoxious and slurred drunken way. Well yeah, we just avoided eye contact and managed not to get reacquainted. Its funny how long ago that was, seemed and it came back to haunt us. I kind of went picture crazy today because I only have so much time left to capture all my favorite things, and new things. Today was good and made me less homesick and wanting to stick around. So we get off the bus to go home and I say oh I bet we’ll see that little pig running down the middle of the driveway. This time the little guy was there, same time as the last two times, same place, but he ran towards us and then off into the bushes. I got some blurry photos, he is so tiny and cute1 I want another one. I am scheming to bait him with food and water and get him closer to the house and eventually have him secretly somewhere in a cage as my little pet : ) I know though if we got him he would be given away so someone can grow and eat him, oh it makes me so sad. We also learned from Rachel we get another wwoofer girl in a week and Rachel leaves in a week and a half. She is cool, but this means we will get almost two weeks with a new wwoofer who will hopefully be amazing and we can do all the fun stuff with her that the new people want to do so it will be a fun eventful last couple weeks here for us. Yeah, today was good, I’m happy, Jeremiah is all better, it was kind of a recovery celebration dinner : )
Day 71
I’m still kind of just ready to come home, but today I woke up very motivated to make the most of my time left. I was just a bundle of energy, gladly feeding the animals, being nice and talkative with Marianna, I worked my butt off before breakfast. I did all sorts of things without being asked, vacuumed the whole living room, it was a good day at work, peeled coffee for the bulk of the afternoon. After work I thought about going to the beach but it was too hot to walk up the driveway so I just lay in the sun here in our patch of backyard. I started writing some letters and got very sentimental and it kind of didn’t fit with the rest of glad to be here day. So me and Jeremiah laid on the bed and I talked about what I missed, why I do miss so much, why is it so important, why am I not the bumbling wanderer I thought I wanted t be. You know we always talk about, us Dallasites, about just leaving, just getting out, just go, am I so pathetic that I want to be back, is that good, am I lame for not wanting to be away forever, am I so naïve and young I’m not yet ready to fly the coop. It brought up a lot of self reflection, just that kind of day really. I sat in the temple for a while with the breeze and the bird sounds and reflected, meditated, hadn’t done that yet, it really is a nice little spot.
I got pictures today of dead bird (Peter). I don’t know if I’ve really talked about him. He is this grey scraggly looking bird with twisted sad little legs. He got sick a while ago and he used to lie on his back and all the guests said he was dead. Marianna hand fed and watered him for months. Since we have been here he manages okay on his own. I still water him and pet him every morning. Its sad because the other bird in the cage, Sherbert, sits above him and he’s always covered in poop and whatnot and gets really dirty because he has a hard time moving to clean himself so Marianna has to wash him in the sink. Once when it was cold and rainy she wrapped him in a washcloth, dry, to keep him all cute and bundled up. I’m going to try and take more pictures around the farm because I see things everyday that I will want to remember, I just need to keep my camera on me. Also today Marianna wanted to mix a little treat in with the dogs’ food. So she put in what she thought was leftover batter from banana bread or something. It was actually rum cake batter that had a lot of rum in it, they were very sleepy later : ) Jeremiah and I watched 60 minutes. I have never watched or been interested in that show until now. It one of those moments in life where “you know you’re getting older and growing up when . . .” you watch 60 minutes by choice. You know also things like, need to take tums after certain foods, are very aware and conscious of your bowels, forget entirely about Saturady morning cartoons, go to bed and wake early, have become aware of several horrifying things about the generation below you throughout the day. Those aren’t the best examples of things that have come up in my life that made me feel old, but you get the gist.
So 60 minutes, was interesting. There is this guy, an actual rocket scientist, who invented this new kind of energy cell called a bloom box. It was pretty fascinating. One of the cells, the size of a brick, could run the average American home for a year, half that brick could run a European home for a year, and a quarter could run one to two homes in India, us silly powers sucking Americans. They also talked about how eight years later ground zero in NYC still hasn’t been rebuilt and it’s a national shame. It’s ridiculous because once they got into the reasons its just politics, egos, power struggles. The guy who has a 99 year lease on the property could barely get through security. There have been so many models, directors, and mayors, its just ridiculous. Yes cost comes into it, but it’s mostly a bunch of bored rich guys playing head trips until they win, which just makes an endless unproductive cycle. I don’t see why it matters so much anyway, oh we got attacked, well welcome to the rest of the world! But oh no we are the impenetrable US, you don’t understand. I am being unpatriotic I guess, but they’re like “respect for the 2,000+ who died”, wait, didn’t like 100,000 Haitians just die? That wasn’t terrorism, but death is death, why does it deserve more attention and gain more honor in 9/11 then a tsunami. None of these people deserved to die and were taken off guard in their normal lives. I don’t know, it just pisses me off to get thinking about this stuff sometimes, that we think we’re so gorram (Firefly!) entitled. Wow didn’t think I had so much to say today. So thanks for reading all my rambling if you did, comments? I do like it when y’all comment so I know someone reads this and its jus nice to communicate and get in touch.
Day 70 – Day Off Alone Feb. 20th
So it was our day off and Jeremiah couldn’t go anywhere so I braved some adventure out and about on my own. I got on the 12:45 bus and headed to the Sheraton. Nobody ever stops or gets picked up there so I was glad to give that bus stop some use. On the ride over I talked with local nut Tony who works night security at Manago hotel, he’s a character. I got off at the Keauhou Sheraton with about five senior citizens and headed for the convention Center. It was big and nice and there were hula girls performing already. I thought there was going to be art and stuff, but the tables were mostly just promoting the performers. It was put on by the Arts of Kona society or whatever. Pretty much I sat and watched four hours of a variety of performance art for free. It was really cool, I was probably the youngest person there besides five year olds with their parents. There was classical orchestra, hillbilly bluegrass, ballet, accapela women’s group, all sorts of stuff. Then I walked to the nearest bus stop home, which took forever, and had some nachos, came home. It was a fun day but I don’t think I like doing exploring like that on my own so much.
Friday, February 19, 2010
Day 69 - the dead baby pig
Today was blah blah for work, except we peeled coffee which was easy. Um after work we all piled in the truck and Marianna dropped off me and Jeremiah at the free clinic, that couldn’t give him an appointment until Mon. So then we went to the urgent care center and he was diagnosed with very bad strep throat. The doctor said if he had waited until tomorrow he would have had to have his tonsils removed. Then we got the prescription for antibiotics and came home. So I try to be happy and keep things positive, but it was a bum day for sure.
Oh there was a dead baby wild pig in the driveway. When we came home i saw a live one and chased it all down the driveway, it was as big as a halfway between a kitten and a cat, it was little, and way cute, can we have another one please mommy ; )
Day 68
So Jeremiah is sick, again! I hope I don’t get it, his throat is very swollen and pussy on one side, I don’t know what that means but it looks disgusting. Marianna gave Pignic a blinging pink sparkly collar and painted her tail all sparkly with fingernail polish, its pretty cute. This is so if she does run off people will know she is a beloved pet and not a meal. Um hmm, I raked a ton today, I haven’t for a while, it feels so good though, everything looks nice and it’s a good workout. After work I went to the store and got Jeremiah some liquids and sick pills. We borrowed some movies from Marianna so that has been nice to sit and watch a movie. The weather is overcast and muggy today, as opposed to the extreme heat and clear skies we had the past few days. I started this book called “The Best American Science and Nature Writing of 2009” its really good so far. Here’s some cool quotes from the first article ( I feel like a dork because who quotes sources in something other then a school assignment : )
“We seem to have come to a collective delusion of grandeur, insisting that all of us are “free” to be a conspicuously greedy and wasteful as the most corrupt of queens and kings”
“Our national faith so far has been ‘There’s always more.’” Our true religion is a sort of autistic industrialism. People of intelligence and ability seem now to be genuinely embarrassed by any solution to any problem that does not involve high technology, a great expenditure of energy, or a big machine.”
Anyway it’s pretty enlightening and revolting in reference to our pathetic “progress” as the human race. We also watched the other night the behind the scenes of Man vs. Wild. I remember a while back they are like, oh he’s a fake he has a crew, blah blah blah. But he actually does everything you see, and so do his crew of two, only two, and sometimes they don’t even go with him, it was crazy. Uh, everyday I do or see something and go, oh I can’t forget to blog about that, well I forgot it all again, it must not have been too interesting. So yeah this has been a minimal update. I’m sure there are cool things happening in my day but its slowing down and getting hum drum now. At least today with the cap weather and Jeremiah being sick and all.
Day 67
Today was Rachel’s day off so I was solo in the kitchen. There were guests with a lot of silly questions and demanding money back for their deposit on snorkel gear, ah a tad stressful but oh well. I can’t really remember, we didn’t go anywhere uh, yeah pretty blah day. Oh however, lately I have been on this top secret chicken spying mission. Let me explain, the chickens lay eggs anywhere they make their little nests. There used to be three or four spots in the laundry room, but Solei either found them or they became uninterested, so those spots are no longer used frequently, or at all. I saw a chicken lay an egg in the jungle kitchen, but no there anymore either. So I am trying to follow and watch them and find out where all the eggs are. I know there has to be some crazy weird spots with tons of eggs just sitting there, but no luck yet. Also this afternoon I got bored so I got all dolled up and wore this crazy feather crown that’s in our trailer and tried a self photo shoot. I really needed Alana and her camera and ideas, I know it could have been amazing, it was still fun, but more fun with her : )
Day 66 - Feb. 16th
Okay, so hmm, morning was chaotic, 12 guests for breakfast. That number shouldn’t concern me, but since Rachel can’t handle in one hour what I used to do in half and at a better quality, apparently everything concerning breakfast is my problem. Any who what is interesting. We had waffles today, talked to a nice old couple from, the Midwest? or whatever. Ah, I like listening to music and just tuning out and watering the plants to a nice wet rain forest gloss for half an hour every morning, it is relaxing. It was an extremely cloudless hot day, could not wait to go to the beach, me and Jeremiah pretty much bolted early from work. Kee’I was great, we hitched in with a couple who had extremely heavy Canadian accents, pretty cute. The sun was pretty, the water was warm, the snorkeling was colorful with parrot fish and whatnot. Oh and we know what is to the right of kee’I the right end of the bay, but today I walked over the lava rock to see what was the left end like, amazing. I could see where the island touched sea on both sides, I mean not like half the island, but the horizon line I could see which extended several bays. I took a video, I just couldn’t believe how close I had been to this amazing view at the beach all the time and had never bothered to explore. I had always been curious and it got the best of me today, thankfully. So we hadn’t eaten since 9am and it was 3:30pm, we’re starving. We decided to get Mexican at Senior Billy’s up the road. The ride we hitched back with dropped us right at the door, really nice girls, so cool. We get in and have our menus and the power went out? It’s a nice day, minimal wind, but anyway we toughed it out eating chips and sipping beer (they have the best happy hour!) Eventually we got our very delicious food and an even better dessert (brownie sundae thing). We had great ting and managed to just catch the bus home. Our bursting bellies said no when we thought about even walking the fifteen minutes downhill. We came home and I did my taxes in record time, turbotax is amazing. I am glad to be getting money back soon, my funds are running low. I fed the animals and did laundry as well. It’s just been a busy day. I neglected to check on Peter (dead bird) but I think he should be okay one night, Marianna says I should try petting him, yay! I really love these animals : )
So here are the two funniest things said today that I thought I would share, now I realize both these jokes were at my expense, but they’re funny anyway.
1. So I walked off alone at kee’I to see the view and I didn’t tell Jeremiah because he was sleeping. The last thing I had said to him was “I’m going to snorkel for a bit”. So when I was walking back I was so worried he would think I drowned and would be scurrying around asking people if they’d seen me, from a distance I could see him sitting with his head on his knees, I thought, is he crying? Anyway nothing was wrong, I guess he saw me walk off, but when I asked, “Were you worried, did you think I was gone forever?” He says when he saw I was gone “I was just really happy”. Poor unloved Chelsea : )
2. So when we got home I had to go to the main house to feed Pignic and here’s my conversation with Reiner.
Reiner: You went to the beach today?
Me: Yeah
Reiner: Did you get some sun?
Me: Yeah, my face is the same color as my shirt (which was red).
Reiner: Oh, I didn’t even know you were wearing one.
He’s a pretty funny guy, one of those ornery old men who like to tease stupid girls such as myself, just kidding, I dish it right back, you know I can.
Day 65
Work is so blah now, I feed the animals, water plants, sweep the deck, fold laundry, then after breakfast I clean rooms and putter around. I actually miss making breakfast in the morning, its chaotic but the new girl just doesn’t care about it as much as I did and it shows. So me and Rachel planned to go to kee’I after work and she meets me at the trailer and says she might have scored us a ride with two new gusts, two women from Holland. They end up wanting to go. We explain that kee’I is cool but if they want to go further we know some other cool places. I wanted to show them the black sand beach with the lava cave/tube past the airport. I told them it was before Hupuna beach, but after the airport and they said sure sounds nice. We are about on third of the way there, in town, and she says “just park anywhere along here?” I say again its quite a lot further still, do you know where the airport and Hupuna are, you came in on a plane here right? She is tired of driving so we end up going to some crappy beach by a hotel with sand, but absolutely no safe water. The surf is extremely high and its all, I mean, all rocks underneath. Still, one of the women goes in and swims, gets washed up on the rocks, we are all just sitting on the beach cringing as we watch, contemplating calling 911. She walks up with at least seven different cuts dripping blood. She says it doesn’t hurt, its fine, they just look bad because its wet. It looked bad, but she was fine and a trooper. I just feel like its all my fault. We asked if they were good swimmers and refused to go in the water ourselves so you think they’d get it, but no. So it wasn’t that great of a time, came home and had spaghetti.
Day 64
So today after work we went to kee’I and it was very much high tide, we stood in a spot that usually to our knees, was chest deep, so it was nice enough, lots of clouds. We got a ride back with a really cool surfer guy who told us about a really great place to wwooof. Sometimes I kind of wish we were going to other places on the island, maybe another time, there is definitely other places worth checking out. He took us the other direction to highway 11 and we got dropped off at this coffee shop we have been trying to go to forever that has cheesecake and éclairs and yummies. So happy to finally get that desert craving somewhat satisfied. We waited forever to get a ride home, it was getting dark. We ended up getting a ride form this girl who was as high as a kite. It was entertaining but her driving was crazy. Anyway it was a good day at the beach and hitching adventure. I’ve decide before I leave I want to go swim with the dolphins, I don’t know why I haven’t thought of it yet. Its close, free, and definitely worth it. Oh today on the beach we saw some major whale action, lots of surfacing and stuff, its mating season so they’re everywhere.
Day 63
So today was our day off, after this there are only four more! Man the weeks are really zipping by. It was a gorgeous clear hot day to go to the beach, so of course Jeremiah insisted we go see a movie. So we went and saw Wolfman starring Benicio Deltoro, all I can say is, meh. I mean it was entertaining, lots of things jumping out and violence, but not too great at all. Then I broke down and replaced my ipod because not having a screen was driving me nits, it was a big purchase, but it will last a while. We had time too kill so we messed around at sports authority and office depot and k-mart. There was a lot of time on the bus today. Oh when we were done at sports authority we were gonna have to go around a long way to get to the side walk form the parking lot because of a hill embankment thing so we decided to just scale the gravel and grass incline, it went well and we felt quite accomplished : ) Yeah a nice day off wasted, kind of bummed except I have new technology, but yeah, nothing much to say here. Oh except our dear friend Ariel form the drive-in is due in five weeks, just two days after we get back, hurray! So excited!
Day 62
So today I picked coffee again, and we made the Alfredo for dinner and it was so delicious! Marianna also made us some veggie friendly miso soup, it tasted like wet hot bread, but it was okay. It had bok choy from our vegetable garden so that was cool. Um I really cant remember today at all.
Saturday, February 13, 2010
Day 61
Today I picked coffee for work, crazy! There were actually quite a lot of good cherries ready. I don’t know if Marianna plans on me hand peeling them as well, we’ll see, that would sort of be a waste of time though for work production here or whatever. Then I detailed out the Jungle kitchen. I don’t think chickens laying eggs in pots and pans is very inviting to guests : ) After work I cleaned our kitchen, which was quite bad also, just with ants and dirty dishes. I had a bite to eat and decided I wanted to make alfredo pasta for dinner. I didn’t have milk so I said hey Jeremiah want to run to the store real quick? That was at 2pm. Long story short we came back three hours later with milk, a dartboard, chips, and gum, and our bellies full of delicious Mexican food. There is this pretty cheap place, called El Habanero, right where we usually do groceries and see movies, so I’m sure we’ll be going back. Also found out that the cool town with the Aloha Theater and health food store is called Kainalui. The traffic through there is so bad all day everyday they call it the Kainalui crawl. I just like to add new crazy sounding Hawaiian names and places to my vocabulary every chance I get. So then we came home and were too full and tired to make dinner. The last few days have been very cloudy and depressing, I need sunshine, so we’ll see what tomorrow brings.
Day 60
So today was Rachel’s first day off. I had quite a time juggling the animal feeding and breakfast, and sweeping the deck, everyone helped each other out though. Then me and Jeremiah had three rooms to clean. We were fast and as thorough as we could be and time just flew by to quitting time. Marianna bought us subway for all our hard work. Solei chased a rooster, they’re nasty buggers, no one cares if she kills them, and a huge chunk of tail feathers was on the trail to our trailer. They are really pretty black with iridescent turquoise and purple. I was just so tired i watched a lot of TV, drew a little. I tried out one of the bikes. Its scary because I just wanted to go downhill and its all uneven, like mountain biking, avoiding large rocks, at racing speeds with bad breaks, just a trip round the property was quite invigorating. Oh I long for the even roads and my three speed French bike, I can’t wait for that. Its like all the exercise I can get here is either really strenuous or none at all. So yeah pretty mellow day for sure. I mean yay! Marianna is back, and she doesn’t have cancer. So that is really cool. Everything was fine when she was gone, no phone ringing off the hook, the animals were chill, but as soon as she came out of her bedroom this morning all hell broke loose, that poor lady never gets a break. She again told me I can come back whenever I want, it’s so cool to have a family in Hawaii. We only have four and a half weeks left here, that’s kind of sad. I still want to do some fun exciting things, I feel like we got adventure out of our system too early. Perhaps we should kayak to Captain Cook monument, it’s only twenty a person for the whole day to rent. I am going to end up doing my taxes in Hawaii so that should be a blast ; ) wink wink. Actually maybe it will be less annoying considering the circumstances . . . we’ll see.
Day 59
Well I must be acclimating quite well because I have been wearing pants for the last week, good thing too because I brought so many and felt it was such a waste of space. So there is a mama hen with five little chicks making the cutest peeping noises, they are always walking around after her, its so adorable! I think the dead baby bird was one of hers, the one I tried to save but couldn’t. Marianna is still gone, things are going well. I just raked and cleaned rooms today. I’m still having a bit of a time trying to adjust to my duties and keep everything in order while or lovely host is gone. Reiner is pretty helpful though. It’s funny to see him scurrying around and being so involved in making breakfast just because she’s gone. Usually he just watches TV and eats cereal. He does a good job though, I didn’t think he knew all we had to do, he’s funny too, its weird having someone else in charge. I guess yesterday, after me and Rachel spent all day detailing the kitchen, he decided to cook some eggs that he wasn’t sure if they were good or not. So he left to the new houses for a bit, but it was a tad to late. The eggs didn’t have a lid on them and exploded ten feet in every direction. He said if you ever see him with a guilty conscience it would be this. I wish I had been there to se it. I was on the computer for a while, I skyped with Jessi yesterday, that was a lot of fun. Today I instant messaged with Uncle Val, man its been a long time, that was cool. I bought my tickets to Reno today for uber cheap, so my money situation is good, me and Jeremiah are going to go out today for lunch and dessert at aloha café, then this cheesecake place we have been dying to check out. I realize the numbering on my blog is messed up again, I should just do titles, I don’t know. I don’t think I have mentioned but Jeremiah made a little reading spot up in the Banyan tree, its easy to climb and he stuck a chair up there, he’s up there all the time, I’m too scared to try, but its pretty cool, and better then TV. I finished my fifth book since I’ve been here last night. I realized everything I have read has been depressing and in first person narrative, I need to change it up! Maybe we’ll go by the bookstore today, or the used bookstore, hmm.
So we went to the Aloha café and they were closed, everyone in Hawaii has weird hours, and everything closes even earlier then in Dallas, whoa man! So we went to the health food store deli, buffet thing. We had it once before. Today the big thing was cheesy lasagna with zucchini and spinach, delicious. Then we went to the place that says cheesecake all over the front that we’ve been dying to go too. Jeremiah got lilikoi cheesecake and I got carrot cake, both delicious. While we walked around we talked about something interesting about Hawaii you might like to hear. So all the pipes for water for everything in the Rainbow Plantation as well as many other houses and businesses, in town places, use PVC pipe above ground for all their water. They are crisscrossing and in the middle of walkways, just everywhere. Its probably cheap and since ints so warm they don’t have to worrying about them cracking in freezing conditions. One of things when we first got here was “if your out walking around don’t step on the pipes!” Apparently there has been many incidences of people crunching them, well no wonder. Its really very odd. Oh the reason we decided to go out at all was because A. I saved a lot of moolah on an uber good deal on my Reno plane tickets B. We have been together for one year and eight months as of today, crazy! Okay so we are waiting of the bus, I have a headache and just want to go home so we decide to hitchhike. We get a ride form an old retired used car salesman form Michigan who drives an Oldsmobile type thing. He was nice and we always realize hitchhiking is so much better, easier, we don’t waste as much time and always meat the coolest people. I think some people have a hard time getting a ride but with just me and Jeremiah, two nice looking kids, we always get a ride in five minutes or less. That is a lot less time then the unreliable bus. So we got home and I fed the animals, all their food is low, hmm, I hope Marianna is hoe soon, but I feel bad bombarding her with all these things that went wrong while she’s gone. Oh she had to get a colonoscopy in case you’re wondering. Okay, so that is today for today, I love and miss everyone!
Monday, February 8, 2010
Day 58
John is gone and Marianna left for Honolulu this morning so things were a little chaotic and scrambled, but I think we managed and everyone is fed and happy. My morning dutys are now laundry, sweeping the deck, feeding the critters, and cleaning the jungle kitchen. I am excited for a change of pace. Things are so weird when Marianna is gone. Me and Rachel spent most of the day making lemonade and detailing the heck out of the kitchen, I hope we did a good thing. I think we are gonna take it easy today, plus when Marianna is gone someone has to feed the animals in the evening, and right now that’s me.
Day 57
So this morning I guess the talk with John went very well and he was ready to go. He left about ten and it was awkward, but not too scary. Rachel does great in the kitchen, she keeps it cleaner then I ever could. After breakfast we cleaned rooms and some very interesting things about john came up. Well I cleaned out the bathroom of old almost empty bathroom stuff about a week ago. Apparently I threw out something of Johns, a toothbrush holder, and he never said anything to us, just threw a fit to Rachel. He also presumed form that that we were thieves and must have looked through all his things, As If! There was alos a nice couple from Alaska staying here and they started talking the night before he left and he gave them this sob story about how we don’t get fed so they made him a really nice dinner and some beers. Then we he knew he was going to leave the next morning he asked them to drive him to a couple places because he was being kicked out and needed a place to crash right now. Neither of these tings are true, we have lots to eat and Marianna said he didn’t have to leave until he was ready. So this poor couple believes him and later wants to cancel their three night reservation ($300) because people shouldn’t be treated like this and they, the guests on vacation, shouldn’t have to deal with it. Marianna explains he’s crazy and they can’t just back out of a reservation things are a little more resolved, they still end up taking him though. There were a lot of other just not so cool things he pulled we found out about later and now we can’t believe we tolerated that for three weeks, he was selfish, rue, loved being the victim. “I am such a cool guy, but everything bad happens to me and I act crazy”. That’s how he presented himself. Okay so all that’s over, not much after cleaning rooms. We all decide to go to the beach. It’s Rachel’s first time to Kee’I. She said the water was too cold, apparently in Florida things are hotter and muggier and that is better, but I think I have just about as much of that as I can take here. We saw a whale spout and come up out of the water a bit on our way out. We also saw a sea turtle who was on shore and looking baked so I splashed him with water till he got irritated and went back in the water, he just didn’t look happy. Our ride home was this really awesome lady who runs retreats for couples, some for singles, three months out of the year here. All her courses are about self actualization, inner-peace, releasing your inner child, tantra, self-worth. She was fascinating and had lots of cool things to say. If you can do something with a degree in psychology and therapy why not teach/host retreats in Hawaii. I was like hmmm . . . that sounds good, I want to do that with my life : ) okay so we are walking down the driveway and Rachel says we should get the lemons. There is this lemon tree in the driveway just bursting with ripe fruit, nut its all very high. So all three of us gently pull down the branches bit by bit until we have lemons rolling down the driveway every few seconds, we just pick and pick and laugh. We are in the middle of this and Rachel gets a call from Marianna saying we were supposed to clean the crow’s nest, the guests are waiting. So we run home and do a quick fix. She gives us ten dollars for working of hours, she forgot as well us that it needed to be cleaned. Jeremiah starts making dinner and me and Rachel go buy a bottle of wine. We have falafel, which is amazing ,we have all the fixens, oh it was so good. So i really like our new group of Wwoofers, we all get along and Rachel isn’t crazy and loves to go do fun things, so we’re happy. Oh I got my letter from Stephanie too, yay!
Day 56
Oh what a glorious restorative day off, just perfect and simple. So I start off with a nice long, much needed after three days and the ocean, shower. Then we went to breakfast, which was okay, the guests ate a lot. John was really rude and confrontational and crazy and this was kind of the straw that broke my camel back and I decided to talk to Marianna about it later. I can’t tolerate such a tense, unappreciative, offensive guy ruining this place for everyone and acting like he could break at any moment and kill us all. So I tried to let it slide and me and Jeremiah headed to our cabin to pack up for the beach, but not before Reiner called for Jeremiah. The package from his mom finally came, after a little less then a month. Such a good mix of food and little things we need like a new loofa and travel lotion, one solitary mama mia, that was funny, I brought like 100. So after devouring its contents with our eyes (oh Jeremiah got a new phone too!) we packed and ran for the hills, actually the coast. We got a ride down pretty easily and there was not a cloud in the sky, the water was amazing, we got in a few times. We just messed around, had our first wet sand fight in the water, its kind of fun. I got it all in jeremiahs hair, but I say face is off limits, I went unknowingly most of the afternoon with a big collection of sand in the crease of my chin looking like a fool. I also rigged up a nice tiny headed person goggle mask thing a guest had left to the snorkel tube dad let us borrow. It works all right except your nose isn’t covered like a normal snorkel mask so you have to remember not to use it. Speaking of not using your nose, only if you’ve read the book will you get that, I started reading Johnny Got His Gun by Dalton Trumbo, just a horrifying and amazing look at war and its consequences on the human soul/psyche. Anyway, then we lay for a while and I got me some good sunshine on my belly, but with this evening out of the sun I am getting ridiculous tan lines on my white pasty chest and booty. Some people say tan lines are sexy, me thinks not oh well. So at about one thirty we headed out and got a ride right away from this lady who drove fast up the windy hill, it was like a roller coaster I loved it. We have been dying for cheesecake or éclairs or something naughty and amazing like that, there is a place just a town down we keep going to and its closed, we want dessert! We ended up having lunch at the Aloha Theater café, haven’t seen the old theater which is renovated, cant imagine why I’d be into that : ) But their café was great, good food, good service, great atmosphere and decor, decent prices (for Hawaii). They had a lot of vegetarian friendly food. I keep forgetting to take pictures but I had super nachos with the coldest beer I have had in my life ever, an amazing combo. Jeremiah had an omelet with veggie sausage and all sorts of goodies inside with a side of potatoes O’Brianish style. We were stuffed and sun baked after that and ready to go home, we got ride back so easily, hitchhiking is getting to be second nature now, I don’t know why we use the bus when it constricts us to its crappy schedule times, but we do. We got home and sat under the main house fiddling with the Internet activating jeremiahs new phone, looking for plane tickets, etc. Marianna came down and I was dreading trying to bring up John and his need to be removed from this residence. When, like fate would do, she brought him up and how crazy he has been getting, perfect opportunity for me “we need to have a little chat about him” so she agrees and he is definitely going get the boot. I just didn’t relish in spending my last weeks here stuck with a crazy downer grump goober guy, yeah, so that was a load off. Then I attended to my new skin color with Aloe. Me and Jeremiah are just the rosiest cheeked little pair, its adorable, I look so embarrassed all the time when I get sun burned even a little. Now we are just chilling in the trailer prepping for work starting again tomorrow. I needed today, it was so nice to get to just hang out and not worry with my beau, and we had a lot of laughs and fun.
Saturday, February 6, 2010
Day 55
I spent the majority of the workday somewhere I never expected to, Marianna’s closet! We moved out a bunch of Reiner’s stuff and I swept and then painted the floor. It was so dusty in there I must have sneezed twenty times and my boogers were hard and black later. Every time in swept I saw more, I swept about ten times, each time filling up the dust pan. Even after that I swept each section thoroughly before painting. Her closet is really cool though. Its like a little girls dress up dream full of bright flowy skirts and dresses, crazy jeweled belts and gypsy shoes, tie-dye and sequins, stacked from floor to high ceiling. Then when I painted the floor a magical midnight blue it was just amazing looking. I almost wanted to play dress up but that would be weird. For an older woman she has fun taste, hippie stuff. She kept taking about needing to clean it out and all these cute shoes she can’t wear anymore because of her crooked feet, I was getting my hopes up but ended up with a pair of sweatpants. I still hold out hope she’ll get rid of a bunch of stuff and let me go through it. She holds on to things like my mom though, clothes, pictures, cleaning supplies, dishes, she is actually a tad worse then mom lately. I swear they could be twins with their stain glass, decorative painting, marital troubles, always stressed out and needing to do things yet never having the time for themselves and such kind nurturing natures. Okay so then after work it was dark and cloudy, no rain yet but I am just sad lately. I am homesick and these Wwoofers, John and Rachel, just aren’t the kind of people I was hoping for. All of us are a very different, not so compatible group. I just wanted people I could get to be good friends with, not just people I can sort of tolerate. They are very particular opinionated uptight people. Me and Jeremiah are just happy to be where we are, but they are always looking for a better farm and better food and better work, I just don’t like that. I want to hang out and laugh and have adventures and be one big happy family who helps each other but they both have their own agenda and don’t like that not everyone revolves around it, ah why can’t we just have cool chill people, like us. I don’t really mean that, but I thought Wwoofers would be more like-minded, open, unstressed, good-workers, young, inspiring, you know? Those revolutionary kind of kids? Or those kooky foreigners? But this new batch is just boring middle-aged wanderers who never seem too happy just where they are. I guess I am being a bit hypocritical, but no, I am happy to be here, it just pisses me off when these people aren’t and it takes practically nothing for them to decide they don’t like it. So yeah I have been depressed and homesick for my home-pals watching TV for the last like 5 hours. I am so happy I have tomorrow off to decompress and get my mind right, but this funk has been going on since Sabina and Eva left, even though one was crazy they still kept it interesting and went places and were happy to be here and good hard workers. So I have replaced Anyway, with And today, I do love a good run-on sentence.
Day 54
Wednesday, February 3, 2010
Day 53 – Now Playing: Carl Blau ~ Ode to Ocean
If you have any fear of creepy crawlies, come to rainbow Plantation and you shall be cured. I flick an ant off my food or myself all day everyday, smash a spider on my pillow, pick a dead fly out of my juice, get jumped on by a geckos, waking up to a squeaking lizard in the curtains by my face, see and hear lizards scurrying in the leaves, as well as toads and rats, I run into spider webs all the time, have seen huge centipedes, moths, and cockroaches, every now and then. I have no fear when it comes to bugs and small reptiles these days. There is also walking in the dark and hearing bigger things like wild pigs, cats chickens, I have about as much critter interaction as I can handle, I am one of the jungle pests myself. What I am getting at is, I ain’t never gonna squeal at a spider or scream at mouse again.
Aonother beautiful clear blue sky day. Made breakfast, cleaned a room, raked, the usual. Hten sfter work me, Jeremiah, and John got our tails in gear and moved rooms, again, I like the change though. Also today john hurt his back ak tinge and spent most of the day detailing out the Wwoofer kitchen which probably hadn’t been in like five years, it was disgusting. I had always been intimidated by the task, but now its in fine form. So not much today besides getting ready for another worker. We get a pizza night, yay! I really wanted to go to the beach, but I think it should be nice tomorrow too, and it is tradotion since we’ve been here to take new Wwoofers to Kee’I on their first day. Hitchhiing to a local beach is a great first experience I do believe.
Day 52
I feel like if I title these with a little more it will be easier for you gentle viewers to keep track of your humble narrator (brownie points if you get the reference : ) So toady was, it just, wow, one of those days where your mind gets blown with every event. I don’t know where to start my mind is going a million miles a minute. I’ll just start at the beginning I suppose, that s the best place. So I woke up earlier then usual and took a nice long shower bath. Then I made breakfast for one. Me and Marianna had some really good conversation about her and Reiner, some good laughs, I am so fond of her really. We got so busy talking the one guest for breakast comes up and says “can I just have some bread” as well as the scrambled eggs Marianna had promised about fifteen minutes ago. I got a lovely letter from Canada, sounds like everyone has a new haircut and me and Jeremiah are uber shaggy. Then for work I had to clean the whole crows nest after some guests who had been here for a week. They left a lot of food and tips, as well as a lot of mess. In the midst of cleaning Jeremiah and Reiner changed out the old hide-a-bed for a new futon. I was done around noon then I did dishes, swept and mopped, someone was coming to look at potentially buying the property around one. After work me and Jeremiah decided it was such a gorgeous blue sky day we would go to the beach. I called Alana while waiting for the bus, great to hear from her, and I learned of Chris’s new job, cool beans. We got dropped off at Magic Sands, one of our first beaches, the sand was all gone? It was scary rock and waves and little place to lay, the surf just ripped it up and there was no magic or sand, so we trekked to a different spot where we could kind of get wet if we wore shoes. I called my mother, such a good day of touching base with family (Sorry dad, you were next on my list). We left and were headed to Mango court, somewhere near us we had not yet explored. It is a little strip mall area with a natural health foods store (mini Lifesource, Salem), um healing center, bookstore, meditation area, just a little hippie joint. We had some delicious buffet vegetarian/vegan foods. Samosas, cheese tamales, salad, fried veggies, bean salad. Then for dessert we had a cookies and cream milkshake and French fries, from a drive-in down the way, not from the healthy place : ). Our whole reason for going to Mango court was because we had seen in the paper there was a documentary night in the bookstore much like the progressive film series we attended at the Grand Vine in Salem. This documentary was about the dolphin harvesting in Taigi Japan. I held back the tears most of it. I am not usually a tree-hugging save the whales person, but after seeing things like this, I don’t know, it is just so awful I can’t even process it. It was called “The Cove”. If you can obtain/download it I highly recommend. This Swiss lady was there who actually made a sweet book about dolphins inspired by her swims with them in Kealakeua Bay, our favorite local place, so that was cool. We listened to her talk after, sadly her book was a bit pricey for us, although very decently priced considering she is self published and its all glossy photos ($30). We got there by bus but were going to have to walk about an hour in pitch black and no shoulder on Mamalahoa highway, scary. We were too chicken to ask anyone there for a ride so we march on. After about three minutes a Jeep stops in front of us and yells “you guys from the plantation?!” Why yes we are. It was a couple with a little girl who were friends of Todd and Derek’s (the hairdressers) and they recognized us from the back in the dark at forty miles an hour, just incredible. Even more crazy is that we know about five people outside of the plantation and they were three of them and we happened to cross paths (by car and foot) at this exact moment, this night, this road, they leave in three days. It was really dangerous and I am so in shock at the fate, coincidence, I don’t know, just a one in a million chance and it happened, someone’s looking out for us : ) So that was the big crazy part of my day, but also the dolphin killing, talking to family (talked to Bri a while too, lovely, so jealous of her art classes), magic Sands turning into nothing, bonding with our hosts. It was just a succession of good and make-you-think kind of things. Also Reiner gave Jeremiah some money for all his hard work lately (he really is Reiner’s right hand man). Also learned that if the vegetable garden gets going we can sell the produce and make up to $200 a week, don’t know if we’ll be here when it starts producing, but apparently in the past Wwoofers have gotten that chance. He said “you need some money”. He is such a character I can’t even describe or imitate. Also the people who picked us up on the road were listening to the Fleet Foxes, just crazyness! I just want to go to Japan and sabotage those stupid fisherman, I just, grr, there is many awful things why mess with something so beautiful for no reason at all. Okay, so yeah, good day, good food, good interactions, good thoughts, I am all energized about life now things got mixed up a bit. So here’s is a little much info, but for all those last few loose days, I had three nice solid movements today, hoorah! Too much information, but it really does make or break the mood of my day to a degree. Oh and a new Woofer named Rachel is arriving tomorrow night, I can’t wait to see what tomorrow brings : 0
Day 51
All right since I know your all dying to know, my stomach has only been a tad upset, but no more problems, I think I’m definitely on the road to recovery, hurrah! Today was so boring I don’t even want to mention it. I must go to the beach! Seriously, its gonna be a time when I look back and can’t believe I wasted 24 hours of my life this way, I must draw or read or write a letter tonight before bed. I cleaned a room, raked, did dishes, cleaned the Jungle kitchen, watched TV, realized I don’t eat well at all, no wonder I was sick for so long, and I am getting uber lazy and out of shape. We are supposed to get a new girl on Wednesday I think, so maybe some more new blood will make me feel more motivated. Okay I hope everyone is well, me and Jeremiah are so excited to go to the Oregon coast when we get back, we are constantly reminiscing about good times back home on the beach. Um just so everyone knows I will land in Portland on March 16th at about 7am (the morning). No word on Jeremiah yet, sadly I think we will be arriving at least twelve hours apart or something ridiculous like that.