Happy Birthday!!!

"What I Learned on My 48th Birthday!" Do NOT blow out the birthday candles in a field of dry grass and kindling. NOT! What a coincidence, on the evening of my birthday, I heard a rustling sound outside the window that I thought was rain. I went onto our lanai and looked over and what did I see? A fire starting in the field next to the HH Building that is next to ours. I told Debbie to call 911 and then went down to the pool area to get the hose and met the resident manager, Gary and told him there was a fire in the field next to our condo. He went with me and we tried to hose down the fire while waiting for the Fire Dept trucks to show up. About 3-5 minutes later, they did show up, but were prevented from getting onto the access road because it was padlocked. They either cut the lock or got thru somehow and were up in no time to put out the fire. Even with 4-5 firetrucks, it took more than an hour to put the flames out. After all that, it started to rain. Our friend Scott commented that it shows God has a sense of humor. I agree.
If I wanted to attach meaning to the fire being on my birthday, then I guess fire represents transformation. Even tho I did not feel any different today.

New Waikoloa House Going Up

So we are having a new house built up in Waikoloa as the Sunset Ridge, a new subdivision going up. Three weeks ago, it was just an empty lot and they were framing up the foundation. Two weeks ago, we went up there and they were framing up the walls. Last week they were putting on the roof and we got an idea of the location of the other homes around us a what our view would look like. So here are photos of the view and Debbie is pointing to Maui in the distance.



It is very exciting to see the walls going up, the roof too and imagine what our interior furnishings would look like. We are thinking of taking a trip to Bali to buy furniture, and with some of the stories that I have heard, we might go to Honolulu instead to get Scandinavian furniture which is simple and elegant.



And finally, a view looking uphill (mauka) towards the east and Mauna Kea, which was covered in clouds that day.



A hui ho...

Careful what you ask for...

So I was checking airfares a few weeks back and found that Aloha Airlines was having their $99 one way specials from Oakland. I emailed our friend, Logan, from CA and told him that there was this special going on and that if he wanted to come out for a visit, I would pay for 1/2 his airfare. Well, the next day, which was Saturday, he called me to say that he was making his reservations for a flight out on Monday. Wow, talk about instant karma. We already had someone staying with us but Logan, being a 23 yo, didn't mind sleeping on the futon sofa for the 5 days he was here.

It was great fun to have Logan visit and take him to places like Volcanoes National Park and around other parts of the island. He really liked swimming and snorkeling in the ocean. I even took him to our "turtle beach" where he fed the turtles. We took photos of that day and he took all the photos back to CA with him. Much like the previous photos of turtles I have posted.