Lights Out

We had a major power outage last night. Almost the entire island of Oahu lost power around 6:30 pm. Power came on for us around 6:00 am this morning.

We're not sure how it happened. Initial news reports mentioned several major transmission lines that went down, perhaps from the strong winds we've been having. This, like most other Hawaii blackouts, caused the power stations to trip off one after another as a precaution. Once the generators are down, it takes several hours to put them back on line.

Lucky for us, we were at home at the time. We heard that traffic was really bad, with all the people leaving the shopping malls all at once without any traffic lights to guide them. There were some grocery stores open and for some reason people felt that they really really needed to get some food or supplies (probably toilet paper). In any case, lines were out the door, just to get into the store. Here is pic that a friend of mine (thx Russ) took at the Times Supermarket in Kahala.



A lot of people in Palolo valley took the black out as an opportunity to set off their illegal fireworks. I wish I got some photos of those since the lights from the fireworks lit up the entire valley. I was pretty cool.
We spent the rest of the evening listening to the crazy people calling into the radio stations and just relaxing.....or suffering, as my son says, with only Game Boys, PSP, and iPods to entertain us.
Oh, and if you were wondering....the Obamas (who are vacationing in Kailua right now) are fine.

Injured Reserved

Blake is on the IR again. His elbow has been sore for the past couple of weeks so we took him to an Orthopedic. After looking at the XRays, the doc said that he would need to rest his arm for at least 4 weeks. He has a small fracture somewhere around the elbow area. I think they call it Little Leaguers elbow.
The good news is that if it heals well after the 4 weeks, he can go back to doing whatever he was doing before. So he should be ready to go when the season actually starts.

Koko Crater Hike

This past weekend, we decided to go hiking. Since we were heading out toward Hawaii Kai, we thought we'd try out the Koko Crater stairway hike. We've been to the park right at the trail head so often and we always say that we should hike it. Well, that day has finally come.



The crater looks pretty high from ground level, but we always see a bunch of people going up and down, so we figured...what the heck, we can do that.

The trail actually follows railroad tracks all the way to the top. There is an old military lookout post up there and they used rail cars to haul supplies to the top. Nowadays, the railroad ties make for handy steps. The trail can sort of be broken down into three sections. The first part is a fairly steep, but not too bad, incline that ends in what looks like a leveling off area. We were hoping that this area was a flat stretch where we could rest a bit, but it turned out to be just a not as steep slope. Stupid illusions....beh.
The next section is a bridge that goes over a shallow (maybe 12 foot) gorge. Sounds pretty tame but with the incline and the fact that you are pretty high up, it can cause you a little bit of concern. We saw a bunch of people climbing up on all fours.





We took a short breather at the bottom of the bridge section. Some of us made the decision to stay right were they were. If you look carefully at the photo above, you can see the third and final section. It's basically a super steep incline to the top. Blake and I were determined to get to the top so we pressed on.




And made it....Yay!!!! The view up there was awesome and well worth the climb. You get a great view of Hawaii Kai, Hanauma Bay, and the Sandy Beach area.





The hike back down was actually much more harder than the climb up. I think if we ran/jogged down, it would have been a lot less rough on our knees and lower thighs...but the incline and the thought of tumbling all the way down stopped us from trying.



At the bridge, we met up with Michelle. She made friends with some of the other hikers and they showed her a secret path to bypass the bridge. You basically climb down and hike around it. There she is in the gorge, showing us the way.



The hike was awesome and we had a great time. Blake is finally at an age where he is physically able to do these hikes and can also appreciate the scenic views, nature stuff, and family time during the hike.

Here We Go Again

Looks like we are going to Disney one more time.













hahahha...just kidding...
Just a little fun stuff from the Internets

Disneyland 2008

Hi everyone, we are back after spending Thanksgiving at Disneyland with the Teruyas. We had a great time and had loads of fun.

First of all, I need to talk about the crowds....or the lack thereof. I read someplace that Thanksgiving weekend was one of the most crowded times at Disneyland. I'm not sure if it was the threat of rain or the declining economy, but the park was totally empty. I think the only line longer than 30 minutes was at the Matterhorn and the new-ish Toy Story 4D ride. All the other rides, we were in line for 10-15 minutes tops. It was totally amazing.....great for us, but possibly a very ominous indicator of the national economy.

This picture was taken around 9:00 AM on Saturday. Totally empty. We managed to ride Buzz Lightyear, Star Tours, Space Mountain, Indiana Jones, and the Haunted Mansion in less than an hour.

On the first day we just hung around Anaheim and took care of some business. Mainly getting our In-N-Out burger fix and doing the Omiyagi thing at Trader Joe's. We also found this pretty cool bowling alley at the Anaheim Garden Walk. Nothing is more fun than neon ultra bowling to get you in the mood for Disney.



After that, it was 4 days straight of Disneyland. Actually we did do a couple of other things in between but I'll save that for a future post. I did want to mention that we managed to eat at the Big Wok, which Brandon and Sharis introduced us to. I totally love that place....we need one of those in Hawaii.







And one last note. I totally love my new camera. For the most part, it took great pictures. I'm sure the pics would have all turned out good if I knew how to use it better. One of the best things about the camera was the very fast startup time and the great battery. During the 6 days of shooting, I only charged the battery once and I must have taken well over 800 pictures.

Playoff Game 2

Sorry, I took a long time to post this. The Falcons lost the second playoff game. Booo!!!

They played a good game but came up just short. The Highland Colts QB ran two long touchdowns and they returned an interception for a TD as well. The Falcons were doing well, but lost their main offensive weapon and key defensive player due to an injury at half-time.

The final score was 13 - 21.


Blake had a really good game. He made some great tackles and even got to play several downs at Wide Receiver.
Here are some pics of some of the tackles I managed to take. I'm still getting used to the camera so I sort of missed his biggest hit. It's the last picture and he's sort of cut off at the top.




So anyway, that's the end of our football season. Most of the team will be playing this weekend in a tournament in Maui and also in a tournament the following weekend. We couldn't play because we will be going off on vacation this week.

Guess where we are going. Yep, you guessed it.....Disneyland......again.

This time we are traveling with the Teruyas.
I'll try to post pics during the week. See you all from the Happiest Place on Earth.

Playoff Game 1

I'll cut to the end...we won our first game against the Kahaluu Broncos!!!
We play again this Sunday against the Highland Colts. Highland is probably the best team remaining in our divisional playoffs and if we can beat them, we have a pretty good chance of taking the championship. The last time we played them we won 13-12. So it'll be a good game this weekend.



So a recap of the Kahaluu game. The first quarter started out pretty good. Our team moved the ball on the ground really well. 10+ yards on virtually every play. But a bunch of penalties and an interception stopped our scoring drives. Blake played a great first quarter. He had several tackles and shut down any outside runs on his side of the field and defended the pass really well. The defense in general did a really good job.





At the end of the quarter Blake came out of the game with a hand injury. At the time, we didn't really know what was going on. Michelle went down to the field and his right hand was pretty swollen. A friend of ours had a relative at the game that was a doctor, so he looked at his hand and said that there might be a fracture. So the league official pulled Blake out for the rest of the game. Blake wanted to stay in and in fact, he stayed on the field for the rest of the defensive series before he told the coaches about his hand. Poor Blake had to watch the rest of the game from the sidelines.



At the half, the score was 8-6. I think Kahaluu scored on a short field due to another interception. We scored on a short run by Tyler after another good drive down the field by the Falcons. The third quarter went by really quickly since Kahaluu ran the ball a lot and ate up the clock. The fourth quarter was dominated by Kalani. The Kahaluu QB fumbled the ball at the line of scrimmage and one of our linebackers picked up the ball and some how got out of the scramble for the ball at the line and ran the ball back for a touchdown. Kahaluu then started to panic a bit and switched from their up the middle run offense (which was doing pretty well) to some trick plays, passes and outside runs. Our linebackers and defensive backs are smart and fast, so they were able to shut Kahaluu down. Kalani's final score came from an amazing run by Tyler. This was after he ran the ball up the middle, broke a couple of tackles and scored a 25 yard touchdown. That one was called back because of a penalty. The scoring play came from a run around the left side. As he neared the endzone, a tackler was on Tyler and he was about to be pushed out of bounds. Tyler then leaped back in and stretched out for the endzone pylon (ala ESPN Top Plays) and scored. It was totally awesome.

After the game, we took Blake to the emergency room to get x-rays. 4 long hours later, the doctors said that it didn't look like a fracture....but they weren't sure. So we'd have to wait for the Radiologist and Blake's Pediatrician to look at it. Turns out that it's not a fracture (whew!) and probably just a bad bruise or sprain.



The doctor cleared him to practice this week so hopefully he'll be fully healed by Sunday. He's already out of the splint and is back at practice .... and catching lizards (?? don't ask, we have no idea).




BTW, we used the new camera to take these pictures. The camera worked great and once Michelle figures out how to use the burst mode, we should have some nice action shots. So far she's managed to take a huge series of photos of the pile up after the play is over.

Panasonic FZ28

Got my new camera yesterday. Been trying to figure out how to use it. So far, I've been playing with all of the default settings. I think it'll take me a while to make the most out of the camera. The main reason I chose this camera was so that I could take better pictures of Blake's sporting events. I also seem to like to take scenic pictures and close up macro shots so I'm going to try to figure out how to best do those first. I'm learning about Aperture and Shutter Speed and ISO...who would have thought it would be so complicated. Anyway, here are some pics of the new camera.



Here are a couple of shots from Diamond Head lookout this morning. The two smaller pictures on the bottom are of a surfer. The one on the top is at 1X and the one on under it is at the maximum 18X zoom. Pretty good zoom...although I may need a tripod.









And finally, here is a comparison of the Macro shots. My old camera is on the top and the Panasonic is under it. It's a little dark because I was so close...but if you click on the image, you'll see that Boba needs some dusting.





So anyway, going to experiment with the new camera. Blake will be playing Sunday at Aloha Stadium and I'm hoping to get some good pics there.

Perfect

Blake's last regular season game was this past weekend. They won the game and finished with a perfect 8-0 record.
Blake has been doing pretty good so far. He's played his position well, making tackles when plays are run toward him. He's also been put into the Wide Receiver rotation during the last couple of games. He has 1 reception so far...a 4th and 5 play inside the 20 yard line. He caught the pass for a first down. Tyler scored on the next play.

Next up is the playoffs. They will be held in Aloha Stadium, so that should be a really great experience for the kids. I've heard that they will be able to use the locker rooms and get the whole football experience at the stadium.

GO FALCONS!!!!

Puffys

We had a football game out in Waialua a couple of weeks ago. We won the game and Blake played pretty well but the highlight of the day was the Puffys.

If you are ever in Waialua, stop by the Paalaa Kai Bakery. I've heard that everything there is good, but the Puffys were the things that we were after.

Puff pastry filled with cream.

They looked like they would be too sweet, but they were just right. Not too sweet and not too bland. The filling was lightly flavored and tasty. The chocolate design on top actually provided most of the sweetness to the Puffy. The puff pastry was flaky but not too flaky as to break apart when you took a bite out of it.

Puffys....Good

Game of Life

We recently played The Game of Life. I remember playing this as a kid. It was really fun...and it still is. They've changed a bunch of the rules in the newer version that we were playing. For example, in the older version, there were Lucky Day spaces where you could take some money from the bank or gamble that money on a spin to get more money. There's no gambling in the new game, probably not Politically Correct, but they do have a Stock Market, which I think is the same thing....or maybe worse.

In the older game, I think it was more of a toss up whether going to college or starting a career was a better choice. In the new game, going to college gives you a huge advantage. I also think that in the older game, you got extra money at the end for each kid you had, in the new game, they've done away with that too. Another PC change perhaps.



Tyler's car is the White one. He had 6 kids at this point in the game and had to tow along an extra car to fit them all. I think he ended up with 8 kids in all. You don't see that too much nowadays.

Anyway, playing The Game of Life was fun. We laughed and joked with each other all through out the game. We had a great time, all without a tv or gameboy or xbox....you don't see that too much either.

Weekend of Tyler

Been busy for the past couple of weeks so I haven't had time to post anything. I need to catch up so sorry for the flood of rushed posts.

First up. We got to have Blake's friend Tyler over for a couple of nights over the past two weekends. He's basically part of our family so we ended up doing a lot of what we usually do. We played a bunch of board games, watched a lot of TV, played video games, and did some exploring of the island.

One Sunday we drove out towards Sandy Beach to see what we could see.

View from a Tourist Scenic View Stop

Tyler and Blake Exploring






The shorebreak...it's dangerous



Beware Man-of-War....we got sticks

So we had a great time doing a whole lot of nothing. It was awesome.

On the DL

It's been a quiet couple of weeks for us. Blake injured his knee.
It turned out to not be anything serious. It just hurt a bit and swelled up one night. We took him to his doctor and he did go to an Orthopedic to get an MRI, but it turned out to be a bit of bursitis ... probably from over use.
So anyway, we got a 2 week break from football. Because we were practicing almost everyday, the break felt like about a month to me....probably felt even better for Blake. But on the plus side, we had a bye this week, so he only missed one game. We are now 5-0 with 3 more games to go. The coaches are already looking ahead to the playoffs that will be held at Aloha Stadium.

Birthday Jam

We got Blake a guitar for his birthday. He's been talking about it for quite some time now so we decided to get him one. I'm not sure if it was due to Guitar Hero, which he's really really good at, or the fact that the neighbor kid has a guitar....or at least we think he has a guitar, but he really really seemed to want one. Of course, those reasons alone would not prompt me to get him a guitar....the reason I thought a guitar might be good for him is this... I secretly believe that he has some sort of hidden musical talent.

I remember when we used to go to Costco or any store that had musical instruments lying around for the kids to touch. Blake couldn't resist playing with the piano, or the keyboard, or the drums, or the ukulele. Which I think is normal behavior for a kid. But the difference, at least for me, is that his random playing, sounded good. It was music. At first I thought it was a fluke, so of course I would try...and sure enough, I sounded like .... crap. So over the years, I've been watching him and taking notice and it's been pretty consistent.

This past summer, he found his school recorder. He carried it around all summer long and played songs with it. He started out just playing random notes. After I couldn't take it any longer, I showed him some notes and how to play a real song. After that, he started figuring them out himself. He taught himself Hawaii 5-0 and Smoke on the Water (Deep Purple).

So anyway....Music savant....maybe.

He's going to take an informal music lesson from our friend Dan, who we bought the guitar and amp from. He's got a cool store..Dan's Guitars. Check it out if you are interested in getting a guitar...Dan's a really good guy.

Kalani Falcons

Blake's team is 3-0 so far. I was going to post pictures of the games and whatnot, but I got stuck video taping the games for the coaching staff. Yes, I'm the nerdy Audio-Visual guy. But what that means for me is that (1) I can't take pictures during the game and (2) I can't really watch Blake too much since the camera is focused mainly in the "box".

Anyway, I was sort of nervous for Blake before the first game. He was still a bit raw with his tackling and football knowledge during practices. But he's pretty quick and was getting better reading the plays. By the end of pre-season practices, he made it on the starting team defense as a Corner Back.

The first game was against Aiea. They were supposed to be an average team. I don't remember too much about the game other than it was fairly close until the end. I do remember that Blake had a great game. I think he had 5-6 tackles. He started off the game with a nice tackle on the kick off and a big hit during Aiea's opening drive. He also defended a pass on 4th and goal and had what I considered to be a touchdown saving tackle. The Aiea Running Back ran around the right side and had an open field to the end zone. Blake was being blocked by a Wide Receiver on that side. He got around the block and made a great solo tackle.

The second game was against Ewa and was pretty uneventful. I think we won 18-6. The Ewa score came on a Kalani fumble that was recovered and ran back for a touch down. No plays came to Blake, in fact, I don't recall many plays that got past the line of scrimmage.

The third game was against Kahaluu at Kahaluu (the field right past the Heigenic store). It was really humid that day and it started to pour right after the game started and didn't really stop until the game ended. Blake's classmates, Tyler and Austin are the starting Running Back and Quarter Back. And they both had a great game. They mixed up the running and passing game pretty well. Tyler scored once (probably his 5th of the season so far) and I think Austin scored as well. But the play of the game, at least for me, was when Kahaluu was just past mid-field, only down by 12 at that point. Kahaluu lined up with split receivers on the right. When the ball was snapped, the QB rolled out to the right and threw the ball to the short receiver. Through the video camera screen, I saw Blake leap up and snag the ball out of the air. I followed him as best as I could with the camera. I think he was finally tackled somewhere inside the 15 yard line. How cool is that...his first interception. And on his birthday on top of that.

Man O' War Hunt

During one of the last weekends of the summer, we decide to go to the beach. It was kind of windy that day so we thought we'd check out the shore for some Portuguese Man O' War on the beach. We found one immediately and as you all know, they hunt in packs.

So we decided to not swim and just hunt for Man O' War. We first equipped ourselves with some official Man O' War pokers (see collage below) and headed off. I believe we found close to 50 before we packed it up and headed to another beach.

Busy Week

This week has been really busy. Blake started school on Tuesday and football is in full swing. His first game is this Saturday. I'll post more this coming week. I have a bunch of pictures from some of the miscellaneous stuff we did this past summer and hopefully some pictures from the football game as well.

Honolulu Zoo

This past weekend we decided to go to the beach. Michelle suggested going to the Honolulu Zoo before we hit the beach so that we could work up a sweat and check out the animals. I sort of don't care too much for the zoo. I always remember being disappointed with going there. Exhibits that are not maintained very well and look messy and run down. And you don't really get to see a lot of the animals, like the lions and tigers, because the pens were large and had a lot of places for them to hide. Which I guess is good for the animals but not so much for zoo-goers. And sure enough, as we walked around the zoo....lots of empty pens. Although I did notice that the zoo looked a lot cleaner and the pens, although empty, were really nicely designed.



So I mentioned this to Michelle and Blake and I guess one of the animals must have overheard and passed the word around because right after that, the animals seemed to pop out all over the place. We would walk up to an empty pen and all of a sudden, a couple of cheetahs would trot by right past us. We were also less than a foot away from this really huge and hungry looking tiger. It was really really cool. It seemed like at every exhibit the animals came as close as they possibly could to us. Michelle thinks it was due to her animal calling skills, but I'm not too sure that all the animals would know the clickity, dolphin-like language that she was using. In any case, the zoo turned out to be great. They've done a great job renovating it and it was totally worth it to stop by for a visit.

Football gear

Blake got his football gear and couldn't wait to try it on.

Go Kalani Falcons!!!!