Cleanliness Is Next To Hunger...

I am a busy man. I think the shocker to many is not the word "busy", but "man". That insult aside, I am serious. This last week has been filled with work, programs, homework, tests, work, chores, work, of course, the emotional rollercoaster rides involving girls to add perverbial icing.

In spite of my angst, I have been able to keep myself witty as ever. I always hate anouncing that as it envokes the most critical eye in anyone to prove me wrong. I do think, however, that I might survive being put to that test. I hear a good opportunity and I just cannot let it go. Yesterday I was in Stats and we were all complaining about how usless that course was for us. The teacher came to the conlcusion that it was good for us regardless of our future vocation as it makes us "well-rounded". The guy sitting in front of me said, "I am glad I came to your class to become well-rounded."

I can't let that go so easy. "Believe me, you were pretty well rounded by the time you walked into this class." I figure that since he is about as overweight as me, I can get away it.

Later at lunch I found myself sitting with JD and Summer. Summer announced that she was ready to leave becuase our guy talk was too much for her. I started to let my mouth speak before my mind approved.

"Well, that's good. Now JD and I can talk about breasts." I have learned that this is one subject that most boys on campus shy away from and girls talk adimatly about in public. Summer, whom is an A-cup at best, was not an exception.

"Ya, I don't think that I want to be here for that."

"Why would you? It's pretty clear that you have nothing to contribute." Again, being the same size (cup, that is) I felt it was a justified comment. I got punched but I also got laughs. It was worth it.


Another part of being busy is missing meals or sacking meals. I had to sack dinner to fit all that I had to do today in. I can't tell you how excited I was to see my old friends the corn dogs again. It must have been the first time this whole semester that we had them available for sacking. I was glad to have 4 sitting in wait in my freezer for missed dinner days.

Today was one of those days. I grabed some chips, water and headed to the fridge. But, lo, it was clean! How very nice! Wait...clean...that sounds too easy. What is the cost? Where is the catch? I checked. My three remaining chocolate eggs from Germany were snug. I had 2 cans of juice still chilling. I was missing a cold water, but I can let one go. Fhew! I guess it was a false alarm. I just casually opened up the freezer to extract two corn dogs for dinner and...uh...WHAT!!!! WHERE THE HECK ARE MY CORN DOGS?! D'oh!

It's off to work for me to spend 6+ long hungry hours in a cold lab.

"Dancing away my hunger pangs. Moving my feet so my stomach won't hurt..."
- Homer Simpson from Hungry Hunger Homer (March 4, 2001)

Fall Blast...

I spoke too soon.

Not long after I finnished up my last post called "Fall Bawl" I got a phone call from Fei. She wanted to go to Fall Ball and nothing would get in her way.

She decided that she was going to buy tickets, hop on the shuttle and go alone if it came down to it. She asked a few friends and the only other person she got was Rachael. I was relunctant. I was at work in the lab and was not supposed to leave. Chris Rusch and I got some pies and other food. We planed on haning out, watching movies and having a good time feeding off eachothers sour moods. After she asked enough and asked me to go for her, my will turned into some form of jell-o and I changed my mind.

Chris still did not want to go, but was more than willing to release me into the night. I left him with some food and movies, a code for the alarm and my ID for punching me out at midnight. He was "Jared Proxy" for the night. Thanks a ton to Chris.

We got home and dolled myself up. Once in a suit, I decided we needed leis. I had two. One was a plastic one I got from a birthday party. The other was the kukui nut lei Fei gave me when I took the ambassador tour at PCC. I wore the kukui lei. On my way to the girls' hale to pick up my two dates, Fei and Rachael, I saw that someone had discarded a plastic box used for fresh leis. The cheap plastic one looked nice in it. Before I even had to worry about which of my two dates to give it to, Fei insisted that she didn't want it. I was expecting that and was ready to lei Rachael. She made it into a wrist style band.

Fei did however have something for me to wear. She had on a purple dress that she originally bought a year and a half ago to go to a ball with me. It was never used by her before this night. She handed me a shawl to use for a matching tie. I didn't have tie that quite fit, but the shawl was the same material. Can't go wrong.

My Makeshift Tie

We were hoping that the shuttle would not be full and that our efforts would not be in vein. On this campus, “shuttle” is a fancy way of saying “cheap rented school busses”. The cheap rented school bus was pretty full looking. There were just a very few seats left. We managed to get in. I was the last to board the bus. There were only 2 spaces left. One empty bench and one girl sitting alone. I sat on the empty bus as my two dates sat together. I knew Fei would NOT sit with me. I would hate to see Racheal feeling left out sitting alone looking at Fei and me. I would also hate to be seeing Fei in the same situation. I think it was the best possible solution.

It was a nice place. We ran around saying hi to everybody. Most of our friends were pretty surprised that we were there. We just decided to go two hours ago; we were surprised too. We took some pics and then met up with Su and her date King Sik. (I think I’m spelling it wrong, but it is phonetically spelled for your convenience.)

My Two Dates

We found her in the Latino room, so we danced there. It was odd deciding who to dance with. I can’t dance with both at once. I had a load of fun danicng Su, Fei and Rachael in throughout the night. I broke cardinal rule #2 which about public display of dancing. It figured it was crowded enough and dark enough and could make an exception just this once.

We stopped dancing for a time to see the magic show. I couldn’t help but lean over to Fei and tell her each trick that I knew. I had even done some of these tricks for classes, small groups, etc. I liked the way he did them. He took the same tricks I knew and put a new twist on them. On others I was amazed. I even got to participate in one of his tricks. I don’t know how he did mine. It was a good one. I'd like to tell you, but I won't.

After that it was more dancing. We walked by the booty dancing room. We never went in. Being in a group and having an odd number of people, it would make more sense. This way we could dance as a group and not have to pair off. I am glad we didn’t. I don’t come out of my "don’t dance" shell often, but I wanted to dance. I have finally become comfortable with dancing with a girl this style. I don’t do well in "just shake and look stupid" dancing yet. So, as a result, I wanted to stay Latino. We did. I also have to admit that I like it. I do like dancing when I know what to do or how to dance. And as a secret guilty pleasure, it is the only way I can get these girls to give me any physical contact and it’s totally OK and socially acceptable. When else would, say, Su let me touch her stomach. I’ve said too much. But it’s true. I like dancing for a few reasons, but one is that you feel close to the person you dance with. It’s not some sicko perverted kind of "oh, I get to put my hands on her" thing. I don’t know. I probably should just move on to the next subject.

After frequently switching back and forth between Fei, Su and Rachel I saw Fera, Anna’s roommate dancing. I was feeling devenaire, so I went up to her and asked to cut in. She was dancing with some girl I’d never seen before, not her boyfriend, so I felt comfortable doing it. She was reluctant at first. We took each other’s hands and started to…uh…I don’t know what the dances are called yet. We moved forward and backward. I started to do some moves. I then realized that she had no idea how to dance except for the forward and backward movement. I actually was dancing with someone who need to learn steps from ME! I was teaching someone else. I was better than the girl I was dancing with! I was the one actually leading! It’s not that she is a bad dancer, in fact, I think she is a good dancer, she just didn’t know the moves yet. We danced the whole song and by the end I had her knowing a few moves (mostly all of what I knew). It wasn’t just that I was the one in control, but it was nice to dance without worrying about keeping up with the girl. Less pressure. I think it was one of the best, if not the best, dance of the night for me. Fera is fun when she wants to be.

Fera

Next thing I knew it was almost 1am and time to go. The lead singer in the band said that they had one last song. Following the dance we walked out and decided to take some pics of me dipping the girls before we got on the bus.

Dipping Fei

Dipping Rachael

We got on the bus. Guess who sat alone again. You guessed it.

When we arived home we all walked to the girls hale’s and had a rousing round of hugs and "good-night"s. I walked home glad that I had gone. It was fun. To Fei’s relief, I did not get the wrong idea. I felt better than I would have if I had sat at home or in the lab with Chris feeding on each other’s misery. It was not my wildest dreams come true but it was a nice break from feeling sorry for myself. I went from Fall Bawl to Fall Blast in only a matter of hours. It was fun but now I have a whole new problem. I have one less thing to kavetch about.

Fall Bawl...

It's that time of year again when all of the girl Hales have an activity for the girls that didn't get asked and the guys hang out saying, "Girls suck, man!" because they are home. This is the minority as many are going. I have gone a few times and also missed an equal amount. This year I am not going. I did just break up with Anna recently. I could go with her, which I thought about doing, but I don't think a date like that is good for a couple that had just broken up. I could have asked another girl, but it's tacky to have a date right after you break up, so I didn't take that route either. Instead I am sitting in a computer lab whining about it.

This year, to break up the monotony, I thought it would be more interesting to do this MadLib style so my sorry story could be used to help others explain why they didn't go as well. When you think about it, they do all have the basic same concepts. Here we go!

INSTRUCTIONS: Fill out the appropriate blanks as fitting. When complete, copy and paste into your blog, journal, or other record keeping method of choice. You may wish to print a blank copy out as it can be reused for future dances.


Well, it's time for ________(season)___________ ___________(type of event, ie: Ball, Dance, Invitational, Briss, etc.)_________ again. _______Unfortunatly/Fortunatly________ I won't be going this year. I was thinking about going with ______(casual friend)_________ but then I thought, "If I am going to go this time, I want to go with someone that I really would be ______(emotion)_____ to go with. What if I were to ask ________(the person you know you really want to go with)__________? Then I day dreamed while in ___________(subject)____________ about what it would be like to go with ____him/her_____. I thought I should at least ask, the worst that could happen is that ____he/she_____ says no. But what if ____he/she_____ does say yes? What then? How will I act? How can I make the conversation comfortable and not awkward silence? Do I even know ____him/her_____ that well? Who will we group with? I guess that if I ask that means I will pay. Is going Dutch too cheap? Do I really want to go with ________(the person you know you really want to go with)__________ after all? I don't know if I could even look ____him/her_____ in the eye anymore if ____he/she_____ said no. And what do we say when we pass each other in the hall in the days leading up to the ________(season)___________ ___________(type of event, ie: Ball, Dance, Invitational, Briss, etc.)_________? Do I say, "hi" or move up to talking about ________(subject)___________ instead?

O.K., too many questions for me to deal with. So, I didn't ask ________(the person you know you really want to go with)__________ after all. I'm not a ________(coward, wimp, etc.)__________ I just thought it'd be more fun to go with a friend or in a group. Then I realized that I spent too much time deciding on whether or not to ask ________(the person you know you really want to go with)__________. I decided to ask ______(casual friend)_________ like I originally planned. But then to my horror, ____he/she_____ was already asked! What was I supposed to do then? I thought about others to ask, like ______(that person who sits at our table)_________ or ______(the friend in our group that has dated everyone else in the group)_________ or ______(the cute friend with no mental cohesiveness)_________ or ______(the one that laughs at everything even when it's not funny)_________ or even ______(the friend that is obviously just trying to get married, will date anyone that will let 'em and thinks that a dance is akin to a marriage proposal)_________. I could always go with ______(friend that you know has had a crush on you for some time but you weren't interested so you just ignored the situation)_________. It was a safe bet, but that would be sending the wrong message.

OK. I decided to just ask ______(friend that you know never gets asked and would never say no)_________. There is no way ____he/she_____ would say no. But ____he/she_____ said no. ____He/She_____ said ____he/she_____ was busy or had some other plans or something. I'm not sure as all that I heard was ______(the way that you impersonate the adults in Charlie Brown cartoons)_________ after I got the "No". That was the day before the ________(season)___________ ___________(type of event, ie: Ball, Dance, Invitational, Briss, etc.)_________. Now it's the day of the ________(season)___________ ___________(type of event, ie: Ball, Dance, Invitational, Briss, etc.)_________ and unless and act of ________(your chosen diety)___________ happens, I'll be sitting at home alone eating ________(your comfort food)___________ out of the ________(type of container it is purchased in)___________ watching ________(the movie you have seen a number of times, usually when you are depressed even if it only makes you more depressed)___________. How does anyone ever enjoy these things? I give up! I should have just asked ________(the person that you know you really want to go with)____________.

Download the PDF file here.

At Least My Dating Life Isn't That Bad...

I was happy to get an email from Jessica Monson's mom whom we call Mom. The meat of the story made me feel better about my lack of dating succuss...

We have all had bad dates...but this takes the cake. This just tells
you how tough it is to be single nowadays. This was on "The Tonight
Show" with Jay Leno.

Jay went into the audience to find the most embarrassing first date
that a woman ever had. The winner described her worst first date
experience. There is absolutely no question as to why her tale took the
prize!

Marilyn said it was midwinter...snowing and quite cold...and the guy
had taken her skiing to Lake Arrowhead. It was a day trip (no
overnight). No, not Marilyn. They were strangers, after all, and truly
had never met before.

The outing was fun but relatively uneventful until they were headed
home late that afternoon. They were driving back down the mountain,
when she gradually began to realize that she should not have had that
extra latte. They were about an hour away from anywhere with a rest
room and in the middle of nowhere! Her companion suggested she try to
hold it, which she did for awhile. Unfortunately, because of the heavy
snow and slow going, there came a point where she told him that he had
better stop and let her pee be side the road, or it would be the front
seat of his car.

They stopped and she quickly crawled out beside the car, yanked her
pants down and started. Unfortunately, in the deep snow she didn't
have good footing, so she let her butt rest against the rear fender to
steady herself. Her companion stood on the side of the car watching
for traffic and indeed was a real gentleman and refrained from
peeking. All she could think about was the relief she felt despite the
rather embarrassing nature of the situation.

Upon finishing however, she soon became aware of another sensation. As
she bent to pull up her pants, the young lady discovered her buttocks
were firmly glued against the car' s fender. Thoughts of tongues
frozen to pump handles immediately came to mind as she attempted to
disengage her flesh from the icy metal. It was quickly apparent that
she had a brand new problem due to the extreme cold.

Horrified by her plight and yet aware of the humor she answered her
date's concerns about "what was taking so long" with a reply that
indeed, she was "freezing her butt off and needed some assistance"!

He came around the car as she tried to cover herself with her sweater
and then, as she looked imploringly into his eyes, he burst out
laughing. She too, got the giggles and when they finally managed to
compose themselves, they assessed her dilemma. Obviously, as
hysterical as the situation was, they also were faced with a real
problem. Both agreed it would take something hot to free her chilly
cheeks from the grip of the icy metal!

Thinking about what had gotten her into the predicament in the first
place, both quickly realized that there was only one way to get her
free. So, as she looked the other way, her first time date proceeded
to unzip his pants and pee her butt off the fender.

As for the Tonight Show... she took the prize hands down. or perhaps
that should be "pants down." And you thought your first date was
embarrassing. Jay Leno's comment - - - - This gives a whole new
meaning to being "pissed off".

Lazy, Lazy, Lazy...

We used to love peanut butter… still do. I saw something in the store the other day that I don’t understand, that peanut butter and jelly in the same jar. Is there a point to that? I mean… I mean I’m lazy, but… I wanna meet the guy who needs that. Some guy going, "You know I could go for a sandwich, but uh, I’m not gonna open TWO jars! I can’t be opening and closing all kinds of jars… cleaning, who KNOWS how many knives!?!" If you’re that lazy, why not put croutons in there and get the whole sandwich on a spoon. You know, just scoopin’ it out… "Mmm…Oh, scrumptious!! I think I’m gonna have another one. Uh, mmmmm… DELECTABLE!! As was the first!" Or if you don’t wanna clean the spoon, you put it all in a squeeze bottle. "Mmmm! Lunch and no clean up!! Can life get better? I submit that it CANNOT!!"
- Brian Regan - Brian Regan Live!

That Brian Regan guy is amazing! He hit the nail right on the head. To culminate our supreeme laziness, some company decided we spent far too much time and dirty knives making sandwiches.

PB Slices

Our society has turned into instant freaks. I think it all started with the TV dinner. From there came the microwave. With that technology the fast food industry increased. Then we decided we didn't even want to get out of our cars to eat, so we had the drive-ins. But after a few years the teenage employees in rollerskates felt that it was far too much work and they wanted a piece of the lazy pie. So, then we do drive through. "YOU drive up to MY window and then I will only exert myself as far as the window to serve you." If we spend longer than 3 minutes in line we will never visit that establishment again.

Let's not forget our illustrious grocery markets. If that bar code does not ring up right the first time, watch what the employees will do. They will scan it again. Then again. They will go through a dozen swipes or more trying all sorts of methods before they will just give up and spend 10 seconds to manually type in the bar code number. How's that for lazy?

What's more, we used to have to put the food infront of the person at the cash register. Not now. Now we have motorized belts that move our food and razor blades the whole 3 feet for us. But how could we expect less for our food than ourselves? Have you been to Vegas lately? I understand the elevator. I even see good reasons for the escelator. But motorized walkways every where we go? "Ok, we will walk from the parking lot to our slot machine, but we want to get there in half the steps...if only the walkway were to move in my direction..."


Now I'm as lazy as the next guy. I like convinece. I won't change the channel without the remonte. I even bought a super remote control that can be progamed to operate over 2 dozen devices at once. It even has macros, so I can push one button and have it to 20 opperations in any desired order. I even own a remote control watch now, so I don't even have to reach over for the remote. I even bought a remote control for my computer so I can control the entire thing from my bed accross the room. I can also contol the entire system via my toilet in the other room due to radio frequency technology. There is no shortcut I will not take.

When I lived at home, I kept a spoon in the freezer next to the ice cream in the spare fridge so I wouldn't have to go to the kitchen.

I guess the question about all of our modern laziness is this:

Is all this really nessisary?

I submit that it IS NOT!

It Takes A Village...

to make fools out of each other.

Ladies and gentlemen, I proudly announce to you "Food For Thought: The Cafeteria Chronicle".

This was concevied by Faye. She set it up and got myself and others in on it. She has done most of the set up for it, later giving me administrator privlages to help customize it the way we like.

The idea is having a fun group community of good discussion topics. I don't know if we can do it right. So far all we have done is come up with our own random thoughts and not stuck with one solid item to discuss together. I'm sure we'll get there once we settle down.

Enjoy it...I hope...

Silver...

It's that time again. What time you ask? Time to look back and think about what I have done with my life.

You know, when you think about it, a birthday is an odd day to celebrate. Why do we cheer the fact that someone is older? I guess it's a way of telling someone we are glad they are around and in our life and the day they were born is something unique to them. I have a good day for a birthday. Many of my friends have a b-day close to mine. I find many people have mid to late November b-days. This, I think, is due to the holiday nine months prior; Valentine's Day. But this is off topic.

My birthday did not start like others. My birthday is November 11, A.K.A. Veteran's Day. Usually, I sleep in. I get up when I feel like it. I have a nice slow breakfast and think about what I want to do until later when there will be cake and presents. I chose to go to a private school that is apparently not very patriotic. We don't get Veteran's Day off. We do get every Hawaiian day invented off. I don't know if Prince Kuhio, Kamehameha and Liliokalani all should get me days off when Columbus or Martin Luther King Jr. could not. I say this under the guise that I care about my American heritage and such, but I really feel slighted that I don't get my birthday off any more.

I woke up and took a long test. I am just glad it is over and I am pretty sure I have another 100% in the bag. I had one hour off between classes and was planning on just skipping my class, but Anna called and asked if she could use my camera about lunch time. She was to meet me in front of my next class, so I went. It was genius on her part. I came to class since I had to be there to give Anna the camera. As I walk in, she walks up to me in my class and puts a large Oreo Cherry cake down, lights the candle and starts a singin’. Only Anna, her roommate, Farrah, and the two girls at my table knew my name. That made it real funny when the crowd sang, “Happy birthday dear…hmmm, hm, hmmmmmmm. Happy birthday to you!”

Clogged arteries pre-consumption

After lunch and Anna was out of class we saddled up, took JD’s car keys and we were off to Kaneohe. We went to the mall, got a shirt that reads, “Property of Anna” which I wear with pride regardless of the fact that we already broke up. I like it, and I will wear it anyway.

Nine tenths

We saw “Shark Tale” which was funny and all, but I just went because I wanted to sit next to a hot chick in a movie with stadium seating. It was all that I thought it could be. We ate Panda Express and we were off…but wait! There’s more!

Anna saw that some old farts were enjoying a hootenanny of fun line dancing. Ya, She made me do it. It was fun. Mostly, it was all for the pics. I was not very good, Anna had never done it before either, but once I started to get the moves, it wasn’t all that bad.

Jared Line Dances (when the tongue is out, you know he is concentrating)

Anna Line Dances

We got back and my fellow RA Richie gave me a vintage “Ren and Stimpy” comic from 1993. It was the one where Powdered Toast Man battles Spiderman. Nice! JD tells me that I have to go to Erika’s work at 10:30 for a surprise party for Anna. I think I had a hunch that it was not for Anna. I went to my lab for a minute to set up for the early morning I had ahead of me teaching class at 7am. On the way I ran into Shem. He said Fei was looking for me. I thought I could call her, no answer. I figured I could find her at Erika’s lab. Once in my lab I ran into Justin. He asked me what I was doing there as he heard there was something for me at Erika’s lab. I went.

When I got there it was almost empty. eHarmony was there, Rachel was there, Erika or Fei was not. At 10:45pm Fei walks in with some 2 liters and big bags of chips. She was devastated. “What is he doing here?”

I was not supposed to be there yet. She was upset that her suprise was totally lost. She looked like she was about to cry. I was. I went after her but she didn’t want to talk.

"I can be surprised, I swear!"

She left.

By 11pm she came back as did others. I waited outside for them to set up my “surprise”. I came in and WOW! I never would have guessed.

"What?! A surprise party?!"

I was so surprised I had a heart attack just like my dad.

Heart Attack

It was fun either way. Fei was disappointed that she didn’t surprise me, but I told her, “Don’t worry; when I saw you come in and give me that look, I was most definitely surprised!” I think that at least salvaged it.

Following the surprise and singing came the gifts.

One fine day...

How did they know what I wanted?

Protecting women from chaffing everywhere...it's...THONGMAN!

We got kicked out and went to the little theater to watch Shem entertain us all.

Shem's Post Party Show

I walked Anna home when security chased us home like rabbits in the garden. She gave me a pimptacular remote control watch/calculator. It is a universal remote with learning capabilities. Basically, you can teach it to control any device that has a remote control. Too cool.

I was beat when I got home, but it was great and well worth it. I was afraid that I would not like my birthday. When we where hanging out by the little theater someone asked me how it felt to be a quarter of a century old. I am not sure. 25 is the silver anniversary. I am too young for that, right?

Someone volunteered, “That means that a fourth of your life is gone already!”

Su came to my rescue, “Well, probably less, you are just hoping to even live to be 100 years old.” Thanks Su.

What have I done in my 25 years? I am still single. I have only had 2 girlfriends, all in the last year and a half, both for less than two months each. I had a job with a real career on the way, but I gave that up. I have family, but so far away it makes it difficult to keep close. I worry about money a bit. I’m not poor, but not too affluent either.

Everyone wants to be rich and famous. I think it is fair to say that I am not on the list of those who have made it. I am okay with that. I didn’t get too much, but I didn’t expect much. I just wanted to be happy. This year, having that in mind, I decided to be just that, happy. As a result, it was a good birthday. I realized that even though I was silver on the calendar, I can still feel like gold on the inside. I have not built up an empire of fame and fortune, but I have built up an empire of Jared, his friends and his family. That is good enough for me.

For more pics, go to this link.

Matters Of The Heart...

Hearts across the globe right now are in disarray. I thought it was just me but I was wrong. My father and I both seem to share a similar ailment. Allow me to explain.

About two weeks ago I broke up with Anna. I was not thrilled, who is after a break up? I tried to move on. In the process I admittedly spent too much time with another ex, Fei. Everyone kept telling me that we should date again. I guess all that talk made my mind wonder. One night on Yahoo! IM (never talk about anything remotely important on that) I asked her what she thought about it. Not a great idea. People get carried away and bolder on chatting programs. I scared her. As a result, she now avoids me like the plague. The next time I saw her after that was over 24 hours later (a big difference from the previous weeks) and all she said was, “I was supposed to be gone before you got here.” That was it. She spoke to others and left.

Just as Fei started to stop talking to me, Anna started to talk to me more. She technically broke up with me and I didn’t want it yet. Once it happened, I was ready to move on. I don’t think she was. We sort of started dating again. It’s great to still have a girlfriend. It’s also melancholy inducing to know that this will again be very short lived. We’ve talked about it and it looks as if we only have a week or two before we call it quits for good.

My heart at this point is taxed. My ex-girlfriend and now apparently ex-best friend goes to great lengths to avoid me. I am dating another ex, which is nice, but with the intent to break up knowing I will again be lonely. I know that she will likely avert her eyes from my gaze as well to make the break up easier and permanent this time. Just when you thought your love life can’t get worse.

I understand that Fei is trying to do what she feels is right. I can accept that. But this must be a sign that her heart is also out of whack some. I know that poor Anna feels amiss and I wish I could do more to fix that. I’m afraid I can’t.

Those of you paying attention might be wondering what this has to do with my Dad. Like I said, he and I share something in common. That may or may not come as a shocker. As a child we didn’t get along very well. From the age of 12 until the time I returned from my mission we could never finish a meal at the same table together. I didn’t agree with him or his tactics most of the time. The same was likewise for him. I thought we had nothing in common to build on. My mom insisted that we had so much in common that we couldn’t get along. Either way, we didn’t. But this time I know that we do some something in common – heart matters.

For my father, however, it is far more literal. My mom called me at midnight last night. I have a special ring tone for home “Solsbury Hill” by Peter Gabriel. I chose it because of the chorus, “I’m going home.”

When I heard that I knew instantly that it was home. I then thought about how odd it is that they would call me so late. It is 3am in Arizona. Something must be wrong. My mom was on the other end. She first said that she needed to tell me something serious about my father but nothing to worry about too much. That’s rich coming from her. This is the girl that had ulcers at eight because she worried about everything.

At first I thought she might have killed him. I had just found out days earlier that my dad had procured himself a new convertible. I imagine it was a quiet bed that night. It wasn’t that. She calmly but concernedly explained to me that my father had just survived a heart attack. I was surprised at how surprised I was not. He has horrible eating habits (Pot paging kettle, pot paging kettle). He has been told by doctors for years that his blood pressure is too high and he needs to watch his diet. He has not done as good of a job as my mom has tried to help him do. I think she has won this argument now.

Mom assured me that Dad is fine at this point. He will probably have to stay in the hospital for another week. He will have to be real careful with his diet from now on. The doctors say he will make a good recovery and should be able to carry on with normal life as long as he is careful. Strangely I was not that concerned. I should have been. I feel bad that I am not. I just felt like everything was fine (relatively) and I should not be adding this to my “fret over” pile yet.

One thing I felt bad about is that I just gave blood that same day. They asked me if I had a history of heart attacks in my family. I said no! I lied! I guess the person getting my blood will just have to take the risk.

On the bright side, I can relate to my father more. We do share some things in common. I think both of us will get through this. Both of us might learn from this and maybe even become better as a result. I just hope that at this time he won’t feel my heartache and I won’t share his event of having my heart break.

Go Home, Ha'ole...

"Na, Na, I like ha'oles, but. You ha'oles are alright. You are welcome to come. Come! Come! Just don't forget to go back home!"
- Bu La'ia

I do love Hawaii. It is a wonderful place. Granted, paradise has a price. It's expensive. The bugs are everywhere. I miss air conditioning. You usually have poorly built housing. Local TV is deplorable. Your family is far away. And worst for most new people to the islands, you don't fit in.

See, the locals call the while folk that come here "Ha'ole" which literally interpreted means "Without the breath of God." It originally was used to mean a foreigner to this land. With time (and given the fact that the white man was the one that came and conquered) the phrase has now been adapted to mean all white folk crackers such as myself.

I came here knowing none of that. I had no clue about Hawaii was at all. Considering that my dad served here and lived here after, you'd think that I'd know more. All I knew was that the Big Island was called "Hawaii" and that Honolulu was on the Main Island (I forgot Oahu). I even got Malibu and Maui mixed up all the time. To quickly alieve me of this burden of ignorance the Lord in his infinite wisdom sent me to Pahoa Hawaii south of the bigger city Hilo. It was in the sticks. Pahoa means "Dagger" and that was fitting that the small dirty town had plenty of knife fights. It was also smack dab in the center of Pokololo country. That, for my ha'ole friends is Marijuana. "Poko" is cigarette and "lolo" is crazy. Cute name, eh?

None the less, I loved it. Our plumbing was not like you know. We had a big pool in the backyard. It was full of rain water. We had to shower in it, brush out teeth with it, wash our dishes in it and do our laundry in it. The water ran down from the roof's gutters into it. After it sat long enough, the water would flow through and around a spool of yarn as the water filter. Everything with time had a blue tint to match the color of the slowly decaying blue plastic liner of the catchment tank. We had to go the public water hole to get drinking water. I loved it.

Pahoa Plumbing

It didn't take long of living there and with the most local of locals to pick up the pigeon dialect and basic Hawaiian words. Due to constant reinforcement, I took a fondness of the food with me as well.

This beats any oven you'll see today

The more I talked the talk and walked the walk, I felt more and more like I belonged. In no time, Hawaii became a second home to me. Nothing has ever changed.

I then left for a period of time. I had a family to get back to and a wife to meet (well, I was more optimistic then). I had my run of Arizona. I was used to new things, green lands and fun new cultures. I wanted out of my work-a-day grind and had yet to meet a girl worth my ire. I prayed and felt good about returning to my aina away from my aina.

I came back to Hawaii as a stranger. I moved to Laie, one place I had almost never been in two years of traveling the islands. The only person I knew there was my old bishop and then current teacher, Bishop Furuto. I had to start almost from scratch.

Luckily for me, I did not have the same problem as most newbies to the island. I knew what it meant when someone called me a mahu (not that it was common). I knew that Lomi Salmon was not just salsa. I knew that you don't disrespect Braddah IZ around locals bigger than you. I knew that just because Eddie would go, I probably shouldn't walk around Wahiawa alone at night. In a way, I still felt like a local to some degree. But I wasn't.

It didn't take long to realize that my old tricks were not cute any more. If I was to try to speak some Hawaiian word and practice using it in context the members of the ward laughed, corrected me and were glad to have me as person interested in their culture. If I made a taboo statement in ignorance, I was politely corrected and quickly forgiven. As a missionary, I was a welcomed guest and pleasant company.

When I returned I was merely a ha'ole. Last semester I was talking some of the pigeon that I knew (I get da kine words, I just need fo work on da accent, but.) I discovered that a local who was listening was a bit upset at me. He felt like I was a poser. Also, a friend's boyfriend who is a local spoke quite disparaging words behind my back for my attempts at fitting in. The bottom line is, when I came back, I was just another ha'ole who was welcomed to spend my money and go. I wasn't cute, I was insulting.

I was talking with my friends the other day. JD and Scott who served in Hong Kong spend some good time with the Hong Kong gang. The RM's who were in Korea all join the Korean club or date a Korean girl or never miss an opportunity to eat with them in the much applauded caf. But for some reason, I don't sit at the "local table" or chill that much with locals. Well, to be fair, I have some local friends. Carrera, Kiapo, Lehua, Niki, Nicole and others I know pretty well like Hi'ilei whom I knew from my first area, Pahoa. But I don't make too many new friends and I know these locals because they hang out with my other mainland friends.

I feel like I understand and can relate to the people here. I also feel that with many of them, they can't understand or relate to me. If not that, they don't try to. I admit, I am the visitor to their aina (land) but I have migrated. I came to live here, not to just go to school here. BYU-Hawaii was the idea I had to afford living here, I would have come with or without school. I may never be a true local, I may never really want to be a genuine one. I may be considered a Ha'ole forever, even if I live out the rest of my days here. This is my home. I love it here. It has it’s ups and downs. I look forward to leaving once in a while for better TV commercials, good Mexican food and the fun of my family, but this is my home too. And I will live here. I belong here. I’m new, and I’m learning, but this is my home too now. This ha’ole didn’t forget to go home, this ha’ole is home.

Boo-Yeah!...

So, it finally comes to a close. I finnished my great task as party planner for Boo-Yeah! When Saturday arived I woke up and had lunch in time to go to the set up. David an RA from my hale was there before me. Shortly there after he left. He said he'd be back in five minutes. I doubtful. We coverd the walls with trash bags and smoke from machines, fake webs and bats and even had a wall of blown up bags you had to walk through. It was hoppin'.



Once the part got rolling I realized how many slacker RA's we have. I'd like to take this time to publicly thank those RA's that pulled their weight in making sure that others had more work to do. These RA's are (in no paticular order):

• Stasha Kemp - She felt that she should play on the beach with her club instead of donig her job! Way to Go!
  
• Sean Neufer - He felt that since he was in the hale office on Saturday, he was exempt from doing his job as well even though all the other RA's who worked that day came.
  
• You-Shik - MIA, as usual. And as usual, no one knows why, where or how.
  
• David Layzia...er...Laozia - He took care of the business he had to in five minutes, then went to his room where JD caught his sleeping THREE HOURS later! He came back after being told to go just in time to see that we were done. KUDOS!
  
• Quin Esparte - He did the same thing as You-shik, only this guy was seen by one of the hale moms and asked to come. He still didn't. Thanks a lot chet!

To be fair, there are two others that were not there:

• Chris - Rumor has it that he was on a hike for his class. We can accept that.
  
• Ed - He had a prior engagement with a soccer game, and came to me in advance asking if it was ok. He then came to the dance so sick he was throwing up. I had to tell him he needed to go home, he was committed and is only on this list becuase he was not there, but he is not a slacker.

Once we were set up, I went to get lunch and ready for the day. My costume was not my first pick, the balerina, but I found a reasonable substitute.

If this costume can get as many girls as it did last night, I'm gonna wear it 24/7

Others had some good costumes as well.

Chris as an RM in church and Anna as a Vietnamese Girl. Could have fooled me

Kelsey is a way good and spooky Goth chick

Shem already looks Mexican, might as well be one...

Ain't she just cute?! She should have worn mine and I bet I'd fit well in her costume...

I don't think Judge or Heather fit in here. This makes me wonder about by selection of friends

Fei had two.

You can see that this Mail Order Bride is so light she only takes three stamps

Eerie how she looks really pregnet. The pic dosen't do it justice. She does look good pregant. We are pretty sure it's the guy from iTunes that says she is a bad kisser.

He sister Su makes a wonderful psycho, don't she?

A woman on each arm...still, not quite what I'm after.

In the midst of the party, Beth asked me where the door that was supposed to be at the front desk was. No one knew. We had paid the Aloha Center Front Desk folk a good amount of money to make sure that only students with current ID's made it in. She was to give them a stamp so they could go get some food. Turns out this supid broad went to dance in the party, abondoning her post and taking the stamp. Anybody was walking in, and we had many people who were not supposed to be there. Many students who wanted to get food could not becuase the stamp was gone. I watched the door for half an hour and then some great RA's took over for the rest of the night. We want our money back and I wante her fired.

At 11 when everyone was supposed to leave, no one wanted to go. We had the whole place packed! That meant longer to clean up. We banded to together to get the job done. Well, some were less active in the cleanup. But the award for the least amount of effort has to go to David who left five minutes before the party ended and did NOTHING to help us again. You'd think with all the extra sleep and rested energy he'd have that he would be able to get up for church the next day like the rest of us RA's who did work were able to do. He gets the "Jared Bodine Semi-Annual Lazyier than a Dead Sloth Award" for Fall of 2004! Congratulations!

The good news is that we finnished before midnight and I was home by curfew. I walked Anna home (who won't even give me a friendly good night hug anymore) and went to bed. I was going to join my friends for a movie, but I was in a bad mood and was tired. I just went to bed.

I might have been busy for much of the party, and did have to be the bad man getting people on the ball and such, but all in all, I think it was a good party. It could have been worse. It was better than last year when Sadie shot me down for Halloween for the trick...there was no treat.

I think that I did have some good friends to make it good. The RA Roz was great. JD did a good job making the iffy games work. Beth was as busy working as could be and did her job as Co-chair, not letting it all rest on me. Others did a good job as unsung heros...and I'm tired of shootin' off names, so we'll keep it unsung. The point is, if it weren't for these good friends that helped and cared for me, I know that I would have lost it entirely. Now I just have to keep it together for the rest of this semester as it will be one depressing holiday after another until Valentine's day ends again.