Rod

You know you have a tailwind when you descend a 1% grade at 30+mph and realize you’re not pedaling. Additional evidence was the palms bent over in my direction of travel, and I could hear everything clearly. More on this below. Combined with long stretches of fresh asphalt aboard a custom Serotta, wide shoulders, an unbroken view of the crystal blue Pacific where humpback whales breach, flat for 30+ miles except one smallish climb, and I ask you:

What. Could. Be. Better.

BIGGER.

That’s Otis at about mile 22 or so measured from Napili en route to Kihei (pronounced: “Key Hay”), my destination today. Kihei looms in the distance across the bay.

So far so good. Until…

… until you turn the corner at the south end of the island and pedal north briefly. Here, you experience a faceful of an Hawaiian trade wind that feels like the force of the hand of God forbidding entrance to heaven for past sins not absolved. The first and only thing you hear is wind, nothing but an angry headwind that fills your ears obscuring the sound of everything else. Even passing cars cannot be heard until they are right beside you. You think falling to your knees to repent may help, but it won’t. For the next three miles you suffer. No gear is low enough, the tightest tuck improves nothing. You just suffer for about three miles. Until…

…until you reach the cutoff for Kihei that involves a blessed 180° turn to the south!

All is suddenly forgiven. The trade wind is once again at your back, the road descends ahead of you, you click the front derailleur to the big ring, the rear to the smallest, and scream-pedal downhill like a little boy on his first bike — Yahoo!

Seen while walking to the beach today:

BIGGER.

I don’t think about frogs much. Or the circumstances of frog death. Was this guy desperate for fresh water and when unable to find it simply lost his will and literally dried up in the sun? His preservation was exquisite, if not also very delicate, like thin parchment. And the frozen animation — as if he was in mid leap when the life was suddenly sucked out of him.

Fascinating.

AM condo counter top.

BIGGER.

Papaya, cup o’ Kona dark roast, Happy Wife’s hand-picked flower arrangement, blogging gear, lingering evidence of PM Mai Tais, and that bowl. Not a bowl really, it’s a dried palm frond. It was a gift from the grounds crew given to Happy Wife when, sufficiently curious by the pruning of the palms, she quickly padded outside barefoot in her little black slip to inquire. Needless to say this held the burly worker men rapt for the duration.

No broken egg no omelet.

No rain no bow.

Taken from our patio.

BIGGER.

And so we traveled to the southeast side of the island today in search of the sun. We found it briefly at a beach in Wailea where we’ve been before.

While soaking in some rays we overheard the woman next to us talking on her cell phone complaining to a merchant on the mainland somewhere that the custom bracelet they made for her, the one she picked up just prior to coming to Hawaii (last Friday), the one she wore for the first time in the sun yesterday, is discoloring badly. Like it started with the gold coming off the clasp, and it’s getting worse, it looks terrible, I can’t wear it with any of my other jewelry, I mean it looks just awful, and I’m not sure why this is happening and, well, obviously I’m here and you’re there and there’s nothing to be done about it RIGHT NOW, so I’m just calling you to let you know how unhappy I am about this.

The woman was begging a stereotype: tall, slender, raven hair, preternaturally tanned, Gucci this Cartier that. When the clouds thickened she and her silver-haired husband quickly up and left leaving the towels, beach chairs and umbrella for the hotel help to clean up. Maybe that’s not too unusual behavior on the beach of a five star hotel where the rooms can run upwards of $1000/night, but it just smacked of the kind of privilege you want to throttle.

We packed it in shortly thereafter convinced the sun had lost the battle, went shopping for sandals for Happy Wife, ate chicken wings and drank Mai Tais. Duh.

Back at our condo I got a call from the neighbor that the septic problem was merely a clogged filter screen on the lift station pump. He hosed it off and replaced it, and now our house sitter is once again flushing with impunity.

For John Venlet, the Banyan Tree in Lahaina.

Planted in 1873 by Sheriff Smith it was a mere 8′ tall. Now, the canopy spans close to an acre. When the seeds of a Banyan tree sprout they send out shoots which look like skinny branches, but they’re really roots. When the shoots reach the ground they take root and eventually grow into what appears to be a separate trunk of a new tree. But the entire matrix is really one tree. Large enough to provide cover for the local art fair. Amazing.

BIGGER.

Happy Wife beneath the canopy near one of the “trunks”.

 BIGGER.

The plane lands on Maui.

Everyone turns on their phone.

Satellites acquire.

Suddenly, I hear the texts queue up on my phone: tweet, tweet… tweet, tweet, like a songbird on steroids…tweet tweet… tweet tweet tweet…

They’re all from our house sitter: Came home and the septic high water alarm was on. Won’t go off. Loud. Annoying. Neighbor came over. Nice guy. Diesel mechanic, like my son! Lucy is fine. What to do?

Happy Wife and I collapse in disbelief. NOT. AGAIN. Two years ago on the eve of our flight to Hawaii a pipe in the septic tank broke, sending the high water alarm into paroxysms. We must’ve looked like parents who just got word their child had died, judging from the looks of the deplaning passengers observing our horror.

We walk to baggage claim; I call the house sitter; the neighbor is there; troubleshooting plan is devised; tools are acquired; time passes. Snow is shoveled to expose the tank lid; screws removed and gray water tank is inspected; no break in the pipe. Yeah! And so? Test the lift station pump manually, I say. I hear the alarm screaming through the phone. Neighbor removes fuse; alarm goes silent. Time passes; the pump is tested manually. But the water, she no come. Ah ha! Bad pump. Water can’t get to the leech field. Tank fills up.

Whew. Could be worse. Much worse.

Of course, this had to happen at 11:30 pm on Friday night. Septic people don’t work Saturdays. Nevertheless, neighbor calls and leaves a message. I thank him and house sitter profusely.

The following morning a reassuring call comes from septic people: “Rod, we got your back. We’ll fix this Monday. Enjoy your vacation. No worries.”

Reassurance accepted.

And so Happy Wife and I venture out for our morning espresso near the Napili Market. Marshall waits obediently near the door for his upright to return. I tell Marshall we’re from Alaska. Marshall says, “Alaska?! Do tell. I’m all ears.”

Later, Otis and I ride to Lahaina and back (~20 mi) to get my legs . I stop at Bad Ass coffee for an iced Mocha:

Back at the condo, Happy Wife and I expose our pasty white selves:

Later still, the sun sets behind our Mai Tai’s at the Sea House bar:

No Worries.

Arm candy (aka Happy Wife) Maui bound.

Bottomless mimosas free in the fun seats at thirty thousand feet.

Heard a news report today that many Facebook users who take a hiatus from the site eventually return to become repeat users. This, in spite of the low quality posts they complain their friends make, one of the main reasons mentioned for taking the hiatus in the first place.

Never got hooked on Facebook myself. Been quietly devoted to spinning the silk of my peanut on the  WW-Web for over ten years now, and I’ve no intention of moving or duplicating my e-persona to any social network du jour, lest it become a gateway experience to the harder stuff. The one exception is LinkedIn, but I’ve not found that to be habit forming. Virtual people pop up in your inbox from time to time with exclamatory invitations, “Hi! I’d like you to join my network!” You figure, what the hell, it only costs a button click. And then you’re connected with them and they with you. A big deal? I don’t think so, except I suppose some people feel the number of connections is proportional to their professional reputation.

Got the southern fence extension up today, raising a 6-footer to an 8-9-footer, to discourage from crashing into the backyard and ravaging our trees while we’re in Maui all but the most committed moose. Wouldn’t want this happening again.

And I completed my 52nd trip around the sun yesterday. Today, my birthday, I begin the next revolution. Happy Wife bought me a guitar for my birthday. I don’t know how to play, I can barely strum a single chord, but come the completion of my 53rd revolution I’d like to be able to play (and sing) for her, Harvest Moon by Neil Young.

In a phrase a dear friend of mine who died far too early once attributed to me, “Hard hard can it be?”

Stopped at a bar in Moose Pass today en route to the beach house. I had no idea guns had to be checked with the bartender. Up here, at least in summer when business picks up, I figure that’d keep a person about as busy as an ordinary coat check girl any place else in America.

Head feels like it was injected with cotton from a gun used to spray insulation.

Ugh.

Nothing like a shot of Dextromethorphan laced with Acetaminophen to keep this cold victim sleeping soundly. Pharmacologically speaking, Dextro- is a dissociative hallucinogen, albeit a relatively mild one in the dosage I took. And it’s available over the counter — what a country!

Molecularly speaking, the active metabolite of Dextro- (like many “pro-drugs“, Dextro- is first metabolized in the liver by the CYP enzymes into an “active” drug) is an NMDA receptor antagonist. NMDA is a cell surface protein (receptor) in the brain that acts to control neural plasticity and memory. When the drug binds to NMDA it inhibits this activity. More than you wanted to know?! Consider yourself fortunate, usually you’d have to pay big bucks to learn this stuff from PhDs.

Anyhoo, I don’t know what, specifically, the Dextro- “disassociates” us from, but it sure does induce wacko dreams.

In one, I was driving a car in the city where I grew up (physically, not intellectually, that came later) and my passengers were two people I recognized I went to high school with. They’re married now, to each other, a real Ken ‘n Barbie thing. Anyway, at one point the three of us were driving on what I recall was the freeway, I went right instead of left and suddenly the road just ended. There was no time to stop. Off the edge we went, into the air, for what felt like minutes, one of those dreams where you’re helplessly falling and there’s nothing to do but wait.

We crashed into the murk of the Milwaukee River, all of us shaken but uninjured. I remember climbing from the car soaking wet and Barbie was complaining because she needed to get to work and how the hell were we going to get her car (why I was driving her car I don’t know) out of the damn river. And then we were at some house (don’t know whose) waiting for Barbie to shower and dress for work.

And then Happy Wife must’ve turned over in bed, rousing me from the dream state.

Figures I should get a cold now, we leave for Maui a week from today. We were fortunate to be able to upgrade to 1st class.

“Mr. Nibbe, is there anything more I can get for you?”

“Why yes, two more Mai Tais, and a shot of Dextromethorphan. Oh, and another Mai Tai for Happy Wife too, please, ‘cept hold the Dextro- on that one.”