How are these men similiar?

It would probably help to know who they are.

Well, most people will be able to ID Nelson Mandela.

You know, the 90 year old Nobel Peace Prize winner only recently removed from the US Government's terrorist watch list...one down, 999,999 "security risks' to go! That Ed Kennedy guy still probably has an axe to grind about that thing in Dallas, but I digress.

The other guy....no one? Bueller? Bueller?

Well, here's how I got started on this.

I was listening to the BBC's reporting on Nelson Mandela's 90th birthday and they mentioned that he was "South Africa's first democratically elected president". This got me to thinking.

If universal suffrage = democracy (and conversely less than universal suffrage <> democracy) then I wondered who was the US's first democratically elected president?

Washington? Yeah right...No it took another 133 years after him to actually elect a president democratically in the USA.

Any guesses? Well, I did pretty much give it away by showing his picture above.

Warren G. Harding btw.

Happy Birthday Jake!

And Kevin Bacon too. And that dude who invented the Zeppelin...um...what's his name again? Oh and the Wall Street Journal! And Marty Feldman!

Only Jake got coffee ice cream cake on the deck though. And dinosaurs, airplanes, cards, hugs, etc.

Yet another music quiz

More bands than 8-bit rockers!

Now with answers!

This quiz made the rounds a couple years ago but I'd never seen it till recently.

Make a pot of coffee, turn off the phone, and make sure the boss is out of the office since it's gonna take a while and you'll need help from friends and/or family.

DOWNLOAD HERE - you'll need to have MS Excel to play.

Dinner on the deck redux

Eating out on the deck in the summer, just like back in 2005.

Father's Day

There was this one time when Kim said "OK. It's your birthday. Pick where you want to go out to eat."

Much to her chagrin, I picked Denny's.

Now in my defense, I did pick the best Denny's in the whole wide world. Which one you ask?


The one across the street from (and with a fantastic view of) Wakiki Beach. Sadly, it's no longer a Denny's and the Grand Slam Breakfasts anytime 24/7 are a long forgotten greasy dream/

This Father's Day Kim showed that she'd been paying attention for the last 19.5 years (yes, you read that right). Instead of asking "Where do you want to go?" she had her own suggestion ready to go when everybody was up and about last Sunday Morning.

She suggested a place that had special significance for me, one that made me wax nostalgic for the days when I was the kid and my dad would get up early to make sure that I had a special Sunday breakfast waiting for me when I woke up.

"How about Jack In The Box?"

Ahhhh. Croissant supreme combo meal. What a treat.

Yes. A Jack In The Box croissant was my Proustian madeleine, transporting me back to Tucson Arizona in the 1980's. Perhaps not as interesting a voyage as fin de siecle Paris but it's all I got, so deal.

Of course the kids had no idea (until I told them) that this was such a treat for me. Jack in the box. Where I drank my first cup of coffee as a 14 year old (or so). Gene and I got up early one weekend morning, drove across town and before getting started on a solar water heater kit for the house that we would build at a local school cafeteria under the supervision of somebody who (unlike us) knew his hammers from his screwdrivers. Before this we stopped off for a breakfast at JITB.

I'm sure it was loaded with so much sugar and half & half/non-dairy creamer, I would gag on if I were to drink it today, but damned if I can't picture that JITB on the corner of Campbell and Broadway (OK a block or two east of Campbell, but you know the one).

Figuring that the kids would like something more, well, kid-like, I got them the French Toast sticks which came with syrup and a dusting of powdered sugar.

Jake was happily chomping away when he took a look over at my Supreme Croissant.

"I want some!"

I rip off a chuck...hand it to him.

"More than that!....Let's switch...You can have mine"

I shudder to admit it, but I honestly got a little choked up....



The rest of the day was as mellow and relaxed as you could imagine. Watched the kids jump about at gymnastics.

Went home and played some Waterworks. Watched the swordfight from Princess Bride to give us ideas on choreography.

NOTE: Now when swordfighting Jake will throw his green foam weapon up, conspicuously switch hands and exclaim "I am not lefthanded!"



Went to Chuck E. Cheese/the ceramics store to 1. Play the Star Wars video game and 2. pick up Lily's handpainted ceramic dog bowl for S. Sparkle.

Then off to the beach to play in the sand and watch the full on summer swell until the sun went down.

Day well spent.

No. I've not taken up huffing...

Pleny people around the museum got a kick out of me in my makeup for my Cetacean Idol bluescreen work. Hope you get as much enjoyment as they did....

Take a look at this to see what the facepaint was all about:



Must say it made my day when I made this highlight reel of Cetacean Idol facts/songs/judges, posted it to YouTube and found out that there were already videos of people playing my game!

Way cool.

A ride on TheBoat

Uncle Charlie (aka Zach's Dad) had been telling us about TheBoat ofor a while now, but we hadn't got it together with them until the other day.

TheBoat is one of those classic city/state traffic relief demonstration boondoggles: too many people drive so, hmmmm, let's offer boat service! Except make it really difficult for them...like not allowing parking at the "commuter" end of the line.

But that being said, when you stop and think about it as a simple FUN/$ ratio and not as a means of commuting, it's a helluva great deal. Here's the scoop:

• 1hr boat ride each way along the south side of O‘ahu from Aloha Tower to Barber's Point


• Spectacular views


• Indoor seating with A/C


• outdoor seating with great view of the sizeable wake...


• ...cuz TheBoat hauls ass

Total cost, round trip for me and two chillun: $6
First intro to maritime adventures: well, still that same price, as above....
Getting both kids back to Aloha Tower with nobody having tossed their respective cookies: worth considerably more than $6 but no, not priceless. Let's be real.

Newest creation

Just finished a Yak. Not the beast of burden but the Soviet WWII fighter.

Jake graduates!

Next stop kindergarten. Jake didn't give us the satisfaction of letting us layer on the leis until we couldn't see his blue eyes. Took them all off except the homemade lei by Tutu Kane and Lily.

"And so my fellow graduates, this is not an end, but rather a beginning...."

The two Children Center alums"

"Yeah? You should see the other guy!"

Went to pick up Lily the other day and found her nursing a seriously nasty looking bump. She collided with her friend who escaped completely uninjured and left Lily with a Rocky Balboa level shiner. Took three days till Lil would let me take a picture of it. By that time we had taken a battery of x-rays to insure the soundness of her zygomatic arch.

Took Lily a couple days to want to be seen in public as well, and that was fine with me since I'm sure a few people were thinking "Hmmm....CPS...where's their number?" when the two of us would walk by.

Pensive Lily

Before above obviously.

Guitaircraft Carrier

Came home to this interesting mashup the other day:

Whales Exhibit

So it finally opened. On May 16th we had what by Bishop Museum standards was a pretty damn good opening night crowd: probably about 500 members and friends.

Definitely a big team effort with help from education, collections, B & G, and many more.... Here's us moving everybody's favorite whale related collections piece from the Vert Zoo collection: our whale penis boat bumper. Yep.

Back in the whaling days, resourceful sailors used every part of the whale's penis. And yes, it really does take three people to move it since it's stuffed with sawdust.

Here's a picture of me regaling our summer intern with an amusing anecdote about summering in the Hamptons, sailing with Bill Buckley and...wait.

No, this is me pretending I have a 6 foot cock. That's right.

Kids playing with the custom made, handpainted foam puzzles:

And some more playing "Humpback Migration" - basically "Candyland" with blubber. Mmmmmm...muktuk!

Brain (whale and human) models for comparison and lice (real and just whale) to gross out the kiddies:

Random bones from the collection and our life sized whale tail wall in the background:

Some humans for scale:

Of course the big draw isn't all the extra junk we all worked so hard to make, but the big whale robots:

Here's a link to the inspiration for the above video.

Lily letting off steam

8-bit Rockers

At the gym where the kids do gymnastics every weekend, there's a old magazine exchange. I ran across a WIRED magazine and they had an article on "artists" who create cover songs apparently to fool people into downloading/buying them from the iTunes store accidentally on purpose. Anyway, just a two paragraph info blurb, but the article's header image was this waycool graphic of musicians and bands turned into 8-bit pixel versions.

I can only get 35 out of the 43. Try see if you can name them....

Dinner Conversation, Part the Second

Dad is in the kitchen prepping dinner (spaghetti in this case) and the rest of the family are tasked with setting the table.

Lily: Jake, I'm sitting there.

Jake: I AM!

L: You sit there and I'll sit here....

J: I want to sit by dad.

L: Me too....

J: It should be boy girl boy girl

L: It should be biggest to smallest...

J: You should sit at the head of the table...

L: No, dad should....

J: OK. Then I'll sit at....THE PENIS OF THE TABLE !

At this point "table setting" ceases and a discussion of what different section of a table should be called ensues:

butt
nose
bottom
penis (again)
face
ear
etc....

Dinner Conversation

After telling Jake and Lily about my day I said

"You know when I was your age I thought I was gonna grow up and be a paleontogist and go all over and look for fossils. Wonder what you guys are gonna do when you grow up"

Lily: I'm gonna be a farmer cuz I like chicks.
(INSERT OBVIOUS ONE LINER HERE)

Jake: I'm gonna make syrup !

Dad: I thought you were gonna be a pilot.

Jake: I am. A pilot who makes syrup.

"One hour before..."

Kim and I have become major addicts of the new Battlestar Galactica. We went through three and a half seasons of episodes in the last 6 months and email each other with plot predictions, philosophical questions, and wondering when we won't have to suffer through YET ANOTHER "does Starbuck love Apollo/Apollo love Starbuck" episode again.

One of their favorite devices is to end an episode or season with (duh) a cliffhanger. More than a few times you get to the end of an episode and there's been some INSANE plot twist in the last five minutes. Their favorite method of getting out of the tight spot is to begin the following episode with the briefest of recaps then a "ONE HOUR BEFORE" subtitle that shows you why everything you know is wrong.

So I'll try a little BSG-style non-linear narrative.

DINNER TABLE - PRESENT
Brad, at home drinking a glass of fine single malt scotch at the dining room table. He's lost in thought. A thin smile on his face, he shakes his head and has another sip. Kim is watching tv...

Kim: You're home early...

DOCTOR'S OFFICE - TWO MONTHS EARLIER
Doctor: So what brings you in today?
Brad: Well, I had my 40th birthday a few months ago..don't I have to do regular checkups and stuff?
Doc: Well, not really. Those usually start a little later - 50 usually for the prostate and colon exams...
Brad (THINKING): SWEET ! See you in ten years man !
Doc: We can run some regular blood tests...I see you could use a tetanus shot....been ten years....blood pressure seems fine....you get exercise?
Brad: Sure. I go surfing. Well, that's pretty much my only exercise...
Doc: Do you drink?
Brad: Yeah...
Doc: How much...one drink a week? Every day?
Brad: Pretty much everyday..usually two beers.
Doc (SIGNIFICANT LOOK): Hmmm...
Brad (THINKING): And maybe more on Friday or Saturday....I'll just keep that to myself. Was that a significant look he just gave me?

DINNER TABLE - PRESENT
Brad (THINKING): Well I'm drinking tonight. I'm celebrating...I don't care if it's Wednesday...

Brad: Remember last week? It was all rainy and cold and I had woken up after I'd had a dream that I been bitten by a shark...?

Kim: Yeah. And I told you you weren't allowed to surf. Yes.

Brad: And I didn't....well, today was perfect!

KITCHEN - FIVE DAYS EARLIER
Brad is making dinner for the kids. Open refrigerator and see at least five..six bottles of Newcastle Brown Ale. Mmmmmmmm.....
Brad (THINKING): You know what? No beer tonight. No alcohol for a week. Not as a diet, not as anything more than an experiment. Damn that doctor with his pregnant pauses....just see what it's like. Maybe I HAVE been drinking to much....well not like two beers is TOO much. Nevertheless - nothing for a week.

DINNER TABLE - PRESENT
Brad (THINKING): OK. Failed experiment. And everything was going so well...it was all so perfect.

Kim: So you didn't want to go hang out at Burke's house?

Brad: Nope. Wanted to come home.

WARD AVENUE NEAR KEWALO BASIN - TWO HOURS EARLIER
"Timed the lights perfectly! The museum to the parking lot in less than 15 minutes. Dave told me that the waves were great this morning and the onshore winds haven't materialized....There's gonna be such a crowd...No way I'm getting a parking spot."

Turn off of Ala Moana and into the harbor access road.

"I should just grab a spot here and take the walk...ahhh what the hell. See if I can get lucky. NO WAY. Not just any spot. The closest one! I haven't gotten to park here in years since people learned about this spot. COOL!"

The paddle out is heartening...glassy waves...barely a breath of wind. And good size waves. Looks like a summer style swell at least a month early. Short waits between sets. Five to ten foot faces. Plenty of waves in each set. ALRIGHT!

DINNER TABLE - PRESENT
"Man it's only just getting too dark to surf NOW. I should be paddling in now...instead here I am breaking my promise to myself. I should still be out there...." Another sip of whiskey. *SNORT* "Yeah, right"

KEWALO'S - STRAIGHT OUTS - ONE HOUR EARLIER <---See there it is !
"Cool. The crowd's thinning. I've still got nearly an hour left out here before it get's too dark to see. How many waves have I gotten? There was the was the one where I made that section..the one where the boogie boarder went right....the one where I caught the one after the guy with the purple board....the other one.."

Movement on my right and a splash. Stand up paddle surfer heads out past to get the first shot at the next big wave.

"Stand up paddling. God that looks weird. Must be tiring to always be stand....what the hell?"

Near the paddle surfer, black shapes slowly move across the face of a small waves.

"Plastic?"

The shapes move in synch. Slowly. Fifty feet away. Moving parallel to shore.

"Triangle..."

Shapes are not shapes. Shapes are parts. Parts of a whole.

DINNER TABLE - PRESENT
Kim: So how big?
Brad: You know I was thinking about that. I was thinking that surfers are probably good at estimating sizes in the water cuz we're always looking at 9' surfboards, 10' surfboards, 7' surfboards as we paddle around. You just know that even when you're fifty feet away, that one over there is a 9' longboard..."

KEWALO'S - 55 MINUTES AGO
"HOLY SHIT. That's a shark. That's a big shark. Dorsal to tail..at least 6-8 feet...that's means...like what? 9-12 feet...I'm getting the hell out of here."

The paddle in is unlike any I've ever had. The stand up guy is MOVING - getting inside as fast as he can.

Usually surfers arrive and leave spots in a slow dribble. Rarely is there a mass entrance or exodus. Today. Within 60 seconds two surf spots with glassy swell waves, formerly host of more than 30 people, riding and laughing, now has a population of one.

DINNER TABLE - PRESENT
"You know, that was the first shark that I ever saw surfing. That baby hammerhead from way back didn't count - he was actually kind of cute. This was scary...glad to be home safe and sound.....I'll drink to that."

Experiment over.

The dangers of googling your own name

Reminders of mortality

Spring Break 08

Had a great Spring Break.

Went to Kaua‘i where we attended a baby 1st lū‘au on a part of a 600 acre ranch and came back the next day for the paniolo style Easter Egg Hunt. Lotsa denim, barbed wire, ranch hands on atv's, and such.

We got a cabin up in Kōke‘e where the kids got a chance to do their first multi-mile hike and see some of the rare native birds. No new ones for my life list but over the course of ten days of hikes and camping on two islands the kids got off to a good start on theirs:

• ‘amakihi


• ‘elepaio


• ‘apapane


• pueo


• Laysan Albatross


• Wandering Tattler


• And, well, chickens...lots and lots of chickens..I mean Jungle Fowl

I got a chance to surf a windy Poipu while the kids explored tidal pools and looked for crabs. Kim and I went out one night up in the forest and saw the brightest satellite that I've ever seen. I was sure it had to be the International Space Station and when I got home I double checked. Here's a useful resource if you want to know which satellite that you saw the other night, or if you are planning a trip out to the country where you'll have a nice view of the sky, which ones might be visible for your trip. NASA's Skywatch Page.

Spent nights in the cabin playing Go Fish and teaching Jake The Awful Green Things From Outer Space Maybe too well since he pwned me - quick learner that guy.

By the end of the trip the kids asked if we could move to Kaua‘i, or failing that, go camping every weekend.