A long time ago I was searching online for Hawaiian sites and happened to find Alohaworld. I spent hours at the site, reading Hanabuddda Days, where people would submit stories of their small keed times that they wanted to share with the world. Some stories are so funny and brought back memories because we can all relate to the rubbah slippahs on the okole.

Then about two years later I found this place, HawaiiStories and started reading journals and blogs by other Hawaiians and Hawaiians at heart. I wanted to join and start a journal too, I wanted to feel like I was still back home and both places gave that to me.

This past April, HawaiiStories had their HawaiiStories Hui VI which I regretfully couldn’t attend. I wish I could though because I wanted to thank Ryan in person for all he does to keep us feeling like we’re still at home and allowing me to keep my ohana and friends informed on how we’re doing here in Japan by hosting this site.

I was reading the message board at Alohaworld and found out that they are having their 4th Annual Alohaworld Pacific Northwest Mini-Gathering to be held on July 23, 2005. Noon till wenevah! We might be able to make that one since we’ll be there. It’ll be so good to be around other locals who long to be back home. Some members of Alohaworld are from the east coast so I asked that if they plan a gathering on the east coast, let me know so I can pass the information on to my ohana in Boston. If you can’t get back to the islands, then get together in somebody’s back yard right?

Kamalani has a new name for me. It’s Annabelle.

One day we were playing and she wanted me to pretend I was a four year old girl (because she wanted to be the boss since she’s five years old) so she asked me what my name was going to be. The first name to pop into my head was Annabelle. I had foolishly thought that we were only going to play pretend for that one day. Big mistake. It’s been a few days now and she calls me Annabelle in front of everyone. Of course people give me that, “I didn’t know your name was Annabelle” look so I’m always having to explain this little game we’re playing. The funny thing is that she’ll pause and say, “Okay, you’re grandma right now” then she’ll tell me what she wants as a grand daughter to her doting grandmother then immediately makes me slip back into Annabelle character.

I really should be videotaping her at this age, it could prove useful if she should someday become a multibillionaire and don’t want the tape leaking to the press. heh.

If you’re one of us Firefox users, I strongly advise that you visit the mozilla security website and read the vulnerablities announcement then follow instructions to temporarily disable javascripts when visiting untrustworthy sites.

Wishing all of you a very Happy Mother’s Day. You deserve it!

Now that all of our things are shipped we have only the basics to live with. What are the basics? For starters, it’s a 9 inch tv/vcr combo and a dvd player. Fortunately, our library has both formats for us to borrow for FREE! What a deal, right? We also have a few old sheet sets and pillows to use during the last 3 1/2 weeks here. I kept my pots and pans so I could continue to prepare meals, we might need to send that via USPS so that I’ll have them on the other side or else I’ll have no choice but to order out. That’s IF I get a phone.

On the subject of phones. It seems most of my family back home has opted to use cell phones and disconnect their home phones. They said there are pretty good phone packages and thought it was a waste of money to keep their home phone lines with the numerous unlimited cell packages available. I’m not sure which route we’ll go. I’ve been checking out some companies online but I still need to weigh the options. We’ll just need to wait and see which will work for us and our new smaller budget.

There’s still a few more things I’ll need to do before we leave here too, such as close out all of our base accounts, make sure the post office has our forwarding address (I hate missed mail), cancel cable, phones, etc. Ensure our library account is closed and no items are overdue. Get our medical records (VERY important!)

Speaking of medical records. I had a restless sleep lastnight because my knee and back was bothering me. After spending a few hours of tossing and turning, I finally got up to take some medication at 3 o’clock this morning. I usually get lower back muscle spasms when I’m stressed about something so I took a pill for that. My knee joint was also bothering me, probably due to the onset of rain so I took a different pill for that as well.

Today my stomach is turning and I feel a little lightheaded. At first I thought it was the coffee since Meg decided to brew a pot of Vanilla Kona Coffee instead of the usual Yuban that we drink. I thought somehow the coffee was upsetting my stomach until I realized that I had taken the pills early this morning. DUH! Well, at least I got the kitchen cleaned so if I should fall over and sleep I don’t have much to worry about.

Kamalani is at day care today. She looks forward to the days that she can spend there. Whenever we go to pick her up, she always begs to stay longer. At this, her teachers laugh because it wasn’t too long ago that she’d cry when we dropped her off. Now that she’s a BIG girl of 5 years old, she wants to be there to play with her friends.

Oh, that reminds me. One day she was upset when I went to pick her up and she pouted and began to tell me how her friends were being mean to her. How were they mean to her? Well, they played with other children during playtime. This upset her. I told her that it was alright for children to play with other children and they are still her friends. She folded her arms across her chest and frowned. Then she said, I’m having an apology party. In my 43 years on this earth I’ve never heard of such a thing. I’ve heard of Tupperware parties and Princess House parties and even lingerie parties but never ever ever an Apology Party. She explained that it was where all her (mean) friends would gather at our house so they could apologize to her. I love it! I should have one of those every year, just invite a shit load of people and have them apologize to me for whatever reason or no reason at all. Then they can bring me gifts while I ponder whether to forgive them or not. On their way out the door, I could slip them the invitation for the next apology party. It’s a thought, eh?

Meg just called to say she was having Mother’s Day luncheon with Kamalani at the day care center. I bet she’s so happy about that, she loves her mommy so much and she loves to brag to all her friends about how pretty her mommy is.