Waves at sunset

Great pic of a guy getting tossed...right of center.

CSI: Caruso

For the first time since maybe season one...I am watching an episode of CSI. I think this happens to be CSI: Miami. I tend to steer clear of television drama, because, honestly, I don't have the attention span for it. Something caught my eye tonight, and I'm glad I've stayed away.

Here's the reason for this entry: Either David Caruso is the most annoying person on the planet, or the writers of CSI: Miami are just trying to make me not want to watch their show..."Dare ya not to watch," they sneer. In the span of two scenes, lasting a combined two minutes, Caruso addressed the person he was talking to by name six times. Example, Caruso: "What do we have, Alex?" (Presumably) Alex: "Two dead bodies, both under 21. I just don't like it." Caruso: "Neither will their parents, Alex."

As I was transcribing this example, Caruso did it two (scratch that) five more times while interrogating a suspect. C: "Nick, take hime away. Later, Chris."

Has anyone else noticed this, or are you too scared to admit you watch...?

My favorite things too...

Ok, I admit. When I saw a commercial for Oprah's "Favorite Things" show, I thought, "I'd like to watch that." I love it when that crazy lady "gives" stuff away.

(Just so everyone knows and doesn't get any delusions of charity, the companies whose products are featured on this show donate the items to Oprah's show as a tax write-off and in return get the best ever free advertising to the demographic with, typically, the most Christmas-present buying power...)

Sidenote: While I worked at Target, I had an extremely well-to-do 65+ year old woman come in the day after the show, wander back to the electronics department, and ask if she NEEDED a pod-thingy, referring, of course, to an IPOD...and, of course, I responded that she definitely needed one. (I wish Target paid comission, or at all, for that matter).

As further testament to my above belief, oprah.com has the following statement below it's picture of the Sony Vaio...

Having trouble ordering your favorite thing? Due to heavy traffic, some websites may become inaccessible throughout the day. We suggest you try again later!

So everyone is clear, again, this quote is posted below a Notebook Computer with a MSRP of $1599.00. Oh, to have that power for one afternoon! "Well, if it's good enough for Oprah..."

My best tally is that the total amount that these (well-deserving) Katrina support workers walked away with is (approximately) $4900, not including the Neimann Marcus diamond watch where no price was listed...

Another Sidenote: Spell-check has not joined the Oprahsphere, because it suggested I change "Oprah" to "ovary"
....fitting.

$1599 Sony Vaio Notebook.

$299 New Blackberry device plus 3-months Unlimited T-Mobile service.

$299 20GB Video IPOD

Michigan...will you ever learn?

An 18 year old high school student becomes mayor of Hillsdale, MI. click here and here
And by the quotes you'd never know this kid is like, totally, still in high school.

Even I didn't realize how close we were to Pearl Harbor. But here's the thing...if I want to go to the Arizona Memorial (somewhere around 10 o'clock on the pic), it would take me about 40 minutes drive.

Arial view of my habitat. Or a close approximation...Brandon, Magee...is this about right? White Plains is the place to surf on the Leeward side.

Novembrrrr

That's how we say "November" in New Brunswick.

I just realized a few minutes ago that it was November. It doesn't usually take me 8 days to adjust to a new month...I keep glancing back at the calendar to make sure it doesn't say June; just checked again, and it doesn't.

It's 10:00pm here and I just walked outside to take some trash to the curb. One year ago to the minute (I'm quite sure of this) I walked outside wearing similar clothes to perform the same task. Tonight I strolled to the curb and thought, "What a nice night." I think my thought from last year was, "Where are my freakin' shoes?"

It's probably about 72 degrees right now in Hawaii...ok, according to weather.com it's 75. They have Muncie, IN (last place of residence) listed at 64 (not bad Indiana), and 0 degrees Celsius (or 32 degrees Farenheit, for you uncultured types) in Moncton, New Brunswick, Canada (my birthplace).

While I was surfing today, someone asked me if I was cold...She must have been kidding, I kinda did one of those double takes, "Are you serious? I'm surfing in Novembrrr," I said.

New Phone #'s

JoAnna and I both have new cell numbers making our old number obsolete. If you did not receive an email containing the new number, leave a comment and I will make sure you get it.

The other silver guy

Parrot-top

The silver guy

Bored...in Hawaii?

Another band shot.

Clear water.

Stairs...

Danger!

The band shot

Waikiki/Honolulu from Diamond Head

Brandon and Magee on Diamond Head

View of Waikiki from Diamond Head...

Lighthouse

View from Diamond Head

In the tube.

Swinging

Hanging around

Lucas Horsman's Playground

A view that's a little too common.

Great shot (from Magee) on Waikiki

Still waiting

White Plains beach...Brandon is waiting patiently to use his board.

Surfer baby.

At the show

Biking in the neighborhood

Bike

Sand-baby

Magee and Brandon hitting the water.

Paddling out.

Bubbles!

My 7'10"

Lagging

I've fallen so far behind in updates, it's hard to know where to start.
There isn't much to tell, I guess.

Brandon left on Wednesday to visit LA/Vegas on his way back to Indy...now we're mostly all alone. Tony, JoAnna's high school friend's brother, is staying with us for another three weeks. He is gone most of the time though.

School is going well. The last two weeks have been the busiest since I've been here...the Vice Pricipal was out to a week long conference, my fellow counselor (School-Based Behavioral Health Specialist or SBBH) had back surgery and was out for a week and a half (leaving all his counseling duties to me) and our Principal is always out one or two days a week. That left me as the only non-teacher administrative type person at the school for two full days, and a few half days. This means I basically have to perform all of those jobs (Principal, VP, SBBH, and School Counselor) on those days. Combine that with the suicidal pandemic that is sweeping our 3-6 graders, and we have a very busy day.

But, when you can leave school and surf until sundown...you tend to forget about the bad stuff.

I'm going to try and add some new pictures now...last time didn't work...

Finally, a new post

I now have high speed internet...thank you earthlink!

It's been a while. We've been busy...apparently. JoAnna is somewhere around 6 weeks pregnant. Number 2 on the way. For those of you who are disappointed to not hear in person or at least over the phone...deal with it. And we're sorry.

Magee has come and gone...he left this week. Brandon is still here, for another 7 days.

Surfing is probably the most exciting thing to do with 2 hours of any given day.

Here are some pictures.

Momma and baby

Random skyline from the beach

Diamond Head from Waikiki

Waikiki sunset

I call him "Goldie Mon"

The boys

sun sets on Waikiki

Another Iroquois Point view.

View from the beach in Iroquois Point (where we're moving), you can see Honolulu and Diamond Head Mountain (where we live now).

I never would have believed this would be in my office.

Random office photo

Lucas and daddy in his office.

Make it official

Finally. After two and a half months of being in Hawaii, we can finally make it official. I went surfing today. Well, sort of. I took a surfboard into the ocean and paddled until I couldn't move my arms, got into a pre-standing position at least twice, but didn't have a lot of success.

Magee and I both got lucky with some good used boards yesterday (Saturday), Magee's was $240, and I managed to get mine for a mere $150...same basic board, mine 7'10" and Magee's 8' both "Funboards."

We grabbed our boards while Lucas and the post night-shift JoAnna slept and walked down to Waikiki to join the masses. There were surfers everywhere. It's sort of surreal getting into the water to try and do something you've only read about and seen others do. We weren't very successful (as noted above).

After everything...it's definitely something I will be doing more of, maybe tomorrow...