December 31, 2005 - Saturday - New Year's Eve

Please stay safe tonight and I'll be back next year.

Meda and I toured Washington Place yesterday morning with my mother and my sister, Bonnie, who is visiting from her home in California. It's the first time I recall hearing my mother, now 91, tell of sliding down the bannister of the main stairway at Washington Place as a girl while visiting her school friend, Sophie Judd, whose father happened to be governor at the time.

When we walked into the dining room, my mother recalled eating in the kitchen rather than the dining room. She then looked up at the large painting of Queen Liliuokalani directly ahead and immediately said the painting had been on the wall to the right when she was a girl.

There were other recollections of the grounds when she was a student at the Priory next door in the 1920s, and a few fragments repeated from my grandmother, who was five or six and also at the Priory when the queen was deposed. Curater Corinne Chun Fujimoto was scribbling notes about observations and people. A good time was had by all.

Kaaawa's tiny post office, which shares a building with Uncle Bobo's BBQ, both next door to the 7-11 store across from Swanzy Beach Park. It's always a friendly place that rarely requires a wait. It was taken a couple of days ago, but I thought this photo makes a nice year-end statement about living in Kaaawa.

Kaaawa 96730

December 30, 2005 - Friday

Prolific webmaster and podcaster Ryan Ozawa somehow had time yesterday morning to pose a question after reading the Star-Bulletin account of a race down the Pali that ended in a fatal accident.

Third paragraph, in how the police want to hear from the other driver: "We're not interested at this time in pressing charges," said Capt. Frank Fujii. Any information provided by the driver will help the family of the dead driver understand what happened, he said.

Last paragraph, explaining why -- even with new rules allowing single-car accident scenes to be processed differently and presumably faster -- the highway was still closed for hours: "We ask the public to remember that in cases like this there is a criminal act, and we want to conduct an investigation that is thorough," Fujii said.

So is the other driver in trouble or not?

The last quote confuses me, too, because the article says the investigation was completed (relatively) quickly, but that the recovery of the car is what caused the delay until midmorning.

But anyway. Happy New Year!

And this new year snippet came courtesy of Paula Bender at Oceanic Institute:

According to IntraFish today, A bluefin tuna fetched the second highest price ever paid at 9.75 million yen at Tokyo’s Tsukiji wholesale market Wednesday as bidding grew intense on greater demand ahead of the year-end holidays. The tuna was 715 pounds and caught in the Tsugaru Strait between Aomori and Hokkaido prefectures and shipped from Aomori’s Oma Port. In normal people’s terms, that’s $83,000.

Gee, sushi or a couple of cars?

This was forwarded by a friend, so I don't know the origin of this funny look at Hawaii weather reports. You Mac users will have to download a copy of Windows Media Player to view it, but it's worth it. [Oops...the server at HostRocket.com wouldn't let me upload the link before we left for the dawn walk, so it wasn't posted until just before 8 a.m.]

Dog people out there might want to take a look at this little home video made by a friend about Bei, their Japanese Tosa. They now have three dogs, it seems. A Tosa, a Mastiff, and a Great Dane. The video shows the dogs playing in their back yard, and it took me a while to realize that the smaller black dog is really a full size Dane. I'll never complain about a few cats in the bed again. I wonder where these dogs all sleep? And how much does that homeowner's liability insurance run?

I've got nothing to match those puppies playing despite being a feline Friday. Now that Leo seems the be mending, my cat worries center on Ms. Harry, a.k.a. Harriet, who has been coming home after battling some unknown foe somewhere down the hill. When she comes home and just crashes for 12 hours or more, I know to check for scratches and bites. But the good news is that she's never gone long and always comes home. Getting to that point has been a victory for us.

Ms. Harry

December 29, 2005 - Thursday

Yesterday was one of those mornings that start gray and colorless, staying that way until the sun is ready to appear and then suddenly bursting into full color.

click for larger photo

If you're interested in more information about the controversy over Hui Malama and the missing Hawaiian artifacts, you can listen to the 9th Circuit Court's oral arguments in Hui Malama's unsuccessful appeal of the permanent injunction issued by Judge David Ezra. Go to the court's web site, click on the "Audio Files" button at the upper left, and enter the case number (05-16721). It is a large file, over 6 MB, so you probably don't want to try this with a dial-up Internet connection.

There may be some out there who remember Marie Stires, a peace and welfare rights activist here in the 1960's and 1970's. Marie died in December 2002, but her family is returning her for burial at Punchbowl in an informal ceremony tomorrow (Friday) at 3 p.m. All who knew her are invited. Click here for a brief biography prepared by her family.

Marie was a familiar face to just about everyone who participated in Vietnam-era peace protests. I located several photos of her among the pictures I've previously scanned dating from 1971, including several from an April 1971 rally and march (addressing the crowd and giving instructions), at the East-West Center the following month (here, and in the next photo), and at a UH rally.

Last year, when Kaaawa School was preparing to celebrate its centennial, I was surprised to learn that Marie's family had lived here in Kaaawa for several years, and her children were in the middle of a cohort of current and former residents sharing their memories of the community. Meeting her family in what has been our home for nearly 18 years was like completing some large and formerly unseen circle of life.

December 28, 2005 - Wednesday

Yesterday's contempt of court finding against Hui Malama and the immediate jailing of one of its leaders raises the stakes in this latest internal battle between factions of the Hawaiian community. This has much more to do with internal Hawaiian politics and the relationships and personal histories of key individuals in the various groups than it does with the objects ostensibly at the center of the legal case.

Here's one rundown on the group's history, compiled from other sources. Additional details can be gleaned from the group's latest tax return for the tax year ending September 29, 2004 (this is a large file of about 1 MB, so be careful if you're using a dial-up Internet connection).

I haven't found the legal documents online anywhere. Posting those would be a useful project for the public.

For all the Dartmouth fans who were concerned about the story regarding surveillance of a Dartmouth student (U Mass-Dartmough and not the Ivy League Dartmouth), it turns out that the whole tale was a hoax. The story fell apart as national and international media clamored for more information about the case, eventually forcing the student to reveal the hoax.

I forgot to mention that we saw a green flash as the sun rose from behind Molokai on Monday morning.

December 27, 2005 - Tuesday

Just about every day, my inbox contains a new email from former Bishop Estate insurance executive Bobby Harmon. The subject--still more names being added to the witness list in a long and complicated arbitration the origins of which are almost lost in the mountain of case documents produced over the years. It started with Harmon's lawsuit against Bishop Estate, led to a bankruptcy filing, and several court orders to stop sending out information about the case, which Harmon appears to have simply ignored or continously challenged.

Just in the last month or so, Harmon has filed notices that he intends to add or expand the roles of witnesses including Star-Bulletin owner David Black, Steve Case, Henry Paulson (CEO of Goldman Sachs) Judge Barry Kurren, Duncan MacNaughton, Charles Schwab, Dan Inouye, Walter Dods, and others.

When I saw David Black's name on the list I got curious and looked up the full witness list on Harmon's web site. Anybody who is anybody is there. Gov. Lingle and Lt. Gov. Aiona, OHA's Haunani Apoliona, former governor's George Ariyoshi and John Waihee, Attorney General Mark Bennet, the list goes on and on. Wait--I was surprised to find my name there along the list along with reporters Sally Apgar, Jim Dooley, and Rick Daysog.

Whether Harmon qualifies as a full-fledged nut job, a shrewd pro se litigator, or a first-rate conspiracy buster remains to be determined, I guess.

More than you can possibly digest can be found at Harmon's web site, The Catbird Seat.

December 26, 2005 - Monday

I would normally object to the sounds of Leo playing with a small rodent in the living room, but I'm trying to be open minded this morning because it's another sign of his continued recovery and he's having so much fun. The pronoun there referring, of course, to Mr. Leo rather than to the rodent.

Doug Thompson of Capitol Hill Blue expands this morning on his rant reviewing their success at breaking major news stories long before the mainstream corporate media.

We've heard that one of our neighbors is hoping to remarry but there's a hitch. She was divorced in Mississippi and, in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, can't prove it. The court is closed, its records are somewhere in Texas, the building that housed her attorney's office is gone, and her case and many others have entered legal limbo.

Here's one outline of the legal chaos, but the human impact of the problem seem to be somewhat understated.

Would Hawaii's legal records be safe in a similar situation? I don't know whether there's been a survey of offices that hold Hawaii's vital records, from court archives to real estate and banking records. I imagine the private sector banks are in much better shape than public agencies in terms of disaster preparedness. The courts are so strapped for space that they've got files stored in all kinds of unusual places, and it isn't hard to imagine extensive hurricane damage with public buildings that already leak when it rains.

Hmmmmm. Come to think of it, maybe some of that state surplus and disaster preparedness needs to be directed towards proper records retention.

In any case, I'm preparing to enjoy a day of recuperation from the weekend's extravagance. I think I'll avoid the hand-to-hand combat at the malls and just stay around home. Then, I suspect, the New Year's parties begin tomorrow.

December 25, 2005 - Sunday

Christmas morning did not start well.

First there was the cat chase and crash that destroyed a favored vintage California Craftsman serving bowl (which matched this set), and then a computer crash that took down the little 'Twas-the-morning-of-Christmas poem I wrote about the disaster while waiting for Meda to get up and hear the bad news.

But we're going to persevere. It could, as I always say, be worse.

And we were lucky enough to celebrate last night with my sister, Bonnie, and her husband, Ray Stevens, visiting from California, and my parents, John and Helen Lind. They all drove out from town for dinner and presents in the country. And a good time was had by all except the cats, who had to watch the festivities from the periphery.

Merry Christmas from all of us

On Christmas Eve morning, I was down the block by 5 a.m., where an imu was being prepared at the home of Spike and Rita Denis. Their son was in charge of the imu, and grandson was getting his first real lesson in the art. Just click on this photo for a look at the whole process.