Melicious Details

Campaigning Hawaiian Style

We just returned from a week with our friends at their home in Hanalei on the island of Kauai.  If you've never been to Hanalei, you should go, I promise you will love it.  And if you have been there, you know Hanalei is in one of the most remote area of the state, on the north shore of the island, not far from where the road literally ends at Ha'ena beach.

Not reading the paper or watching the news was one of the highlights of the trip.  I was tired of hearing about John and Sarah and Barack and Joe, so happily spent a few days in a haze induced by sunshine, seawater, mai tais and the view of Bali Hai.  But it turned out not to be possible to completely escape the elections.

The campaign for Mayor of Kauai (who knew each island had it's own mayor?) was in full swing.  We found this out when we drove about 10 miles to Kilauea on the only road going south.  It's called the Kuhio Highway but do not picture anything like Highway 101 because it's a two lane road bordered by lush trees, bougainvillea and taro fields.  As we got close to town, we saw several groups of people along the side of the road.  Everyone was relaxed, sitting in beach chairs or standing in the shade of the large umbrellas they had set up.  At first I thought they might be waiting for a parade, but no, they were holding signs - the kind every political candidate prints up with their name in big letters.

One candidate's supporters were on one side of the road, while friends of the opposition were a bit farther down, on the other side.  And what exactly were they doing?  Smiling and waving at every car that drove by.  No yelling or name calling, no impersonations or finger pointing.  Just people supporting their candidates, in the most charming and civilized way.

Most Bizarre Conversation Ever.

I was in my yoga class yesterday and a woman I don't really know came up to me and said "Did I just see you walking down the street with a turtle?"

I stared at her, thinking, did she just say turtle?  Does she mean Turtle, the guy on Entourage?  Or those chocolate covered nut and caramel candies called turtles?  Or maybe she meant those little green turtles that my mom use to buy me when I was a kid until my Dad decided they would give me salmonella?  

Needing to clarify, I said,  "A turtle?"

The woman said yes.  She held her hands up in the shape of a dinner plate.  "A turtle.  A large one."

I tried to form a mental image of a woman walking a large turtle. "Was it on a leash?" 

"No", she said. (The fact that neither of us has started cracking up at the ridiculousness of this entire conversation is astounding.)  "It was just walking next to her.  So it wasn't you?"

"Um. No. It wasn't me." 

And then I had to go sit on my mat and meditate all of that out of my brain.

Breaking my own rule.

This blog is either about everything or nothing, depending on how you look at it.  But I did decide there were a few topics I wouldn't write about. Like politics.  Or religion.  Scientology is not a religion, so no problem there.  I also try to carefully balance myself on the fine line that separates honesty and oversharing.

So on to the off limits topic of politics:  I really like this point of view regarding the marketing blunders of the McCain campaign. 

A picture of what my day can be like.

Since escaping from the corporate world, I now have the fluid, flexible, full of random unstructuredness kind of daily schedule that I'd always dreamed of.  And Oh My God.  I love it so much.  But all of this freedom has also unleashed my Inner Procrastinator, who uses my laptop as her Primary Tool of  Procrastination Domination like you would not believe. I've observed this development with horror and fascination, and have tried a couple times to write down (being a word person, not a picture person) how it happens. I could never really capture it though. But then Drew sent me a flowchart, and yeah, this is exactly it.

3 Degrees of Separation. Or Less.

I love how the internet makes it so easy to find and connect with people you haven't seen in years.  And of course the internet also means you can't really hide from the people you haven't seen in years and wish to God you never have to see again.

The distance between you and someone you know and then someone else you also know (both of whom you think could not possibly ever know each other because it would just be too random and an uncanny coincidence if they did) well, that distance used to be called Six Degrees of Separation, only now it has been reduced to (thank you Worldwide Web!) Three Degrees.

My latest example of this?  My friend Melissa invited me to the Taos Writer's Spa where I met Karen, who lives in Miami. Karen took some great photos during our week in Taos, including a couple of Melissa and I. 

So here's where the world gets small. Last year Karen had gone to Ann Arbor for a reunion of sorority sisters, and runs in to Kathryn Ullrich, who she hasn't seen in years. They chat, they catch up, they stay in touch. In fact, Kathryn (who now lives in the Bay Area) had recently told Karen that she (Karen) had motivated Kathryn to write her book, which is in the process of being published.

When Karen posted her Taos photos on Snapfish last week and emailed the link to her friends, Kathryn saw me in one of the photos and sent Karen an email saying "How do you know Melissa Dyrdahl??"

And how do I know Kathryn?  I was one of women she interviewed for her book.