"And your books will be due..."

When's the last time you saw one of those in a library book?? It's been over a decade since I've gotten a due date stamped in a library book, but that's how they do things here in Hawaii. At first I thought it was extremely old-school. But the more I thought about it, I realized it's genius. They still scan the books' barcodes into the computer, but they stamp your books instead of printing out a receipt with the due date. This is great for two reasons:

a) It saves tons of paper. Think how many trees are used to make paper for library receipts that most people don't even use? And then that paper goes into the trash, which adds to the already packed landfills. Obviously one reciept in a bag of trash doesn't make a difference, but imagine how many bags would be filled if you combined all the thrown-away library receipts in America in one year!

b) Printed receipts are easy to lose. I often used to end up checking my online account to see when my books were due because I'd misplaced or accidentally tossed the receipt. This way, you always know exactly when your book is due because the date is right inside the cover.

Not many of Hawaii's policies seem to be things other states would want to emulate (Furlough Fridays for example!), but I think this is an excellent idea. I wonder why libraries moved away from date-stamping in the first place?

And here's a picture I just snapped of Conan, lounging with his newest toy. I hate taking his picture with the flash because it always makes his eyes look weird. I wish photo editing programs would come with a pet-eye feature similar to the red-eye feature for humans.

Hawaiian Centipede

I discovered an interesting visitor in our living room when I woke up yesterday morning. We'd heard about Hawaiian centipedes, but this was our first encounter with one. Other than looking super creepy, they're apparently posionous to young kids and pets. And their bite is supposed to be extremely painful. Luckily, this one was on his way to centipede heaven/hell already so he didn't protest too much when Jarrod scooped him up in a plastic bag. (Yes, I woke Jarrod up and made him come deal with it.) The protrusions off the back end looked like stingers to me, but I later read that's actually just a defense mechanism to fool predators into thinking that's its head. The business end is definitely the front. I've also heard and read that they're extremely hard to kill and no amount of stomping or smashing will do away with one; you have to chop it apart somehow. Luckily, since this one was pretty much beyond fighting back, we didn't have to deal with making a mess on the carpet. (Or, more likely, transporting him outside and away from our yard to go frighten another family.) They can supposedly grow to around six inches long and two inches across. Our 42-legged friend was about four or five inches long.

High Surf Advisory

There honestly aren't many things I enjoy about the local Hawaii news, but I do like the weather segment. They always show sunset pictures and talk about surfing conditions and wave heights. My favorite thing is the "high surf advisory" icon on the forecast. It cracks me up every time, the way the guy fell off his surf board and looks like he's about to get eaten by a massive, ferocious wave!

Beach Video

For Christmas, my parents got us a wonderful gift -- a pocket-sized video camera. I've been trying it out for two months now and finally got around to putting the videos on the computer. I was a little disappointed in how they came out -- kind of blurry and choppy. I know this is a good camera though, so I'm sure the error was on my end. I'm going to sit down with the instruction manual and see what I can figure out. One video came out pretty good, though, and I posted it on YouTube. It's from one of our trips to the beach. Here's the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tMP5h_y4gs0 Enjoy!

Flora

One of the things I love about Hawaii is the adundance of beautiful flowers. They are everywhere -- and I'm so jealous of people who have gorgeous flowering shrubs or trees in their yards. (We just have palm trees.) I read somewhere that many of Hawaii's plants and flowers are actually not native but were brought here by settlers. Interesting! Apparently Hawaii doesn't have all that many native species. In fact, there are only two mammals native to Hawaii, the monk seal (which I really hope to see in the wild here at some point) and the hoary bat. But back to the topic at hand: below are pictures of some common Hawaiian flowers as well as a few really neat, not-as-common ones.

This is my favorite flower that I've come across so far. We passed it when we were driving up Mount Tantalus and I made Jarrod stop the car so I could run back and take a picture of it. Despite tons of Googling, I can't figure out what it's called, but I think it's so gorgeous!

Hibiscus -- these are EVERYWHERE and come in an amazing array of colors.

Ginger flower. These are semi-common. I think they're used a lot in landscaping and gardening.

Canna -- this reminds me of blown glass.

Hawaiian cactus. (I don't know why this picture insisted on turning sideways -- sorry.)

Bougainvillea -- these flowering bushes are extremely common and come in all sorts of colors ranging from light orange to bright pink to purple. I loved them so much I bought a small plant for our front porch.

Bird of paradise. These are also fairly common.

One flower I really wanted to include is the plumeria, but I didn't have a good picture of one. The common ones are white with a yellow center and grow on trees. (There are some similar flowers in colors like pink and purple, and I assume those are also in the plumeria family.) They smell DIVINE and are very popular in leis. My neighbor has a plumeria tree in her yard, so I might have to sneak over and take some pictures!

Birds, Birds and More Birds!

Hawaii has tons of amazing birds and I've been working on taking pictures of them since we got here. My pictures aren't that good and I hope to take better ones eventually, but this will give you an idea of some of the birds who frequent our yard (except the last one, who frequents the dog beach). The coolest bird I've seen so far is an albatross on our hike to Makapu'u Lighthouse. I tried to photograph him but he was too far away, and by the time we hiked closer he had decided to tuck his head into his wing and take an afternoon nap.

Another bird I really like is the Hawaiian Cardinal. It looks somewhat similar to typical cardinals (which also live in Hawaii) but in addition to a bright red head, it has a white breast, gray wings and tail, and a huge mohawk.

The only birds I really don't like are the morning doves. They're so small I actually thought they were babies at first. They are EVERYwhere and apparently have no fear of people, dogs or cars. Since it seems like their favorite place to hang out is in the middle of the road, and there are zillions of them in our neighborhood, I'm sure I'll probably hit one with the Escape eventually. (Although I have to admit, I'm somewhat biased against doves since they were the cause of the Great Bird Mite Infestation in our San Angelo house.) Without further ado, here are a few photos:

Hawaiian Cardinal

Despite searching and searching on the internet, I can't figure out what this guy is. At first I assumed it was a female Hawaiian Cardinal, but I read that male and female Hawaiian Cardinals are both red. Hmm... Anyway, I love his hairdo.

Myna Bird (It's a little hard to see, but he has BRIGHT yellow feet, bill and mask across his eyes.)

Saffron Finch

Java Sparrow (The coloring kind of reminds me of a puffin, my favorite bird. I can't wait to drag Jarrod to Maine someday to see them.)

Hawaiian Stilt (His legs were super pink, but the color kind of got lost since I had to zoom x16 to get a close enough shot without him flying off.)