Week 2 - Now With More Mai Tais!

Well gosh darnit, I sure hope you had a great weekend. Blondie and I did indeed. We went Kayaking along the Wailua River, which was gorgeous. They filmed some scenes from Jurassic Park there. We swam under a waterfall too; something I can honestly say I've never done before:

watch out for the raptors

We also had some real-ass Hawaiian Pizza Pie. It was scrumtralescent:

And speaking of pineapple, we've had a ton of Mai Tais lately. We had so many on Sunday night, that Monday was kind of a wash. I call it an Island Hangover. We were up, it was gorgeous, Blondie worked and I did some errands, but we were both zombies in the sun. We napped twice and didn't do much but eat. So I apologize for this Monday blog post being yours on Tuesday. It's hard to lift your fingers when you're staring at a beautiful landscape with a cloudy mind and have nothing to do but relax.

We've begun try one at every place we visit, and rate them. We're not quite done with our findings, but here is how, in graph form, it's generally going:
We'll have a full report later, depending upon how drunk we get.

More than Ukulele Music Around Here

I'm writing this on Thursday, but it's already Friday for you. Consider this a Time Capsule of Pop. Happy Weekend.

I've got some new music, as promised, to rock your weekend. Most of you probably know Brendan Benson as the other singer in The Raconteurs. But you may not know that he is an accomplished pop-rock songwriter and musician in his own right. And it makes sense when you look at a band like the Racs, where the songs mix bluesy, heavy guitar engine (Jack White) with very tight pop melodies and rhythms (Benson). The best examples of this fusion are "Intimate Secretary" from their first record, or "Many Shades of Black" from their second.

hey, that's my hat!

But enough about them, this is about Brendan's new solo record My Old, Familiar Friend. It's an 11 song tour-de-pop, full of melodious vocal lines, slickly blended verses and choruses, easy lyrics, and tightly written chord progressions. Think of it as a really catchy mixtape of The Who, Joe Jackson, and ELO covers. Brendan stands out on this record with "Garbage Day" (very 70's pop rock) "Gonowhere" (a bit of McCartney), and "Eyes On The Horizon" (Elvis Costello-esque).

And if you can, grab his previous LP, 2005's The Alternative To Love. The title track remains my personal favorite across all his various groups.

Then who's having sex with the hen??

A few videos for your Thursday morning/afternoon.

First, I woke up to Dr. Noisewater this morning:

we're getting dangerously close to a rooster-only blog.

Secondly, starting as an offhand comment during an epic GChat, The Stame "uncovered" this timeless gem from the comedy vault:

And a final thought: Blondie and I have limited TV choices here at night (local Hawaiian TV is unintentionally hilarious, but that's a whole other post), so we're working our way through Hulu, Netflix Watch Instantly, and her DVD collection on my laptop. Last night, we took in the cinematic tour-de-force known as "Cocktail." My God it's awful. But did Elisabeth Shue ever looked hotter than in that movie? BTTF and Leaving Las Vegas pale in comparison. That waterfall scene is one for the books:

And why the hell are our two favorite shows out there right now, Top Chef and Mad Men, not on Hulu/any official websites? I'm resorting to these Nordic Bootleg sites to watch, and it makes me feel like a pirate (and not the good kind). To help my sanity, feel free to send/email any movies/shows you have ripped for iTunes. I can only watch so much Intergalactic Commander Cruise before weeping.

I Did It

I bought a cheap little ukulele. I didn't think I'd be able to play it with my giant hands, but its surprisingly comfortable. Here's a quick video of me playing "Something" by The Beatles on it this morning:

not bad for the first time, though i'm sure someone will comment on my stupid hat.

Otherwise, I've been checking out the beaches, tooling around in the 'Stang, and taking photos. Hoping to get some of my B&W developed today, and switch to color permanently. This place is just too colorful to stay in B&W. NYC looks good in monochrome; Hawaii deserves the full Kodachrome 800 spectrum.

On the food front, Blondie and I have been out to sushi twice, and it is out of this world. We've been to two places in Hanalei, Bouchon's and Dolphin, and sat at the sushi bar both times. What's odd is that we've only had non-Japanese sushi chefs so far. That's the first we've ever encountered such an occurrence. And they were great; we let them make for us whatever they thought we'd like the most: quite a delicious decision. Most importantly to me, we tried "uni" for the first time. What exactly is uni? Well, it's raw sea urchin (removed from that spiny body of course), and it's really fuckin' good. I've been seeing it on Food Network and Top Chef for so long, we had to try it. And the best part about Hawaii sushi? It's considerably cheaper, and fresher, than it's NYC counterpart. So they've got that going for them. Which is nice.

Or a "patio," if you want to be a dick about it.

First of all, I got some vernacular in last post wrong. Liz Roth graciously informed me that the word for "patio" in Hawaiian is "lanai." How did she know this? Well, she's insane, and remembers it from an episode of the Golden Girls when the irreverent post-menopausal ladies went to Hawaii. Liz Roth everybody, a Golden Girl in her 20's.

This is what Blondie and I have been barrelling around the narrow roads of Kaua'i in:
A 2009 Ford Mustang. It's a sweet ride. After driving a 1994 Chevy Suburban for all of my life, its amazing to find out that cars can actually do a U-ey without requiring a 3 point turn, and that acceleration doesn't require violent shaking and gurgling sound coming from the engine. But hey, I don't mean to get down on Big Blue; who else can carry 9 kegs and 7 guys across Boston at the same time?

Speaking of Big Blue, she hit 200,000 miles not long ago. I couldn't be more proud of the old girl:
The only annoying part of the 'Stang is the fact that it intermittently rains every so often here. Not "oh crap our day is ruined because it's raining" rain, but "oh here's another 10 minute sun shower that creates a gorgeous rainbow and cools everything off" rain. Yet, since it's a rental, and I don't want to have to pay for water damage to the plush leather seats, we have to constantly put the top up and down. Life is hard, isn't it?

It also has that Microsoft Sync thing, where I can stream music to the stereo from my iPhone via bluetooth. It's an awesome feature, but it's got this weird hiccup problem, where it skips a beat every minute or so, much like old discmans (discmen?) used to do back before "shockwave technology." Again, life's a bitch here in paradise, ain't it?

I'm jonesing to try some Poi son. What's poi you ask? It's a local Hawaiian dip/sidedish, and once I try it I'll report back. For now, I just enjoy saying it. Poi. Poi. Pe-pio-pe.

Monday, I'm Alright

What a weekend getting settled. Blondie has the life here, despite the crazy hours she's working. Here's a little slice of the life in the Kapua Suite.

This is the view from our patio:

This is the view from our patio during sunset:

This is the view from our patio when the most magical rainbow appears:

This is the view from our patio at dinner time. We made an awesome Mango, Ahi, Macademia Nut & Tomato salad:


We're on this cliff overlooking the beginning of Hanaeli Bay, on the very north side of Kaua'i:

View Larger Map

Also, for some reason that even Wikipedia has trouble explaining, this island is goddamn overrun with roosters. Seriously. NYC has pigeons and rats, New NYC has owls (that's for you Inkpen), and Kaua'i has roosters. This is our resident cock, who I have effectionately named Dr. Kenneth Noisewater:

i could kill you, pal.

The Travel Recap

Aloha beetches, I made it. Just woke up from a 3 sleeping pill induced sleep. Its 8AM here, so we're 6 hours behind NYC time. Set your clocks.

All in all, that was the best long-term flight experience I've ever had. And to top it all off, I woke up to this:

this from the patio. right outside. we're on a fuckin' cliff. hell yes.

A flight recap:
- The old "recent knee surgery" trick worked TWICE in getting me an exit row seat. Incredibly clutch. That made the trip.
- The NYC-LA leg had that GoGo WiFi on the plane, and it was free. The future is now, and it is awesome.
- A bartender at Chili's in LAX asked me "Should I know you?" when I ordered a beer and charged my laptop. I really wanted to say "Yes, I'm Don Draper."
- I sat next to this crazy 30-something lady from LA-Kaua'i who talked the entire time. Even when I had my headphones in. She tried to convince me that I should go to Burning Man.

So that's that. Thanks for following along. Now, off to explore while Blondie works for a bit. Any suggestions?

Mile Hi Wi Fi

First of all, this GoGo free wireless is clutch. Not that my battery can last long enough to keep me online all day, but it's sweet I can post from the sky. The future is now, dammit!

Also, I pulled the old "recent knee surgery" trick and got myself an exit row, so no bruised knees for this leg of the trip. Everything is starting out nicely.

The only negative: "My Life in Ruins" is the in-flight movie. Richard Dreyfuss, Rachel Dratch and Harland Williams' careers have hit a low it seems. I liked it better the first time, when it was called "My Big Fat Obnoxious Greek Wedding Movie!" Right Tom? Right?

Speaking of Tom jokes...um, stewardess?

I'm listening to Brendan Benson's new album "My Old, Familiar Friend" and it's awesome. Just a well written, well produced, pop rock record full of hooks and simple melodies. He's the guy who isn't Jack White in the Raconteurs, and you can see where that band gets some of its pop sensibility. I'll post it up when I get to the archipelago.

And speaking of Hawaii, serendipitously enough, today is the 50th Anniversary of it's Statehood. There's a great article in the NY Times by Paul Theroux. Definitely give it a read.

"What I cant go to Hawaii now because Sarah Marshall has heard of Hawaii?"

Sorry for the cliché blog hiatus; musically, 2009 turned out to be a turkey compared to 2008. But let us not dwell, there is an important reason for this relaunch. I'm going to Hawaii for 18 beautiful days starting tomorrow, and I'm going to write about it. Blondie is stationed on the picturesque isle of Kauai for two months opening a ritzy hotel, and I couldn't pass up the trip.


A few goals:
- Finish at least a first draft of the 4 scripts I've been working on (1 feature, 2 pilots, 1 short story)
- Photo much pretty things a lot
- Take a surfing lesson
- Get tan? (I doubt it's possible, but dammit I'm going to try)
- Eat like a local
- Drink like a local
- Find new music for you
- Buy a ukulele

Those is de plans. I will keep you updated, I plan on using this as a conversation with the Contiguous 48. Any suggestions/dares/ideas for me to do while in Polynesia, please let me know. I'll try it all.

Just call me `Ula.