Steven Rubio's Online Life

hawaii postscript

A quick recap:

It was hot and humid every day. I looked forward to coming back to the Bay Area, and sure enough, it was pleasantly cool when we arrived. But it had been raining, and the humidity was like 95%. Oh well.

Geckos crawl on the walls. This is supposed to be a good thing.

We saw Obama’s vacation home, the place where they filmed the pilot to Gilligan’s Island, and lots of mountainous forestry that looked like Lost.

And we went to a wine tasting at a yacht club.

Here’s a teaser photo … there’s a photo album on Google+ that is growing as I get more pix uploaded. This is Robin and I, with Burt Lancaster and Deborah Kerr on the other side of the fence, making out on the beach:

traveling with steven

Today we drove to the “From Here to Eternity” beach:

It looks pretty much exactly like it did in the movie, which makes sense, since, unlike man-made structures, it’s just a part of nature that isn’t likely to change that much in 60 years.

This tells you all you need to know about my traveling priorities: after we’d seen the beach, I was ready to return home. But we saw a bunch of tourists at another part of the scenic point we had pulled into. And that’s when I remembered there was an actual natural wonder at that location, a “blowhole”. In my excitement over reliving the screen romance of Burt Lancaster and Deborah Kerr, I almost missed the real-life artifact.

from here to down the road

I imagine most people come to Hawaii for the first time, and they check out the beaches, or the volcanoes, or Honolulu, or they go to luau, or any number of other typical touristy things.

Yesterday, we went to Schofield Barracks. I wanted to check out places from the movie From Here to Eternity, and the famous cove where Burt Lancaster and Deborah Kerr kissed looked kinda scary to a fraidy cat like me. So we went to the barracks where much of the movie was filmed.

Guess what? It looks like a barracks. But now I can say I’ve been there. Check out this preview for the movie … you’ll see an extended view of soldiers marching at Schofield Barracks, and a quick shot of that sexy cove:

two of my favorite ladies

Tonight we had dinner with our friend Pat. I lived with her in Indiana for a year in 1971-2. It was a learning experience for me, and the only time in my 58+ years that I lived outside the greater Bay Area. She was very kind to me as I fumbled around, trying to figure out how to be a grown up. Here are two pix, one of her with Robin, one with me. Note that I’m actually smiling for a change!

light winds

Here’s one more travel post. I took this photo with my camera pointed at the TV screen, so don’t look for quality, but you’ll get the point. This is from an actual weather report:

If you aren’t sure why I’d be fascinated at such a consistent long-term forecast, you’ve never seen this:

happy birthday robin, hawaii edition

You may have noticed a couple of recent posts were pretty brief, while others were of the usual length. I post-dated several posts that would appear while we were away, and have only been able to add brief posts via my cellphone. But I’ve managed to cobble together a thing or two on Robin’s netbook, so here are a couple of photos from our trip, all featuring the birthday girl!

I hope she isn’t mad at me for posting this, but I thought you should see what happens to curly hair in the humid heat of Hawaii.

The Pacific Ocean is warmer here.

Finally, the two of us. You can see these, and more, if you are on Google+.

where i was yesterday

an idiot abroad premiere

There’s a way in which An Idiot Abroad is Karl Pilkington’s revenge. When he participates in podcasts with Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant, he really does seem like an animal in a cage, being poked by Ricky. In this series, the poking occurs … Pilkington visits the New Seven Wonders of the World, and Gervais/Merchant come up with a variety of torments for him … but Karl is the only one actually there, actually participating, so his unique perspective on the world is offered to us, for the most part, without Gervais’ insane laughter. Pilkington doesn’t seem like an idiot at all in this show. He most definitely seems like a fish out of water, and he has a willingness to blurt out whatever is in his head. But as often as not, I found myself empathizing with him, because I knew I’d be the same.

So, in this episode, he goes to the Great Wall of China. He’s not impressed by the wall, especially when he learns from the guidebook that renovations have been done … how can it be a Wonder if they worked on it in 1980? But it’s in his encounters with Chinese culture that the combination of laughs and insight occurs. He eats toad … he gets a Chinese massage that amounts to having flaming gloves placed on his legs … he uses the public restroom and finds there are no doors on the stalls … and, of course, no one speaks English. We can make fun of his provincialism, but that doesn’t make him an idiot. And the fact is, Pilkington actually does the stuff he dreads. When he visits a family for a meal, he worries that they might feed him something he doesn’t like, and he won’t be able to tell them his tastes. He’s sitting outside when he sees the lady of the house with a bag of something … he quickly realizes it’s a bag of live toads, and she is whomping off their heads, one by one. He really doesn’t want to eat, but he goes to the table, and she forces pieces of toad into his mouth. He can’t really keep them down, and he is really suffering … but he’s doing it, while Gervais and Merchant are back home, laughing. It all makes Karl seem oddly heroic.

I should add that the HD photography is excellent (the series is on the Science Channel). I don’t know that I can exactly recommend the series, but I’ll be back for episode two.

a visit from the homeland

We went to Juan’s tonight, and got “our” table, the one next to this picture on the wall:

There were only two other people in the restaurant, it being a bit early for dinner … two guys sitting together. Our server, Eddie, immediately pointed at the picture and started talking to the guys in Spanish … I joined in … it took no time at all for them to say they were from Andalucía. We shared a few stories, I told them my family was from there, specifically Estepona, we talked about various places, including Ronda where the above picture was taken. It was fun!

As we were leaving, I shook hands with the two guys. We talked a little more … what soccer team they liked, stuff like that. As we walked out the door, I heard one of them say “’ta luego!”

Robin and I were delighted. It’s been almost two years since we got to hear the Andalusian accent. It’s distinctive enough, and we’ve been there often enough, that even Robin, who doesn’t speak Spanish, recognizes that “lazy tongue.” Never use two syllables when one will do just fine.

security

Patrick Smith on airport security:

TSA tells us we need to stay "one step ahead of the terrorists," but the evidence suggests they've been one step ahead of us. And that shouldn't be shocking. Plainly put, we need to own up to the fact that we cannot protect ourselves from every conceivable threat. Short of turning our airports into fortresses, there will always be a way for a clever, resourceful enough perpetrator to skirt whatever measures we put in place. That's not defeat, it's reality. As is the fact that the true nuts and bolts of thwarting a terror attack is not the job of a TSA concourse screener. It's the job of the FBI, CIA, Interpol, etc. It's the job of law enforcement and counterintelligence. Old-fashioned detective work is a lot more effective and useful than a TSA screener arguing with somebody over the size of a toothpaste tube.