New Year's Eve

Lori dropped by this morning with her parents and some food. She brought over macaroni salad, poke, and mochi. In Japanese culture, mochi is very important for the New Year. For lunch Mom wanted mochi, so I put some kinako on a plate, topped it with mochi, & microwaved it. Mom loved it!


There was a replay of the Lantern Floating Hawaii celebration in May 2016. I have seen the From Hiroshima to Hope remembrance in Seattle in August, where 3,000 lanterns are released on Green Lake. Hawai'i's Memorial Day lantern floating releases 6,000 lanterns at Ala Moana Beach Park, along with larger lanterns on small boats. The Hawai'i lanterns are on bases with bows, while the Seattle lanterns are just on squares of wood. I think the difference is because the Hawai'i lanterns are released in to an area with some small waves. The lanterns in both Hawai'i and Seattle are collected at the end of the events. (The small boats are similar to those that I remember being set adrift as part of the Obon celebration when I was a child.)

Lanterns floating off Ala Moana Beach Park, with many more still to be released. (screen shot from TV)

Aerial view of lanterns, stage illuminated in upper left. (screen shot from TV)

Small boats with lanterns. (screen shot from TV)

 
When I was growing up, New Year's Eve got very noisy with all the firecrackers going off, especially at midnight. If you weren't prepared for it you would be in for a big surprise. The air would get so smoky that asthmatics would need to use their inhalers for relief. Now you have to get a permit & each permit has a limit for the amount of fireworks that may be purchased. During the early part of the evening, when it was illegal to set off fireworks so there were only a few pops here and there, the cats were fairly relaxed. After 9 pm when it became legal and it got a little louder and more frequent, Shiro decided he needed to hide for a little while so he crawled behind the TV wall. He came out about an hour later when he realized no one was coming after him. I hope he remains calm at midnight when it will get really loud. I hope Xander's asthma stays under control. (I gave him his prednisolone pill this morning. I'll give him another in about an hour.)

Happy Birthday to Amy & Trevor! Happy Anniversary to Terry & Pam!