My Summer Vacation: E Hele, e Steelers!

Go, Steelers! Curtis arrived with his mask on; one of his 3 Steelers masks. He was wearing it because he had a slight cough and was feeling short of breath but he had no fever. He thought the shortness of breath might be anxiety because of the cough. I put my mask on as I got in the car, just in case. As I have written earlier, the infectious disease specialists say your chance of being infected increases with the longer amount of time you are exposed as well as with higher amounts of virus load you are exposed to. Which is why solo exercising outdoors without a mask is an acceptable risk. Traffic this morning was heavier than it was on my last trip; fortunately I did not forget anything this time!

I traveled to the Big Island this morning. While I was going through the new quarantine screening I was asked why I was traveling. I explained that my official residence is on Hawaiʻi Island but I have the Durable Power of Attorney for Dad who is on Oahʻu; I showed them both documents. I was told I qualify as an "essential worker" so I do not need to quarantine. But I was also told to check in with how Hawaiʻi County wants me to deal with it; I think I'm just going to quarantine any way since I have already built it in to my trip. Even though I spent about 15 minutes at the quarantine screening table, I did not hold up the line; there was none. I also got my temperature taken (97.6 F) and went through the regular TSA check; which is now the quickest part of the process! Like the previous trip, the terminal was really empty.

Headed to the kiosks to check-in.

Done with TSA; now on to the gate.

The restaurants are still closed up.

The gate was deserted when I arrived; one other passenger showed up about 15 minutes after I did, then more sauntered in later. There are now hand sanitizer stations all over the place. And PSAs on the message board at the gate and over the PA system about COVID-19 and the quarantine. There was also a differently-abled ʻEhakō limping around, totally at ease with the lack of people. When the plane arrived I counted the deplaning passengers, there were less than 30 people; no crew members left the plane. (I just realized, after listening to it for probably the 10th time, that the voice on the PA talking about the quarantine sounds like Tim Sakahara, the DOT Public Affairs Officer.)

ʻEhakō is missing its left foot.

All total there were perhaps 20 of us on the plane; so the diagram showing the plane nearly full was just there to keep me from trying to change my seat? When I boarded I discovered there was a person sitting right next to me even though the plane was pretty empty; the flight attendants would not let us change seats. Huh? What about the airlines supporting physical distancing? I checked the seating chart when I got to the house and found it was different than the one back on April 29th when they first changed my flight; very different. I also looked at my return flight; the seating chart looks the same as it did on April 29th. We shall see what happens as we get closer to that departure date.

My boarding pass.

There was no one across the aisle but the flight attendants would not let us move.

This is what the seating chart looked like this afternoon which was fairly accurate.

This is the seating chart for my return flight on 06/04.

While I was waiting at the gate to board, I spent the time deleting emails from my laptop. It appears that deleting over 1000 emails has stopped those warning messages about my hard drive being too full from popping up as frequently. But it still does so I will continue deleting old emails and other things I don't need.

When I landed in Kona I texted Bill, then went to get my suitcase; he was already waiting at baggage claim. He was parked in the disabled parking right next to baggage claim. Bill dropped me off at the house then went to get the groceries. In the meanwhile I opened things up. And discovered the plastic sheeting on my bed had self-destructed even more!

That big rip down the middle was not there when I left.

Neither was this.

I did a walk around the yard and found that the pigs have not moved the concrete blocks; thanks to Dr Leslie for that suggestion! Bill also made a suggestion; he said he can rehang the gate so it is about 4" lower which will make it more difficult for the pigs to crawl under. I never thought about that as an option but it is doable and faster than what I had planned.

But perhaps the pigs did not move the concrete blocks because there are no juicy mountain apples on the ground. I could only find small, hard green ones from the fruit drop. It looks there will be another bumper crop of mountain apples in a month or so; I wish I was around more so I could tell exactly how long it takes from flower to ripe fruit.

Fruit drop.

I am interested to see how large they will be in 3 weeks.

Here are the other things I saw in my walk around the yard. The gardenia that my grandmother planted probably 50 years ago is still blooming and had a bunch of flowers this year. I need to consider removing the leaning plant above it before it falls and flattens the bush.

The lychee is just starting to form fruit on what few flowering clusters it has; it will not be a good year for lychee. But the guava has a lot of fruit! Though I don't think I will be here when they are ripe.

Lychee flower cluster.

Guavas.

The avocado also went through a fruit drop; I could only find 1 small avocado. It was larger than my thumbnail this time; now about the size of a medium sized olive. I was surprised when I saw the fruit in April, I had thought the tree was rather young to already be producing a crop. I guess I was right. I don't think the 1 fruit I found will grow to maturity, it is already turning color and I did not think the Murashige avocado turned color when it was ripe. I think it is going to fall off.

Aikane still has not removed the suckers.

The lone remaining fruit.

The persimmon is totally covered with leaves! So what I saw earlier was its normal leaf drop. Since we don't have very distinctive seasons here it was startling to see it without leaves; I will have to make a note of that in the binder that I am putting together about the house and the plants in the yard.

I checked on the hāpuʻu starts that I had potted at the end of the last trip. One is doing very well, another died back and is resprouting. The other 4 look like they did not make it, but I will keep watering while I am here and check their status before I leave again. Especially since I discovered that the water had been shut off! Guess I will have to attach a sign to the faucet regarding leaving the water on for the potted plants.

The heliconia are now producing a lot of blooms; their pendulous inflorescences work well with the tall water containers at Aunty Chiyono and Baban & Jichan's grave site.

I also checked out my project site along the south side of the house. When Bill unloaded the bags of red lava rock, he spaced them out so I would not have to carry them around. Mahalo, Bill!

I called Jessie a week or so ago to let her know I was coming, I asked if she had found white flour since she had been looking for it when I left. She had but she said she was now looking for hand sanitizer without luck; that was just after I found out Don Quijote had hand sanitizer. I went back a couple times before I was able to time it right to get there shortly after the box was opened and I got a bottle for Jessie! I also got her a small 2 oz size that she could carry with her, then refill from the large bottle. I gave that to her shortly after I arrived.

As usual, birds were all over the place. A couple of ʻEhakō were sunning themselves on the driveway bricks while a Saffron Finch foraged nearby. Later I saw a Saffron Finch with 2 Yellow-fronted Canaries foraging by the gate.

Saffron Finch (L) and 2 ʻEhakō lying in the sun like lizards.

Saffron Finch (L) and 2 Yellow-fronted Canaries (R).

I saw Mom Cat lounging in Jessie's back yard so I tried to make as much noise as possible as I poured the cat food in to the bowl. A couple hours later the food was gone! I think Mom Cat or her kitten must have heard the rattle of the food against the ceramic!

I might get a loaner cat while I am in quarantine. Bill said Laurel said to ask me if I wanted to borrow one of their indoor cats while I was in quarantine. I said sure; though I don't know exactly when the cat will show up.

It doesn't take as much time now to uncover everything and clean things up so that they can be used. I was even able to get in some vacuuming and still have time to set up the treadmill & exercise bike. I vacuumed as much as I could before my back gave out; I still need to do the kitchen & bathroom. Then tomorrow I will Swiffer the floors. The plan is to use the Bona deep cleaning kit the day after that to give the floors a good cleaning this time.

The soft rubber part of the handle is falling apart.

Forgot to get a before photo; the bike and a couple boxes were in front of it.

Ready for action!

Like the one at the YMCA, I can also change the inclination to mimic my Maunalani walking route.

This is for aerobic exercise. And, yes, it is out of the way of the door.

I also checked out the frozen eggs. They look funny, I think they are freezer burnt. But that is my fault; I did not put them in a plastic bag before I left. Once they thawed out they still did fine in the mug cake recipe. They should also do fine in a casserole or other egg dish where the looks of a fresh egg are not required.

I forgot to weigh myself this morning, so I will have to compare my weight when I return to my May 1st weight; I forgot to get my weight last Friday.

There were no new COVID-19 cases today; but the total number of known cases is now 637. Yes, its less than yesterday; there was another data error that has been corrected. They also have a new ZCTA map available; it shows the number of known cases over the previous 28 days.