My Summer Vacation: I Found My Drill!

Last night I texted Delphine to see if he had a drill up at their house next door to me; he said he wasn't sure & would check when he got up there today. This morning he said he had one! It told him I would be over in 15 minutes to pick it up. In those 15 minutes I started to get all the things together that I needed to drill holes for. When I went to get the toilet paper holder, I found the drill! It was behind the toilet paper holder; out of my line of sight. More importantly, not where I usually keep it on the tool bench. Auē! I should always put my tools back where they belong & not next to the project they are needed for.

This is what I could see from my view as I looked at the shelf.

This is what I saw after I removed the toilet paper holder box. Auē!

About half an hour before the end of the morning feeding Holoi was being very cautious coming over to eat. She waited for a minute or so, looking around to see if there were any warning signs. Then she quickly came through the fence & went to the ramp.

Holoi at the food bowl with Mom Cat about 2 seconds after beginning the trek.

Mom Cat is done eating.

Mom Cat goes back to Jessie's

Holoi follows Mom Cat.

The hog wire fence does not slow them down a bit.

About half an hour later at the last morning feeding time, Holoi was leaving & spotted something in the yard or maybe next door, that made her concerned about crossing the driveway to get to Jessie's.

Holoi stopped when she spotted the threat.

As soon as she reached the driveway she sprinted for the fence.

Once safely on the other side she paused to watch the threat.

Before Delphine told me he had a drill this morning, I was working on moving the wooden, 3-drawer filing cabinet into my bedroom to replace the 2-drawer plastic filing cabinet that has problems. It initially required moving the dresser that is in that room at least 1/2 inch to the south in order for the door to open; I moved the dresser 1&1/2 inches. Which turned out to be a really smart, though serendipitous, move; I forgot about the old door hardware that sticks out. Since it is a 3-drawer filing cabinet it would have hit the hardware if I had only given it an additional 1/2 inch of space. The 2-drawer filing cabinet did not come as high & sat there without any problems so I had not even thought about it.

Before.

New filing cabinet almost in place.

This is my secret helper.

A specially modified slipper with a slider attached to it.

Perfect!

After.

Since I had to move boxes around to make space for the dresser to move those 1&1/2 inches, before I put them back I opened them up to find out what was in them. (This is due to the Verizon guy who deleted the Moving app from my phone when he thought he was helping me optimize my phone speed. I was unable to get any of that data back so I have been working in the dark in terms of what is actually in almost all the boxes. Fortunately, I had at least sorted the boxes in to the rooms they belonged in before he was so "helpful".) I pulled some things out of the boxes I looked through. Like the little plastic bin full of office supplies. A week ago I knew I had one mini stapler in my backpack; it is part of my office supplies that I would take to OmniTrak when I was contact tracing. (That way I did not have to share supplies with others.) I pulled it out last week when I needed a full sized stapler but could not find one; then I found another slightly larger stapler a couple days later. And today, while looking for something else, I found a regular sized stapler in the safe drawer along with 2 boxes of staples. Hulō! Then I found 2 in the office supply bin, I now have 5 staplers! And a bunch of paper clips, push pins, pens, & highlighters; I also crossed Post-It notes off of my Office Depot shopping list. Still need filing folders though.

I decided to stop in at Rainbow Cafe this morning to have breakfast with Lem. But before going there I made a big loop & went to the dump 1st; I passed an awesome dry-laid stone wall being built about half a mile up the road from the house.

From the dump it was an easy downhill run to go to Sunshine. At Sunshine, Kawika & Tupu helped me find a bunch of fasteners, clips, & other small items; the one big thing I forgot was another crate which I had seen there a few days earlier. Oh well, next trip; because I know there will be one. Old house.

Today at Rainbox Cafe I tried the Mahimahi Breakfast. It was 2 eggs over easy with 2 pieces of mahimahi, & white rice. I strongly recommend that you avoid this; I will not be ordering it again. I was expecting nice, flaky, sauteed mahimahi, not crusty, breaded, deep-fried mahimahi; besides being tough to cut it was also a little too salty.

I thought it was wrong order when I got it, but I was only one who had ordered breakfast.

Something Lem said got me thinking; he had a new mattress delivered yesterday so he was not at Rainbow Cafe. He said when they were in Las Vegas last week he slept really well & had no aches & pains; he attributed it to the mattress. After he got his new mattress he also had no aches & pains. Maybe I need a new mattress? Maybe the aches & pains that I thought were from moving heavy boxes & vacuuming was actually the mattress? I am pretty sure the mattress in my bedroom & the front bedroom are the original ones from the mid-1960's. I know the one in the back bedroom on my grandparents old bed is a lot older than that; I think it is the original mattress that came with that really old bed that has been around since at least the 1950's.

The wise old kupuna.

When I got back I checked out the area where I will be hanging the house hanger for the power cord for the Crosstrek. I will have to call Sam & find a time when he can come & help me take a bunch of things to the dump so I can clear out that side of the garage.

Need to sort & purge things along this wall.

Here's the stuff where hose hanger will be installed for charging cord.

It's right under the caddy for the retractable clothes line.

Here's a closer view of the area.

I also found some stuff around the stairs that needs to be removed. I think I will have a couple truckloads of work for Sam.

The door in the back wall goes to anthurium garden.

While I was on my way in, I checked out how far up the support piece by the back stairs I could reach in order to hang the wasp deterrent. As I was checking things out, I noticed a new wasp nest under construction where the one Sarah removed last year was at. That spot must have some ideal conditions because during the years I was removing the nests, every year a new one would show up there. When I discovered wasps were territorial & had good vision which assisted them in avoiding building a nest too close to another one I left the last nest; it worked for 3 or 4 years to keep wasps away until Sarah removed it. I have decided to let this wasp build a big enough of a nest to be easily seen by other wasps, then I will eliminate the residents but keep the nest. I think a real nest will be more of a deterrent than a fake nest.

The fake wasp nest.

I was going to hang it on the angled support piece.

The real wasp nest & real wasp.

I started going through the other boxes that I had to moved earlier in order to move the dresser. I did not find anything as immediately necessary as the office supplies box but I did find a bunch of CDs (for when the CD player is found or a new one is bought) & Kai's Beanie Baby collection! I wonder if they are worth anything now?

I needed to get these handled since they will make sleeping impossible.

When I finished that I focused on installing the LED light under the kitchen cabinet; you know, the one that I had zip-tied to the power strip. It now looks really nice! But I still need to figure out what to do with the power cord; there is a Command Hook at the corner where the cord turns to drop down to the outlet. Gravity holds it in place nicely. But the rest of the cord under the cabinet would just fall off a Command Hook; for now the solution is blue tape.

The parts.

After.

One Command hook & blue tape for now.

Just as I was finishing up the LED light installation Ken called! He finished the table & wanted to know if I would be home so he could deliver it. The table is beautiful; it is much better than I anticipated it could be. I am really pleased with his work; it cost less than $200.

In a temporary location.

As the day heated up, I checked on the amount of sun coming in the window of the front bedroom. The window fan was being a little wonky last night; it would not shut off after it got dark & cooler.

At noon no sunlight comes directly in the windows.

As I was checking on the fan I noticed a tailless female Common House Gecko (Hemidactlyus frenatus) sitting near where the other eggs were; this bedroom must be a popular place for them to lay their eggs. I could see the 2 eggs in her belly.

Yellow dotted lines indicate eggs she is carrying.

FYI The 2 eggs that I found earlier are getting darker; not sure what that means. Are they getting ready to hatch? Or are they rotting? I have never had the opportunity to watch gecko eggs hatch before.

I briefly stopped by Jessie's to return her canning jar & a knob of some sort that Ken found when he came by. It looks like it might be something off of Masa's riding lawn mower. While I was there I mentioned needing to have Sam come over & help me take some things to the dump & she told me he had a heart attack 3 weeks ago! He is now recuperating but has to cut back on some of the work he was doing.

I was on a roll! So I cleaned off the top of the dresser; I did not find any immediately usable items in those boxes, but I did find some neat stuff for when the time comes for them to be unpacked. I will need to do a bunch of work on the top of the dresser so for now it will remain uncovered.

After. For "Before" imagine top 3 boxes on pile on top of dresser plus other small stuff.

Top of dresser needs some TLC.

I also spent a little time using the handheld vacuum to clean the spots that the Roomba can't get to.

Note how clean the parts Roomba can reach are.

As I was working on the boxes & dresser in my bedroom, I noticed the cats coming out from under Jessie's house. It was about 4:30. I did not pay much attention to them, but could tell they were very interested in watching me. At about 4:45 I saw Holoi start to saunter in the direction of the ramp; the others soon followed. At 5, when my reminder alarm went off, I checked the baby monitor before heading for the front door; all 4 of the cats were patiently waiting on the ramp, some closer to the door than others! I think I have them trained to expect feeding to begin at 5 pm!

Holoi is the only one that stayed when I opened the door.

For dinner I heated up some of the leftover Grandma's Hyotan Squash with Ginger Garlic Chicken. And also had a salad.

Salad.

Grandma's Hyotan Squash with Ginger Garlic Chicken. And some Tajin.

Looks like the Russians are not coming to Kona in October for the Ironman; neither are the Belarussians. Apparently the Ironman organization is banning the Russian & Belarussian athletes from all Ironman competitions as a sanction against the invasion of Ukraine. They also cancelled the Inaugural Ironman 70.3 that was to be held in Russia in July.

The eruption at Kīlauea volcano continues. There is still snow on Mauna Kea. And the wind advisory for the summits is continuing through Friday.

At 6:27 p.m.

Big Island Now forecast weather in Kohala to be sunny in the morning the becoming mostly cloudy with showers likely & a 70% chance of rain; it was accurate for the morning but we never got any showers or rain. Further down the coast in Honomū, 0.01 inches of precipitation had accumulated by 6:20 p.m.

Four minutes after sunrise.

Looking southerly from garage at 10 a.m.; not enough sky to see weather pattern.

End of driveway looking westerly at 10:07 a.m.; guess this is the best weather shot.

Looking northerly at Alenuihāhā Channel at 11:30 a.m.

Waikīkī looking easterly at 6:23 p.m.

Kaimukī looking westerly at 6:25 p.m.

Honomū looking northerly at 6:25 p.m.

Marysville looking northerly at 6:26 p.m. HST.

The north facing shores had very large surf todya; west facing shores were also large but not quite as much. The Banyans web cam keeps giving me intermittent error messages; I do nothing in between the messages so I have been unable to figure out how to appease the site.