Ola i ka Wai

Water is Life. That is a main theme of the Waiwai: The Future of Water in Hawaiʻi video presentation that I went to this afternoon. Dr. Kamana Beamer was the guest speaker during the 1st Huli Summer Speaker Series program presented by the Episcopal Diocese of Hawaiʻi back in June. He talked about the importance of Aloha ʻĀina and Circular Economy. He talked about how the ancestral Hawaiian agricultural system, which used only 6% of the land, could produce enough food to sustain 86% of the current population. He compared it to current agriculture which uses 4 times as much land but only provides 13% of the food consumed in the state. More importantly, he noted how 71% of the agricultural land used by the Hawaiians is still undeveloped. (The video below is of the full nearly 2 hour Huli presentation; we only watched about an hour of the portion focused on Waiwai.)

 

Early this morning I heard a noise outside & looked out in to the cat yard & saw Hoʻokoa & ʻAlani walking along the top of the concrete wall portion of the fence along the property line. That is the 1st time I had seen any of the cats on the wall. I think that is the closest they have come to the top of the fence. I have not seen any attempts by any of them to climb over the top of the fence.

I briefly got their attention.

But just for that split second.

I think I am annoying him.

This morning Fran hosted a heavenly birthday party for Lem at the Kohala Rainbow Cafe. She invited all of Lem's morning bunch & a couple of us from other parts of Lem's life. She bought breakfast for all of us. She followed it with a Lem Trivia game; prizes were some of the things she had bought for him just before he passed but were never used by him.

Galo won a prize!

I dropped by Motek Bakery on my way to the video presentation in order to pick up their shakshuka breakfast special. I brought a Pyrex container with a Snaplock top along with an ice pack & insulated carrier since I was not going straight home. Yael was dubious about putting the container with hot shakshuka in the carrier with the ice pack. But it survived! I was pretty sure it would because I was using a Pyrex container which is made of low thermal expansion borosilicate glass.

It tastes a lot better than it looks; it got sloshed around a bit.

After the video, Lani came over to the house to pick up the big mirror that isn't mine. I had spoken to Lani at the thrift store about a month ago, asking if they would accept it as a donation. She said her daughter was looking for a large mirror so it worked out great! I did not have to haul it down to the thrift store & her daughter did not need to spend any money on it. Win-win! And win for the cats, too, because now they can easily run around the island of books. The Eufy will also not get stuck now. 

Yay! No mirror!

While we were moving the mirror box out of the cat room, I noticed that the aloe on the table outside had been moved. On closer inspection it looks like there was possibly an altercation on the table & the pot & plant got bumped. There was soil scattered around & a part of a leaf was broken off.

As I parked the car this afternoon, I looked over at the wasp nest in the garage. They are in an area close to the old window screens. I may have to kill them off in order to move the screens near the outer edge of the garage to a more sheltered location in preparation for Hurricane Kiko's arrival. If Kiko continues to move away from us & I won't have to move the screens, I will let them continue building their nest there. Wasps are beneficial insects.

Around sunset, there was another brief downpour like last night. With the small amount of precipitation we got yesterday the grass is beginning to turn green again. I can't wait to see what things look like tomorrow.

The light streaks are streams of rain coming off the roof.

Today is Sunday, which is the day the previous week's points on Duolingo are tallied. I was able to get in enough practice this week in order to be promoted up to the Pearl League. There are 2 higher leagues that I need to work my way back up to.

The top 5 get promoted.

I got another Civil Defense alert today. It is just an information statement. It basically says the current impacts are basically high surf & that the wind threat appears to be diminishing due to the forecast track moving northerly of the state.

As predicted, Hurricane Kiko has diminished to a Category 2 after coming in to contact with cooler waters. Kiko is now about 850 miles east of Hilo with sustained winds of about 105 mph. It is traveling about 14 mph in a northwesterly direction with hurricane force winds extending out about 30 miles & tropical storm force winds extending out about 90 miles. It looks like the earliest winds at the edge of Hurricane Kiko will be passing close to us will be tomorrow afternoon.

It now looks like Episode 33 of the ongoing eruption at Kīlauea will start around the 17th or later.

Hauʻoli lā Hānau e Leno, Charlene, Jaime, & Grey!