Hurricane Lala Arrives

Note: This post was written on 08/15 but published the next day for reasons noted in this post. Check back later for more photos. (I was having difficulty downloading them.)

I went to Lapakahi 1^st thing this morning. The gate was closed & locked but there was a guy in a white truck parked there; he was just watching the storm. There were no goats in the trap but there was a lot of water in the rain gauge! At 1^st I thought there was 0.1” of rain; but it turns out that was what had overflowed! There was 1” plus the amount in the holder. Since the average annual rainfall at Lapakahi is 9”, Jaime got a gauge that measures in the 1/100's of inches to a maximum of 1”. I will have to find out if the gauge came with instructions for measuring the overflow amount. If not, I will get the diameters so I can figure out the volume of water that was in the holder. The sustained winds were normal for Lapakahi; the gusts, however, were stronger than usual.

This is overflow.

Gauge was filled to top!

I took Moʻo with me to Lapakahi; she stayed in the car while I checked up on things. She seemed to like it; she was warm & dry & near me. I kept her in the house for the rest of the day. She likes to run around out in the rain & I did not want her to get soaking wet & have to do a lot of work drying her off when I brought her in later in the evening.

As I was driving to Lapakahi I noticed there were no businesses open. Except for Takata's; they have a large bank of solar panels & heavy duty array of back-up batteries. There were also very few cars on the road on my way to Lapakahi, but I did see both patrol officers sitting by the side of the road waiting for speeders to zip by! On the way back Takata's parking lot was almost full! 

Usually parking is full all the way out to here.

Even though I had power, the Internet was out so I was unable to occupy my time by watching those Netflix shows that are “leaving soon”. I had to fill my time with making orange juice, putting away laundry, & taking naps (it was really difficult to do this last one... 🤣). The 10 pounds of oranges gave me 3 quarts of juice; on average 9 oranges made 1 quart of juice.

From where I was making juice I could look out clerestory window at ironwoods along gulch.

I also found out that I could not make phone calls because the Internet was out. I knew in disasters they tell you to send texts because the phone will keep trying to send until it finds an open slot, but I was not aware that you could not make calls if the Internet was down. Silly me! Tomorrow I will see if I was able to send texts out this morning because I was connected to the Starlink system at Lapakahi. Maybe I should take my laptop with me tomorrow? (I did, so you are able to read this.)

About noon, the intensity of the rain & wind increased. But it was only for about half an hour. Then later, around 2 pm there were a series of stronger gusts along with more wind. The branches of the puakenikeni that had been occasionally thumping against the eaves became more intense. The cats slept through everything. The stronger winds & gusts persisted for most of the afternoon & evening but the rain came intermittently.

I steamed some green beans for dinner; I was so focused on the oranges I forgot to press the extra water out of the tofu so decided to do something a little different for dinner tonight. 

Over the last few months I have been “training” the Common Mynas to not roost in the lychee tree in the backyard; I don't want to have to deal with Myna droppings all over the place! I have a bamboo pole that is about 20 feet long; I would poke it into the top of the lychee tree to chase the Mynas out. But as I took it from the garage out to the tree, I would loudly tap it twice against the old metal clothesline pole. It got so when the Mynas heard the tapping, they would leave the tree; most would move to the ironwoods along the gulch before I would even start poking the pole in the lychee. Now they rarely roost in the lychee. But in these very strong winds they were back in the lychee this evening since it provides more cover than the ironwoods. I really did not want to try to poke the 20 foot long bamboo pole in the tree with these winds, so I just took a 2” x 4” & tapped it against the clothesline pole twice; the Mynas left & got blown towards other trees! Yay for conditioned responses! Working smarter not harder! FYI In order for something like this to work you have to start with consistent harassment when the sound is made. Then you can back off & just make the sound, but must randomly follow through with harassment every so often so they don't become complacent.

Since Mo'o & the cats have been confined to the house I decided to give Mo'o & Ho'okoa a little play time this evening. Ho'okoa is the cat that plays with Mo'o the most. He will let Mo'o chomp on him & lick him until I separate them; he purrs when he is playing with Mo'o. Pa'ipa'i will put up with Mo'o up to a point, then will turn around & swat her if Mo'o doesn't back off. 'Alani will walk away when Mo'o approaches him. 'Ohuna just disappears when Mo'o is allowed in to the cat room. 

He walks in to her crate to play with her!

[Check back later for the finished post.]

When I brought Mo'o in from her last potty break, as I was walking down the hallway to the bathroom & I noticed the attic access panel was ajar. Apparently differing air pressures caused it to be lifted up. In the early afternoon I had noticed a gust of air when I passed through the hallway on my way to the kitchen but did not really think about where it came from, now I know! I will have to bring the 6' ladder in tomorrow & set the panel back in place. I should check for any roof leaks while I am up there; this rain should be a good test!

Since the Internet was down, I was unable to do my Lingopie lesson so my streak was broken. But I was still able to get the 5 Duolingo lessons that were downloaded on to my phone by the SuperDuolingo app that I am using.

Since the Internet was down I was also unable to get the storm path maps like I usually do but I know how to go into the archives to get maps after the fact. Here are the predicted paths at 5 am, 11am, 5pm, & 11 pm.

Kilauea

Hau'oli la Hanau e Sean & Natalie! A me ka Hauʻoli lā Hoʻomanaʻo makahiki kanakolu kumamāiwa e Curtis & Lori!