Obey Zolac!

The dogs had another fight last night. I had to go out and break it up, and then I had to lock Belle in the bathroom so I could check on Molly... I assumed she'd come off the worst because this has happened before, and Belle is the one that is young and crazy and randomly attacks Molly, and Molly is old and stiff and can't really defend herself. And Molly was acting scared and hurt, but I couldn't find anything wrong so I gave Belle some stern words that I'm sure completely failed to sink in, and I went to bed.

So this morning I get up to let the dogs and AND THERE IS BLOOD ON MOLLY'S FUR. And there is a gash on her chest, and it's smallish but it's big enough to need stitches.

So I've emailed Kapono to let him know I'll be late or a no-show, and I had to email Dennis and Lisa on their vacation in Italy and tell them everything, and I'm waiting for Dennis and Lisa's vet to open so I can call them, and then I get to load Molly into Lisa's minivan and drive half an hour down to Kea‘au so she can get stitched up.

And I didn't take the dogs on their walk because I didn't want Molly to exert herself when she's BLEEDING FROM AN OPEN WOUND ON HER CHEST, and I didn't want to take Belle without taking Molly because that's not fair to Molly and also BELLE DOES NOT DESERVE A WALK. So Belle is all hyper and sad and confused because she didn't get a walk and I cannot explain to her that I'll walk her later and also IT'S ALL HER FAULT BECAUSE SHE ATTACKED HER FRIEND, A HELPLESS OLD HARMLESS SWEETHEART OF A DOG. DDDDDDDDD:<

*SIGH*

...Belle has problems, okay, and it's not entirely her fault, I think she was abused before Dennis and Lisa adopted her, and she's apparently doing much better than she used to, and 95% of the time she's a real sweet dog and I love her, but... ARGH. VIOLENCE IS NOT OKAY. I am very displeased with her right now. D:<

ETA: Called the vet and they suggested that since the wound is smallish, I can try keeping it disinfected myself and letting it heal on its own. ...Should be okay, I guess, because I don't think Molly can reach it with her teeth to make it worse. But I need to go buy some Betadine, can't find any in the house. So I will go find Betadine, and clean Molly up, and then I will think about going to work.

Belle's starting to catch on that I'm upset with her, but of course she doesn't know why. *sigh*

Life is good because:

-It's Friday!

-I spent all day listening to rock music learning about math earning real wages!

-My team DESTROYED the other team during Friday Lunch Hour Bocce. I mean, granted, I was on Leroy's team (the IT tech, not the hawk) and he is generally acknowledged to be the best bocce player in USGS, but... dude, I was on FIRE today, I think I scored most of the points! ...I think I must have some sort of natural bocce talent? I'm really a novice, I can count the number of times I've played on one hand, but since the first game I've kind of been consistently kicking ass and taking names. :DDD

-There are plum trees in the front yard. This is kind of a big deal, because things like plums and apples and pears and cherries just do not grow well at lower elevations in Hawai‘i; they need a bit of cold. But I live in Volcano, and it is cold here, and there are plum trees in the front yard, and the plums are coming ripe, and I picked a few, and they are DELICIOUS.

HOW DID I NOT KNOW THAT THERE IS A COMIC BOOK STORE IN HILO UNTIL THIS MORNING?? I was busy complaining to someone that we didn't have one, and I thought WAIT BUT WHAT IF WE DO? As is my custom I turned immediately to the internet, and LO! A COMIC BOOK STORE.

It's even in a part of town that I know very well, so... d'ohh! To be fair, though, it's not really visible from the street. On the other hand I am now remembering I've actually been in there, once, back in high school. D'OHH! ...But my friends took me there in the middle of the night and I don't think I saw the actual store part, just a back room full of gamer nerds, so I think if I had any inkling whatsoever that this place was an actual store where you could actually buy actual things, I must've thought it was a gaming store.

COMIC BOOK STORES I MISS YOOOOOOUUUU~! ...When next I'm killing time downtown, I'll have to check this place out!

...In other news, as expected I ran out of data entry within, like, an hour. I reorganized the storage closet and fixed some bird bags for the rest of the morning, then spent all afternoon doing net repair. This is pretty much all I have to look forward to on the days I don't go out in the field with Mark Kapono. Although I went and had a chat with Mark Wasser and I think I'mma get to go surveying down in KW for a few days, so yay! ...Kinda hoping Mark Kapono won't need me on Monday, because I'd love to catch part of the Vitousek talks.

...Okay, break's over... must find a sort of half hour sized job to occupy me until I can go home.

So a bunch of stuff happened in the last couple weeks. Had fun going to the Kamehameha Day Festival and seeing Prometheus. ...The movie was awesome, by the way... definitely very Ridley Scott, if you like Ridley Scott. Creepy Android!Michael Fassbender was, as I fully expected, my favorite. ...Now I feel like I need to marathon the Alien movies. (Tried to watch Blade Runner the other night... BORED ME TO TEARS.)

The last couple of weeks have been pretty nice at work... exploring Kahuku, mist-netting at ‘Ainahou... I like ‘Ainahou, I mean, it's pretty weedy and there's lower bird diversity and I'm pretty biased towards the rainforest (‘Ainahou's a lot drier than Nauhi), but... it's just a really nice place to hang out. It's sunny and warm and the birds come in at just the right pace... and I'm lounging in the grass under a blue sky, writing, and getting up occasionally to go for a walk under the trees and check nets, and play with birds for a few minutes before going back to lounging and writing and just... how awesome is my life?? Other people work in cubicles. (I told my mom this and she pointed out that other people get paid more than $20 a day. THANKS MOM. ...It's still the best job ever, so there. XP)

And then Friday before last Jackie and I were going to go to Na‘alehu to meet with her friend John from The Nature Conservancy and pore over maps and get his opinions on the best ways to access remote parts of the Ka‘u Forest Reserve, but he absolutely had to go into the field that day... so we went with him! We met up with him and this-younger-guy-whose-name-I-forget in Pahala and drove up to TNC's Kaiholena Preserve, which was AWESOME because I've never ever been up there before. It's way up in the Ninole Hills, which is this really awesome and interesting and (I think) kinda creepy area in Ka‘u, where a massive fault-slip and subsequent erosion created these hills that look completely out of place with the rest of the island's geology (most hills in Hawai‘i are cinder cones), and they're all green and mysterious with their heads in the clouds and I've always wanted to go up there. And the forest in Kaiholena is beautiful, really pristine and full of all my favorite plants, and we took a nice walk along the fence line marking out where the helicopter needed to drop fence-repair materials and I had a lot of trouble keeping up because I kept stopping to geek out at the botany. ^_^;; And we had lunch TNC's little pavilion at the bottom of the preserve with a gorgeous view down to the coast, and on the way down we took a side trip to one of the hills to see this plant called nuku ‘i‘iwi (‘i‘iwi bill) because I'd never seen it/heard of it before and Jackie thought I'd enjoy it, which is... really kind of sweet, actually. It's this really cool vine with beautiful flowers that, yes, do resemble ‘i‘iwi bills in color and shape, and as;hgkalhskfakjshdfls NEW PLANT. *geeks out some more* And all of the lower hills had, mixed in with the native plants, ti and kukui and one of the old Hawaiian varieties of bananas, the name of which I forget, but John told me it was one of the few varieties that women were allowed to eat, and also that it was one of the varieties of bananas that the Hawaiians brought with them in their very first voyage, which makes sense because we're so close to that very first settlement down there. Looking at those ti and kukui and bananas that were probably descendants of plants planted around the very oldest Hawaiian settlements gave me a kind of chicken-skin feeling. ...Anyway, IT WAS A COOL TRIP and it made me very happy. Fuck $20 a day, I CAN'T BELIEVE I GET PAID FOR THIS AT ALL.

On Saturdays I've been doing a bunch of chores for Mom, since her arm's in a cast and she can't do a lot. Father's Day Dad came up to Volcano, and we had a really excellent afternoon: lunch at Lava Rock Cafe, wine tasting at the Volcano Winery, a trip to Jaggar to watch the steam come out of Halema‘uma‘u, and a trip down to ‘Ainahou so I could show him my work site and the historic ranch buildings.

Last week has been more netting at ‘Ainahou mostly, although Thursday and Friday I was on-loan to Mark Kupono trying to catch ‘i‘iwi up Mauna Loa Strip Road. No ‘i‘iwi in the net, just ‘amakihi and ‘apapane and white-eyes, but one of the ‘apapane was this really pretty hatch year bird that was in between fledgling and adult plumage... mostly red with gray and tawny bits and a red racing stripe on the back of its head. SO CUTE. And it was just a really nice day up there, lounging on the rocks and reading. ...Boss Jackie is taking off for Bali for three weeks, so I expect to be doing a lot more of this, along with fun things like data entry and organizing the supply closet. :P

Another major thing is I moved into my boss Dennis' house Thursday before last. He and his family are on vacation for over a month, traveling on the Mainland and in Italy, and I'm house-sitting for them. (Thus the adventure with the can opener the other day.) It's... a bit of an adjustment for me, because they have two dogs and three cats and two bunnies and two turtles and some fish, and it's weird having dependents. And the dogs need to be walked every day, and they have to be walked really early in the morning when no one else is on the street because they get aggressive with other dogs and strange people, so this means I wake up at 6:00 even on the weekends, which is just... not like me at all, heh. But all of the animals are super sweet. It's pretty nice for my ego to come home and EVERYONE IS SO HAPPY TO SEE ME OMG. So I'm really enjoying it, even if there's dog hair EVERYWHERE and Belle is needy and loud and psychotic and has WAY TOO MUCH ENERGY and Splotch has a marked tendency to wake me up at 2:30 in the morning MEOWING LOUDLY FOR NO REASON AT ALL. Can't get too upset with them, THEY'RE ALL SO CUTE.

( Oh and also I PIMPED MY RIDE. )

And then Keola and his friend came over and Shawn and I went out with them to to the Lava Lounge for Karaoke night and oh shit I'm so drunk I can barely see I don't think I've ever been this drunk before.

WHOO!

So it's been a pretty weird couple of weeks.

As you all know, instead of going on my awesome expedition, I decided maybe stomach flu would be more fun. So I spent three days flat on my back. Was ready to work again on Friday, but Dennis was out most of the day at a doctor's appointment, and there wasn't any work to do anyway. So i just didn't work at all last week, really. And then it was Memorial Day weekend, so Dennis told me to report back on Tuesday and maybe he'd have some work for me, who knows. So I had a three-day weekend, and I drove into Hilo and acquired a car and mostly lay around like a bum otherwise.

Tuesday morning Dennis tells me we're retrieving the field team from lower Hakalau... they were supposed to be in the field until today, but things were apparently SO HORRIBLE they didn't want to continue. So we drove up Saddle and helped with the heli-op, which was kind of fun, and packed all of the gear into the trucks and drove down into town and treated Shawn and Jackie to a well-deserved lunch at Miyo's. Finally got the scoop on the Shawn-disappearing-for-five-hours thing... apparently once he got to 'Awehi Stream he'd been unable to find his way back. He didn't have a GPS unit on him and what he'd thought was a compass turned out to be an altimeter.

That afternoon Shawn and I took all the tents and tarps home with us, hosed off the mud, and hung them out to dry. Then I spent all evening unpacking my food and gear which had gone into the field without me. (My bagels and tortillas went moldy, wah.)

Shawn and I spent most of Wednesday unpacking gear, washing it, drying it, and repacking. This took us until about 3:00, after which we repaired birdbags until Dennis made us go home. Shawn was now on weekend time, but I still had to work out the week. I asked Dennis when I should report on Thursday; since we'd pretty much done all the work, he told me he'd call me if he needed me.

Didn't hear from Dennis at all on Thursday. Spent the day cleaning my room, reading old omg_alchemist logs and threads, and marathoning episodes of Once Upon A Time.

Today I get a call at 8:30 from Jackie, wondering where the hell I am. I explained to her about yesterday, and said I'd assumed today would be the same. Jackie wasn't pleased by my not coming to work yesterday, nor was she pleased with the state of the gear. I hustled right over there and got to work cleaning things up to her satisfaction; luckily Jackie accepted that I'd just been following orders, and didn't seem upset with me. It took me about an hour and a half to get the gear squared away, and then I really didn't have much else to do, so I spent the rest of the day repairing bird bags and helping Jackie destroy the boys' team at Friday Lunchtime Bocce. Ran out of work at 2, so I left. And now it's the weekend again! I feel like such a slacker. :P

Next week should be a lot of fun day trips... Malama Ki Monday and Wednesday, Ainahou Tuesday and probably Thursday, Kahuku Friday and probably the following Monday. So, yay!

I have noooooo idea where Shawn is... he disappeared Thursday morning and I haven't seen him since. I really hope this means he is out exploring the island.

Some sad news... I've probably missed my chance to get helicopter-dropped into lower Hakalau. There will be more expeditions, but probably not before I leave in August. I AM MAJORLY BUMMED. Even if everyone was miserable, I still wanted to go! (And it would probably be less miserable next time anyway, sans hiking and plus a couple extra pairs of hands.) ...Also my mother just called and told me she got in an accident with a car and her bike again, and she broke her elbow. DDDDDD:

ETA: Shawn just reappeared, backpack in tow. I asked him where he went.

Shawn: I went to Kona!
Me: Cool!
S: I didn't like it there.
M: Why not?
S: There's nothing to do.
M: ...What do you like to do?
S: ...Dunno, but whatever it is, Kona didn't have it.

*facepalm* This kid, I just don't even sometimes.

...But he says he likes the Hilo library, so there's that I guess. ^_^;;

Been meaning to see this movie for a while; I'd heard a lot of good things. And yeah, I liked it a lot. It was... subtle. I liked that it was authentic Hawai‘i, without being in your face about it. The shirts, the paintings, the carved wooden bowls, the streets and trees and neighborhoods, the authentic locations, the quiet chirp of a gecko. I liked that we got to see glimpses of the neighbor islands. I loved the soundtrack of Hawaiian slack key standards: elegant, understated, beautiful. I recommend seeing it, if you haven't.

That it was a story about affluent white people got my hackles up a bit, because it offers such a distorted view of what Hawai‘i is like to most of the people who live here. I did really like that the movie addresses this head-on; I loved that speech he made to Cousin Hugh at the King family meeting.

I had sort of strangely-colored lenses on while watching, because my boss Jackie said that the fictional King family makes her think of the way I talk about my family (large kama‘aina haole family, several generations born in the Islands, owns property). So I couldn't help doing the compare-and-contrast thing. The Kings are a lot richer than the Gills, certainly, and they've been in the islands a lot longer... they're somewhere between my family and the Campbells, and a lot closer to the Campbells at that. Like, they're a less-Hawaiian, less-famous, less-royal, less-influential version of the Campbells. Or maybe they're a bit like a whiter version of the Parkers. (Heck, they're a hell of a lot whiter than the Gills, at least if you take my generation into account. XD) Because it's an older family, it's a much bigger family, and they don't seem quite as close.

It was other parts of the movie that I found myself identifying with, parts relating to Matt and his immediate family. ( Cut conceals minor movie spoilers but mostly me waxing emotional about family, those departed and those that don't yet and may never exist. )

So, this is it. Within minutes (in theory) I'll be leaving for the deep woods. OH MY GOD YOU GUYS I AM SO EXCITED. TT_TT

So I forgot to talk about last week! Last week at work was a lot of fun, actually. Well, Monday we spent all day cleaning out the garage storage closet, so that was... amusing, at least, but dunno that I'd say fun. But we spent the rest of the week doing field trips to cool places!

Tuesday Dennis took us to Cooper's Forest to train us on pig sign/mosquito habitat transects. This forest is really close by, just outside of the National Park... it's full of stawberry guava and faya and kahili and pigs and mosquitoes, but otherwise is a really pretty forest, and as you go deeper in you find some pretty cool plants. Also, as I was hiking along I felt an itch on the side of my face and reached for it reflexively and got my fingers on a bug-type thing, and I grab it and look at my fingers and it's a happy face spider. THERE WAS A HAPPY FACE SPIDER. CRAWLING DOWN THE SIDE OF MY FACE. (For context, this is an endemic spider with a distinctive happy face pattern on its abdomen; they are found nowhere else in the world, and they are tiny and hard to find. AND THIS ONE CRAWLED DOWN MY FACE. ...Do a Google image search, guys, even arachnophobes think this spider is cute.) I was afraid I'd crushed her, but she was fine. And she seemed to develop Stockholm syndrome because I had great difficulty getting her to leave me and go back on some bushes. ...SO COOL.

Wednesday we accompanied Carter to Malama Ki in lower Puna, to set up poles for mist-netting. This one area has a population of malaria-tolerant amakihi and apapane; generally, below a certain elevation you just don't find honeycreepers at all, but there they were, lots of them, at sea level. It was surreal and super exciting. Had fun botanizing down there, too, and we found Jackie's GeoCache, "Groom A Wookie", and it was hot and sunny and beautiful and Carter bought us Slurpees after. ^_^

Thursday we went to Ainahou (a dry forest section of the National Park with a historic ranch house and a nene breeding ground) to collect old poles, check up on the mamane bloom, and look for mosquitoes. This took a couple of hours, and then we headed down toward Hilo and the Wailuku River so Dennis could give us stream margin-dipping/puddle critter identification training. But first we took a detour to Jackie's house to see her Pez collection, and to Dennis' house to let his dogs out, and we stopped at Ace Hardware in Kea‘au to buy supplies, and basically it didn't at all feel like we were working. XD; And it was gorgeous in Hilo, and we got to poke around in puddles and look at bugs which is, like, how I spent my childhood, so that didn't feel like work either. And afterwards Dennis took the very very scenic route through Pu‘ueo (in the wrong direction) and took a winding, leisurely route through town before getting back on the highway, and, yeah, the whole day was hilarious and lazy and like a vacation.

...I missed some fun this weekend, though. Like ten of the interns went camping in Pololu Valley, which I really would've liked to join them for if I wasn't doing archaeology on O'ahu. STILL WANT THAT TIME TURNER. ...I feel like a lame human being, I've lived here my whole life and never even seen Pololu, and Matt's only been here a year and he's been, like, three times.

Speaking of housemate Matt, he left us this morning. ;_; But at least we scored his food and coffee and beer. :D His replacement came in this morning as well... I have already forgotten her name. WHAT, I'VE BEEN BUSY. She seems nice, though. ^_^

Aaaaaaand that's all the time I have, need to go back to the office, now. Hopefully Carter's ready to go, so we can go to Hakalau already.

BYE GUYS I LOVE YOU I'LL SEE YOU ALL IN JUNE IF I DONT' DIE. :DDDDDD

I'm alone in the house. Not 100% sure where my housemates are, but I'm pretty sure they went to Kalapana with some of the other interns. Not sure. No one said anything. Or, you know, invited me.

Dickbags.

I mean, okay, it's probably my fault for being gone most weekends when everyone else is hanging around housing, like, bonding and stuff. And even if they'd invited me I would've had to turn them down, because I needed tonight to pack for this weekend, and also do as much prep for the expedition as possible, since I won't be back until Sunday morning. And I've been kept happily occupied with the season finale for The Vampire Diaries (OH MY GOD.)

...But still! That's just... kinda rude. D:

Yeah, so I really really don't have time to see Avengers again this weekend, BUT I AM GOING TO SEE IT TONIGHT ANYWAY. WITH MY ETERNAL BRO ERIC. AGAIN. LIKE A BOSS.

Oh gaaaaawwwdd you guys I am so exhausted and I still have so much shopping and packing to do, aaauuuuuugghh! @_@

To do list for the rest of the evening:
-Shower
-Laundry
-Coffee
-Attempt to eat as many things in my fridge as possible that might go bad over the next two weeks
-Inventory food supply
-Write up packing/shopping lists
-Start packing?
-9:15 drive to Hilo
-10:30 AVENGERS
-Sleep (maybe)
-?????
-PROFIT

Tomorrow: Meet with Dad, sign insurance papers! Buy flowers for Mom! Party with Peace Corps friends recently returned from Mali!

Sunday: Brunch with Mom and visiting friends! BUY ALL OF THE THINGS! PACK ALL OF THE THINGS! And do all of the other things I urgently need to do. T_T

Monday: INTO THE JUNGLE FOREVER SERIOUSLY IT WAS NICE KNOWING YOU GUYS~!