Obey Zolac!

Quick drive-by update, since it's been a while. Since I wrapped up my USGS Avian Disease Project job my life has been brief flurries of adventuring all over the island in between bouts of being too sick to move. For serious, I have had this horrible cold off and on for weeks. Finally got my energy back (for the second time) in time to hike down to the bottom of Pololū Valley (FINALLY) and go dancing to The Olliephonics at the Blue Dragon in Kawaihae and eat piles and piles of delicious food (omg the lambchops with the fig-pomegranate sauce and the fern shoots and the goat cheese mashed potatoes and the jaboticaba sorbet a;lhsdlgha;ksjgkahsldfk). Had great fun dancing with a guy who just moved to the island from Eugene; he's in Kona but he swears he'll come to Hilo often so he can dance with us. All I can say is, HE'D BETTER, god, young, awesome dancers really need to move here more often.

So that was Sunday, and we got back late Sunday night, and I had just enough time to get my shit together Monday morning before taking off again into the field for the first couple of days of my new job. Up to Hakalau with grad student Josh and an intern who will be leaving shortly, taking a side trip to the summit of Mauna Kea just for fun, spending an enjoyable evening eating teriyaki and char siu axis deer and talking about Science, and waking up early to spend the day in the forest looking for birds. So many excellent sightings of ‘akepa and Hawai‘i creeper, among other things.

In theory I am now full-time employed, although I haven't actually seen my boss' face since February, and I haven't heard from him where or when I'm needed tomorrow or what I'll be doing. *SIGH* Pat is an excellent scientist and a super nice guy and I owe him a lot and I will owe him even more over the next few years, but... he is not terribly well organized. OH WELL.

The big big news is that in ten days I'm taking off on a massive trip with my mother that will involve a day of poking around in Baltimore/Washington D.C., a day of poking around London, many days hiking, biking, kayaking, etc. through Croatia and Bosnia & Herzegovina, and a few days exploring Bulgaria during which time I will FINALLY meet my dear friend sirona_gs and maybe I will meet up with my friend Toni as well? GUYS THIS IS GOING TO BE SO AWESOME OMG I AM SO EXCITED.

Which brings me to the question, WHO WANTS A POSTCARD??? If I don't already have your contact info you can give me your address (send me a PM if you're leery of leaving it in a comment, or email me if you have my email, or whatever); if you have a preference for where you'd like your postcard from (Baltimore, Washington D.C., London, Croatia, Bosnia & Herzegovina, or Bulgaria) let me know, and I shall do my best to comply. I'll be spending the most time in Croatia and Bulgaria, so I can pretty much guarantee satisfaction for those two locations, at least.

Okay, so in case anyone hadn't already figured it out, my internet presence is going to be somewhat diminished for the next several months. I will only have the possibility of internet when I'm not in the field, which, as I go further into my internship, will not be a lot of the time; when I'm not in the field I will only really have internet when I make the time and effort to go seek it out (only one of the volunteer houses has wireless, and it's not mine), or when I come down to Hilo for a bit. I will have internet on my Droid when I'm not in the field, so emails and LJ comment alerts will still get to me on weekends and office days, and who knows, I may even have time to respond. :P

I am going to give up all attempts at actually keeping up with my Friends list. I'll check in occasionally but I'm realistically only going to catch like 10% of what goes on there. I'll make posts when I can to keep you guys abreast (haha I said breast) of what I'm up to, and I'll really make an effort to post pictures occasionally, so you guys can see my beautiful forest and gorgeous adorable birdies.

...So yeah, anyway, this is me just squeezing in a quick update while I devour some breakfast. First week of the internship is going great. The other intern is this guy named Sean from North Carolina; he's quiet and somewhat shy and totally pleasant and amiable and we're getting along great. We live with Matt from Ohio who does insect stuff, and he's cool and friendly and we like him and I think we're all going to be great housemates. I think there's supposed to be a couple of Eban's bird demography volunteers moving in with us this weekend, but there's this whole big drama right now with Eban's crew and who's going to live where and whether or not his techs will get housing even though it's against the rules and blah blah blah, so I don't really know what the situation will be like when I get back on Monday.

Matt and Sean and I usually all start work at the same time in the morning, except for when Sean and I are going into the field and therefore have to wake up at ass o'clock (we have to be at the office at six a.m. on Tuesday. SIX A.M.), so most mornings we walk to work together. Guys, this is fantastic; I've gone from a 45-minutes-by-car one-way commute, to a 15-minutes-by-foot one-way commute. And also it's the nicest commute ever, a pleasant stroll on a path through the rainforest with the birds waking up all around us. T_T It's a great way to start the morning.

We spent a few days doing office stuff, thrilling work like disentangling mist nets and checking them for holes, and disinfecting mist nets and bird bags, and aliquoting lysis buffer into tiny vials, and getting First Aid/CPR/AED certified. We did go up to Hakalau on Wednesday to check out Nauhi Cabin, which is where we'll be staying when we're in the field for the next... a lot of time, and set up a bunch of poles and played tour guide for a visiting malaria expert from Penn State, a dude named Andrew with an awesome New Zealand accent.

Life at housing is neat. Thursday was pizza night, so we all went over to where Caitlin and Keola are living and contributed pizza ingredients. We had a vegetarian pizza with white sauce (spinach and mushrooms and garlic and onions), and a pepperoni, spaghetti squash, garlic, onions, and basil pizza with red sauce (I contributed the spaghetti squash and the Italian-style stewed tomatoes for the sauce), and I brought tortilla chips and Matt brought salsa and Caitlin busted out the SCARY INTENSE hot sauce Laurèen sent from Réunion and Brent brought cheesy bread (AMAZING) and Keola made some intensely delicious shoyu chicken and Caitilin busted out the kim chee and someone brought wine and Matt brought spiced rum and there was a lot of beer floating around. It was super fun. And I had a lot of stuff to take care of that evening, but I had a beer and some wine and a swig of the rum and then I took a hot shower and all of a sudden my head was REALLY HEAVY, so I went to sleep at like 9 and woke up early to do stuff instead. XD;

I am at home in Hilo at the moment, and for at least like another couple of hours, and then Don and Mom and I are headed up to Kapa‘a, which is a beach campground in Kohala, a little ways north of Kawaihae. We're getting together with a bunch of friends for the weekend and there will be music and singing and whale-watching and soooooo much potluck food and I had planned to invite Alex but he broke up with me so he doesn't get to come, nyahh~. And it's a three-day weekend in this great nation, so Sunday night we're sneaking away and going to the Blue Dragon and the Olliephonics are playing and like at least fifteen Hepcats are showing up and we're basically going to take over the whole place and dance dance dance.

And then on Tuesday it's out to the field for a couple of days, catching birdies whee~!

So yeah. I'll, uh. Be in touch when I can.

I LOVE YOU ALL!! ♥♥♥

So this is really ill-advised, because I am SO TIRED OMG and I need to make a good impression tomorrow. But.

Okay so first of all work last Thursday was super fun, they set us interns loose in an area I've never been before, some patches of dry forest on the Hōlei Pali, where we scrambled around on sharp, precarious ‘a‘a flows (redundant) on a very steep slope, collecting tissue from a rare plant for a genetics project and seed-collecting. It was a really cool area with a really neat plant community and FANTASTIC views of the coastal plains. If I ever have time to, like, take two breaths I will maybe post pictures.

Friday morning I went to Maui Party, and. I just. Oh my god. ( SOME OF THE BEST FUN I HAVE EVER HAD IN MY LIFE. )

...Anyway, I need to be ASLEEP, I've gotta be up in... less than five hours, now, because I am going up to Hakalau for a couple days after all, to learn how to put up mist nets and handle tiny birdies and take their blood. And then Thursday will be my last day with NPS, and then I somehow got roped into teaching the Blues mini-lesson at the Lounge, and Thomas and Joaquin from Maui Party are expected to show up which is AWESOME because Thomas was one of my very favorite dance partners and vice-versa; both of them, really, are amazing leads, and. Friday night is Jazz Mele at the Hilo Town Tavern, and Saturday night is Island Swing Orchestra at the Elk's Lodge, and my new internship starts on Monday and I really can't think about the rest of the month yet, it's just too exhausting OH GOD WHAT IS MY LIFE.

IT'S WONDERFUL, THAT'S WHAT.

So, in all of the (enjoyable) mass chaos of this month, I think I forgot to mention that just before New Year's we got a new car? Out with the '91 Previa, in with the brand new Honda Fit Sport! I took one look at the thing and promptly named it TARDIS, because it's TARDIS blue, it's bigger on the inside (no seriously this little car is so freaking spacious, it really should not be possible), and it will take us on adventures through Time and Space! :DDD

( LOOK AT IT!! :DD )

...Mom hasn't let me drive her yet. D:

So anyway, last week Sunday (yes, I know, a week ago, shut up I've been busy) a bunch of us drove over to Kawaihae to eat dinner at The Blue Dragon and dance to The Olliephonic Horns, one of our favorite swing bands. Coming down the hill from Waimea out past Pu‘ukoholā Heiau there were MORE WHALES, about three of them, BREACHING AGAIN AND AGAIN AND HAVING A BIG OLD PARTY, which was lovely, and I thought very appropriate since Pu‘ukoholā means "Hill of the Whale".

The Olliephonics were a blast, as usual, and we had a surprise treat: their guest vocalist was Pauline Wilson! She's the Big Island's only Grammy winner (and she won it back in the day before there were a million categories), and she's FABULOUS and we love her. So that was excellent.

Oh, and shichahn, ( in case you thought I was joking or something... )

Not technically champagne; it was a sparkling wine from Italy, I believe. And delicious. ALMOST AS DELICIOUS AS BUNNY.

...So this weekend has been a lot of snorkeling and dancing and good times. (And yardwork.) The weather's been absolutely gorgeous... warm and sunny and crystal clear to the tops of both peaks, patches of snow on Mauna Kea, just... stunning.

I love my life. AND I LOVE ALL OF YOU. ♥ ♥ ♥

We're getting to one of those times of the year where the ratio of Fun Stuff Filling My Life to Time I Have To Sit Down And Tell You About It tilts sharply toward the former. So, recap! I shall attempt to be brief. (HA. HA HA HA.)

So Ted's Blues workshop was super excellent and fun; first workshop I've taken as a lead... I feel accomplished! Having Ted and Lea as house guests was super excellent and fun, too. Seriously, best house guests ever, they were swift and sneaky about pouncing on things like dishes and laundry, aside from being polite and thoughtful and just nice people in general. I had a great time playing tour guide with them, too; we had a fun day at the National Park, and a fun day exploring lower Puna (and nice weather on both those days, too, which was a bleeding miracle), and I took them to the Mauna Loa Macadamia Nut Factory and Rainbow Falls and around the Downtown Hilo shops. And their last two nights we invited Amy over and Ted put on some music (which is largely the same as my music, apparently), and we enjoyed tasty local brews and played Candyland and Apples To Apples and I just barely beat Ted in an excellent game of Stratego and I introduced everyone to the fabulousness that is Bananagrams.

I snuck away on Friday night to go to the HAVO Employee Christmas Party, which was fun. My boss, Mark, was one of the guys in charge of decorating the Volcano House, and he and his buddies chopped down a bunch of faya trees and stuck them in the corners and strung lights on them. ...Morella faya is, btw, an invasive alien species, and one of the top two worst problems in the Park. So. BEST USE OF FAYA EVER. There was also bamboo and monstera staplegunned to the walls and lights everywhere and live Hawaiian music and a roaring fire in the fireplace and small adorable children running around, this is important for the ambience, okay... it was very nice. And Caitlin and I arrived just as the last of twilight was fading, and the view over Kilauea Caldera with the light in the clouds and the silhouette of Mauna Loa and Venus setting over the orange glow of Halema‘uma‘u, and a huge, full moon rising behind us, clear and bright... GOD, SO BEAUTIFUL. ...Anyway, the food was traditional lu‘au fare, all the good stuff, kalua pig and rice and laulau and mac potato salad and chicken long rice and poi and haupia and THE MOST AMAZING TAKO LU‘AU EVER and it was delicious. And after Santa showed up (what a rockstar he is too, seriously, all the dude has to do is show up and wave at people and everyone cheers, everyone's happy to see him, for serious, what a pimp), Caitlin and I decided it was TOO GODDAMN COLD to hang around the main party, so we took our wine and plates of dessert over by the GIANT MOTHERFUCKING FIRE and sort of oooooozed across the couches and just talked for a while, which was nice. ^_^

( And so on and so on, BITCHES DON'T KNOW ABOUT MY TROPICAL RAINSTORMS, sekrit LJ is not so sekrit, plus enjoyable spam. )

Okay so it's past my bedtime already and as usual I am underslept (there is really not enough time in a day to work eight hours and commute and do all of the things I want/need to do), but I'm going to do a drive-by post of THINGS, because if anything I am about to get busier. When the fuck am I going to do my Christmas shopping oh my gaaaaaaaaaaawd!! T_T

First off, Ted Maddry is here with his girlfriend Lea... he's here to teach a Blues workshop this weekend. Mom's on O‘ahu for work, so I picked them up from the airport and fed them and showed them the ropes. It was instantly clear that they are both fabulous people, as I have come to expect from the traveling Swing/Blues instructor crowd; I'm really looking forward to learning from Ted and to hanging out with them and showing them around the island for the next week. Ted bought us beer (Maui Brewing Company Coconut Porter oh my gaaaaaaawwwwd~!) and said some really complimentary things about my mother (that he's been hearing her name from everyone on the circuit as a workshop coordinator who is supremely excellent to work with, and having corresponded with her for this workshop he can now see why) that I hope he will repeat in her presence, because awww~.

So, yeah, I'mma be busy playing tour guide and Blues dancing and having fun, and then next week I'm going on a Waipi‘o-Waimanu backpacking trip with some people, which I am super excited about; with this trip and the Labor Day Mauna Loa summit adventure that's two out of three crossed off of my Big Island Backpacking Bucket List... now if I can only get Pele to cooperate so I can camp at Nāpau-! ...Oh man, and then I've got the Haleakala backpacking trip coming up in January... SO MUCH AWESOME HIKING YAY.

And now a list of Things To Flail About:

- For those of you who enjoy Red vs. Blue, Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along-Blog, the sillier bits of Doctor Who, and/or THINGS THAT ARE AWESOME, I highly recommend The Visitor from the Future (Le Visiteur du Futur), a French science fiction/comedy web series (don't worry, it comes with subtitles). The show is, in general, much like its title character: adorable, frenetic, and slightly insane (oh my god I have such a crush on the Visitor and his crazyface, for serious, SO IN LOVE), and it's full of time-travel shenanigans and robots and zombies and silliness. So. WATCH IT.

( Continued under the cut: rock and roll, naked Fassbender, jet packs, lava, SPACE, and that guy I like. And Batman eats a pony. )

THAT TOOK WAY LONGER THAN I MEANT IT TO, OH GOD I'M SO TIRED, okay bye now!

Stolen from apple_pathways:



For all you comic nerds on my Flist. And everyone else, too. We don't like to discriminate.

I would dearly love to see an Apokolips holiday "celebration" of Anti-Life. WORST HOLIDAY EVER. ...Also I find it interesting that we have three heroes from Marvel and one bad guy, one of the worst villains ever, of all time, from DC. WHAT ARE YOU TRYING TO SAY HERE, GUYS?

So what's new in my life.

Adorable Southern Boy Update (it will be a hilarious day when he discovers my Livejournal and finds out this is how I refer to him): Alex and I went on a Sexy Beach Date on Saturday. There were sea turtles, it didn't even rain on us, and I learned how to stand on a paddleboard. Alex was impressed by my mad not-falling-off skills... I fell off three times, and then I didn't fall off again. (Years of walking on railings at the peril of my elementary school administrators' frowny faces pays off!) Next stop: surfing! (Maybe.)

CHALLENGE: Kiss someone seated behind you without toppling both of you off of the paddleboard and into the sea. CHALLENGE ACCEPTED. SUCCESS!

Later that evening he played with the Island Swing Band and I danced, and when the canned music came on at intermission we danced a little, and then I bought him a drink. After the party I was talking to James and Andolie and they were like, "That keyboardist is incredible! Who is he? Do you know him? We think they should have featured him more, he's fantastic!" I got to pass on their comments to Alex and he got all aw shucks embarrassed. It was cute. ^_^

And then this guy wanted to know more about our swing club and he gave Mom his card, and she was like, "...Wait a minute, I already have this card," and he turned out to be Rodger, our pilot from our Blue Hawaiian helicopter tour. The one where Mom and I ran the tour ourselves, and Rodger asked us to please please please contact him later so he could take notes. SO THAT WAS A HILARIOUS COINCIDENCE.

Alex and I will see each other again on Friday night when he plays for Jazz Mele, and we have vague plans for me to show him the good hiking trails in the National Park at some point over the weekend.

...Okay so what else. It's Thanksgiving week, which means today Maintenance brought in a backhoe and dug a GIGANTIC PIT behind our greenhouses for use as an imu. Tomorrow afternoon we're loading it up with about ten metric shit-tons of food, and Wednesday we'll take all the food out and have an awesome Thanksgiving potluck. For my contribution to the imu I cut up a breadfruit and an Okinawan sweet potato, put the pieces in a pan, and dumped a can of coconut milk over it; I have no idea what will happen but I imagine it will be DELICIOUS.

( Finally, trailers. )

Okay, that is all, I am very tired, goodbye now.

HAPPY AMURRICAN SUPREMACY DAY!

Today involves wedding set-up and then a barbecue/potluck/dance party/fireworks viewing at the Hockers' farm in Pu‘ueo.

That's all I have to say for the moment, because my brother is downstairs in the kitchen making CRÈPES and I need to be eating some of them RIGHT NOW. *best brother EVER*

Hope y'all have an excellent day, even if your country didn't give you the day off to blow shit up and grill things. ♥

Tonight was a Big Island Jazz & Blues Association event, at which there was great dancing, excellent music, and fabulous spoken-word poetry. And then I went to see the X-Men period piece X-Men: First Class. I'd had two glasses of wine at the jazz thing so I was maybe a tiny bit drunk at the start of the movie, haha.

The movie, by the way, was AMAZING~!! And I swear that's not just the alcohol talking. The film did a great job at connecting with the audience; there were a lot of moments where we all laughed or groaned or cheered or clapped together (probably helped that there were clearly so many nerds in the audience, but even so). Lots of great references to the greater X-Men continuity. Fassbender (sexy, sexy Fassbender) did a brilliant job with Magneto, and when he had the helmet on he even looked like a younger Sir Ian McKellan. And let me just say, there was a lot of sexy in this movie. I mean, James McAvoy is hardly rough on the eyes, and that delicious accent ain't hard on the ears either. Lucas Till? Pretty. Nicholas Hoult? ADORBS. Álex González? So sexy. Caleb Landry Jones? OMG YES PLEASE I WANT ONE PLEASE CAN I CAN I?

Baconface Kevin Bacon did a good job of being evil. Logan cameo was awesome and hilarious. The end credits were full of SCIENCE and awesome music. And how funny is it that Emma Frost was played by a chick named January?

In other news, I can smell the slashers coming. Like, holy crap, don't even make them work for it, Mr. Vaughn. XD; Xavier/Magneto, obviously, although I can totally see there being a tiny but diehard group of Havoc/Darwin slashers.

Anyway, AWESOME MOVIE GO SEE IT.

Dear Supernatural,

HOLY SHIT!

Love,
Angela

P.S. Crowley, I am still as madly in love with you as ever. Mark Sheppard, would you please consider having my babies?

Aaaaaand that's it for all of my shows except for Doctor Who, at least until various things start up again in the summer. ...At least I'll maybe have a little more free time?

In my continuing adventures in yardwork (thrilling, I know, but this is my life now; when it rains, it pours, but when it's sunny, yardwork), hacking apart banana trunks with handsaws and machete is still immensely satisfying, as is excavating the root mass with a spade. Whilst doing the latter, I disturbed (and was disturbed by) a centipede as thick as my finger and long as my hand. Oh, Hawai‘i. ...Well, no more of that today, anyway; the rain is back WITH A VENGEANCE. It's coming down so hard right now, omg.

Last night Mom and I went up to a friends' house in Kaumana for one of their Mauka Music parties. It was hella fun... potluck dinner with a whole bunch of people and lots of wine (and a dog and some cats, very friendly), and then after we'd eaten and talked story we gathered in the living room with guitars, ‘ukulele, ‘ipu, flutes, drums, tambourines, and various sorts of rattles and maracas to play music and sing. They've been having these parties sort of semi-regularly (my Mom only just recently made it onto the guest list), and they have these big binders with lyrics and chords... tons of songs, all the best, from Bob Dylan to Eric Idle to Queen Lili‘uokalani. We even sang "Crazy" by Gnarles Barkley... or, the cute twenty-something guy with the mad guitar skills and fucking amazing gorgeous voice did (music cruuuuuuuuush) and I joined him, while all the older folks listened, because it wasn't in the book and it wasn't written in the sixties, so they didn't know it, haha. Mom and I were almost the last to leave... we hung out and sang until one in the morning. So much fun, for serious.

In a few minutes I'll be off again... today is the monthly International Folk Dance party up on the Hocker's farm. More good food, nice folks, and live music. And presumably, when I get back, Doctor Who. Life ain't so bad.

Hope all is well with y'all. ♥

ETA: OH YEAH, I almost forgot. Last night my dreams mostly involved me hanging out with Justin Bieber, of all people. HE WAS AT MY HOUSE. He was actually very adorable and cool and sweet and personable. We became friends. I was hanging out with him on tour, and I went with him and his friends to check out this giant mansion he was thinking of buying. This place was insane, it was like a small country. ...Anyway. Wtf.