Obey Zolac!

So, I failed out of mini-wrimo pretty quickly. When I signed up in October, I didn't know I was about to jump back into RPing, and my new game started on the same day and... yeah, I've basically had no interest in anything else. And technically it's writing, I'm writing so much every day in the game, but... RPing is not what I need help with. Mini-wrimo is supposed to help me with my prose fiction projects, and it's not doing that for me this year. I can't even bring myself to care, because oh my god this game is too much fun, why do anything else, ANYTHING. ELSE.

In RL stuff, beginning of the month was also my second anniversary with Forrest. We did a nice little day trip to Makalawena, which is a GORGEOUS but hard to get to beach in Kona. The following weekend we had a little getaway to a cabin in Kalopa State Park.

Last weekend was crazy busy with dancing, climaxing with THE Glenn Miller Orchestra and all of us Hep Cats showing up in force to teach and perform and be awesome on the dance floor. I got all dolled up in my new red dress and did my hairs and make-up all period and wore my cute vintage-style dance shoes and felt SO FABULOUS. Look! (I'm on the left.) And look again!

Again, mostly my energies have been wrapped up in Snowblind. I am having hella fun, these people are my people, by which I mean TERRIBLE PEOPLE, I've never felt so warmly welcomed so quickly in a game, and I'm constantly crying laughing in the Snowblind plurks, everything is shame boners and severed toes and how many snowbos can we cram into the shower at once, and also how can I murder my character today?

Today what had me crying laughing was this plurk thread; I've filed all the serial numbers off and done some minor editing and I hope they don't mind me reposting this without permission, but.

( Honestly, this needs to be saved for posterity. )

So anyway, that's my life lately. What up, nerds?

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.

Yesterday Alex and I went to Makalawena Beach, which is a gorgeous white sand beach in Kekaha Kai State Park on the Kona side, that can only be accessed by either a) walking a long way in the hot hot sun over sharp, rough ‘a‘a rock, or b) taking your life in your hands and a 4x4 vehicle that you don't like very much down the access "road". Alex has a Nissan XTerra and is the best kind of lunatic, so we went with option b. (No seriously, I can't even tell you how fucked up this 4x4 track is, I mean, I've driven in some pretty effing gnarly places for my various internships, but jesus, that road gave us a thrashing! :DD)

Anyway, skipping past all of the very excellent things about Makalawena and going straight to the WHALES, OMG SO MANY WHALES, HOLY SHIT WHALES~!!! It's humpback season in Hawai‘i, and I've been looking and looking and hadn't seen any until yesterday just before sunset, when HOLY SHIT SO MANY WHALES showed up. I can't even, I've lived in Hawai‘i my whole life and I've traveled to Alaska and I've had some pretty freaking excellent whale sightings, but in terms of the combination of sheer number of whales, proximity to the whales, and whale activity, this was THE BEST I'VE EVER SEEN. There had to have been a dozen of them, at least, maybe more, hard to tell, they're under the water and they move around, so. There were definitely one or two babies. The closest whales, a group of I think three, including a baby, was FOR SERIOUS ONLY A HUNDRED METERS OFF SHORE. We could have swum out to them easily if that wasn't a) illegal, and b) dangerous. There was a lot of spouting and we had a couple nice views of tails, and then there were the two whales further out that just WOULD NOT STOP BREACHING, they were having a freaking BREACHING PARTY, oh my god, just flinging themselves bodily out of the water OVER AND OVER AGAIN.

BEST. WHALES. EVER.

...Okay platoapproved, it's safe now.

So anyway, this beach. Not too crowded due to the effort it takes to get there, and it's beautiful and there are fun sea creatures and the waves are nice for bodyboarding or surfing, and there were moa (those Polynesian chickens) wandering around entertaining us by boldly stealing food from people's unwatched bags. And surrounding the beach there are a series of rare anchialine ponds and ʻŌpaeʻula Pond, a wetland area that's a National Natural Landmark and is one of the only remaining breeding and nesting areas for rare Hawaiian wetland birds such as the āeʻo (Hawaiian Stilt), the ʻalae keʻokeʻo (Hawaiian Coot), and the ʻaukuʻu (Black-crowned Night Heron). There were SO MANY STILTS, which was super exciting, you almost never see those, and I've never seen so many at once, oh my gaaaaaawd I really wished I'd brought binoculars, and oh my god this place is totally going on my list of Awesome Birding Places to take shichahn to when she finally comes to visit me.

( Also, check out how cute this bird is, seriously. )

...And the vog wasn't bad and the sunset was FUCKING BEAUTIFUL and asghsla;hfklsahgkfs it was a Perfect. Freaking. Day. TT_TT

Also tomorrow is a holiday so tonight a bunch of us are driving up to Kawaihae for dinner at the Blue Dragon and SO MUCH DANCING to the very excellent Olliephonics, OMG YAY I AM EXCITE.

Today was PERFECT. The weather was glorious even in Hilo, and the whole drive up the Hamakua coast was stunning, sun shining and ocean the deepest, bluest blue. Hapuna was, predictably, hella crowded, but not to a bothersome degree aside from the parking. I ate a gigantic motherfucking plate of food, poke and bbq chicken and vegetable shishkabob and coleslaw and green papaya salad and sushi and watermelon and lychee and banana, and then I was full to bursting with food and then I ate a steak. And then I got in the water that was glass-clear and as warm as my skin, and I horsed around with family and friends and played keepaway and bodysurfed even though the surf was pathetic and I didn't come out again for two and a half hours and ohmigod I was so relaaaaaaaxed~!

And then, since we were already in South Kohala and it was a first Sunday, we abducted half the party and went to the Blue Dragon to hear The Olliephonics and dance. I had myself a drink called the Tequila Dragon which had tequila and Grand Marnier and lime juice and mango puree in it; it was basically a mango smoothie with tequila in and it was DELICIOUS. Since I still felt full from the gigantic motherfucking plate of food + steak from three and a half hours earlier I avoided the entrees and ordered the seared ahi and spinach salad, which was also delicious; these little batter-fried slices of eggplant were especially amazing. And as usual The Olliephonics were motherfucking spectacular, and as usual we had a freaking amazing good time dancing, and as usual members of the band and random other patrons came up to our table to tell us how amazing we look on the dance floor, and I think we hooked someone for the blues dance workshop in August, so that's cool. And I danced with my brother to "A-Train", which is his favorite ever swing song (he used to play it when he played alto saxophone for a couple of big band/swing/jazz bands back in high school), and I led sister-to-be Nova more-or-less successfully in a cha-cha to "Oye Como Va", which was hilarious but hella fun, and they played "Mack the Knife" and "Jump Jive and Wail" and "In The Mood" and ALL OF THE GOOD SONGS, ALL OF THEM, and it was sooooooooo fun. ^_^

And my friend Eric (from high school... and middle school... and elementary school) somehow discovered that I was on the island and texted me, so I'm going to have to find time to hang out with him, yaaaaaaaaay Eric! I don't know WHEN, because my schedule for the next MONTH looks like this: wedding prep, partying, working full-time, folk dance, partying, working full-time, wedding prep, WEDDING, wedding clean-up, working full-time, traveling to O‘ahu, traveling to Kaua‘i, working full-time, blues workshop. @_@ But I dunno, fuck it, maybe sometime next week after the WEDDING is over with we can meet up after work for dinner and/or a movie or something.

What is my liiiiiiiiife. ...It is wonderful, that's what.