Hawaii, you guys, is totally awesome.
In case you didn't know, BF and I got to take a little vacation with his family to the island of Oahu for a week. Apparently it was a great week to be there because here in the Pacific Northwest it may or may not have rained and kind of turned into Fall a little early (by most accounts, it totally did). We flew out last Tuesday, which I was pretty nervous about because, little factoid, I am not so great on airplanes and it was an almost 6 hour flight from Portland to Honolulu. I should probably clarify that I may be prone to getting a little panicky when I am not in control of a vehicle. This is not limited to airplanes, and is something that mostly rears is ugly head when I am in cars. Strangely I'm ok on boats. I have gotten better at managing my panicky moments (sometimes much better than others) but flights generally make me a bit jumpy. Because I have traveled a lot the last 2 years for work I have gotten 200% better than I used to be, but it's still not that fun and I almost always get stressed out before a flight, even if it ends at a tropical island.
So moving on, BF decided that before we got on the flight what I really needed was a good lunch and a few beers. You know what? BF is a smart man. We ate at Gustav's at the airport and filled ourselves with fondue and bread and some delicious cold beer. Don't even worry, I only had 2 hefeweizens and in combination with the cheese and bread I was feeling relaxed and a little sleepy. We boarded our flight and I was in such a good state that I didn't hardly notice that we had taken off - also, the pilot was awesome. You can always tell by the take off and landing if the pilot is super experienced or not. This take off was crazy smooth and the whole ride there was easy going.
We arrived in Honolulu and picked up the rental car (which was not awesome... not a big fan of Jeep vehicles) and drove to our rental home in Kailua. Boy am I glad we stayed in a small town instead of downtown Honolulu or Waikiki. It was so relaxed and homey feeling and we were a block away from the beach! The beach was amazing with white sand, the clearest turquoise waters and was barely populated each day so we had plenty of space to lay out. Kailua is a great little town as well that we explored a bit for restaurants and shops when we didn't have things planned.
Instead of going day by day I mostly want to hit the important things we did, which means I mostly want to tell you what we ate so I'll start there! We went out for breakfast to a little place in Kailua called Cinnamon's which served Red Velvet Pancakes with white chocolate drizzle. If I can basically eat cake for breakfast with a side of bacon I am one happy girl, so that's what I did. You guys, those were some amazing pancakes! They were light and fluffy and wonderful and I would eat them every day if it weren't for the massive amount of weight I would gain doing so. BF chose differently and got some weird omelette which he sort of regretted because it had some strange unidentifiable green stuff in it. We also stopped by Rainbow Drive In one of the afternoons, which I guess is famous, but mostly we wanted a good plate lunch and that is exactly what we got! BF got the mixed plate and I got the Shoyu chicken plate lunch and I can honestly say I've never had better plate lunch in my life. Ever. The chicken was out of this world and the mac salad... well, I can see why they sell it in buckets.
I had shrimp multiple times because, duh, I was in Hawaii, where shrimp is plentiful and delicious and I love me some shrimp! We also, of course, had to stop by Matsumoto's Shave Ice for a famous shave ice on a hot day and then while at the Dole Plantation we got the World Famous Dole Whip after a quick trip on the Pineapple Express. One of the days I also had a burrito that was bigger than my head which I did not even come close to finishing (not even a little bit, I maybe ate 1/4 of it). Also, Mexican food in Hawaii is sort of adorable because it's not quite what we know as Mexican food, but it's close. Case in point: my mexican rice had green peas in it and more closely resembled fried rice, but it was still delicious.
So pretty much everything we ate was good! Which now leaves me room to describe what we actually did besides eat all week. We visited the Valley of the Temples and went to the Biyodo- In Temple, a buddhist temple with an awesomely large bell we got to ring for luck. It was beautiful and peaceful and I am so glad we got to go. We also visited the Dole Plantation, because how can you go to Oahu and not? I was baffled at how a pineapple plant grows. Basically it looks like a pokey ground plant and the pineapple come up out of the middle on a stalk, almost like the plant is presenting you with this strange little fruit. BF, myself and his family hiked up to the top of Diamond Head one afternoon which was an amazing view, but I forgot to bring my inhaler and felt kind of crappy as we ascended struggling for breath. It's crazy how a little heat and humidity can impact your breathing. We also got to see the show at the Polynesian Cultural Center which was pretty neat and we got a canoe ride around it as well.
One thing that we did that we will probably never attempt again is Scuba Diving. I have no idea what possessed BF and I to try it, but we both like boats and thought seeing things underwater would be a cool experience. I will tell you this right now- if you are not good in the deep end of the pool you probably shouldn't scuba dive (I'm referring to BF on this one). Also, if you get panic attacks, you also probably should not scuba dive (this one's all me). Here's what happened: a friend of ours in Portland has family in Oahu, one of which is a dive instructor so he offered to set us up with scuba diving. We thought it was a great idea and agreed to do it. We arrived at the docks and got fitted with wetsuits and fins as we waited for the boat to arrive. The instructors explained the rules of scuba diving and how to use the equipment and then we loaded a boat that had other dive instructors and other divers heading out with us. As we were heading out to our first dive spot the instructors helped us put weight belts, masks, vests and air tanks on, which weighed about 2 million pounds (ok, maybe 50, but trying to move around with it all on and flippers on your feet makes it feel like a lot more weight). I was starting to feel sick, but not seasick. It was hard to describe, but I was feeling weak and light headed, not nauseous. I think it was from the heat of being in the sun with a full wetsuit and 50 lbs of gear on. We got to our dive location and one by one dropped into the water. BF dropped into the water and wasn't super comfortable, but tried to get there. I dropped into the water and was fine until they started trying to take us down. I went down a few feet but then started to panic because the water pressure on my lungs made me feel like I was having a heart attack and the regulator in my mouth was such and uncomfortable feeling that I couldn't get over it. I went back to the surface to start over, but just couldn't get passed the awful feeling in my lungs. Then I noticed that BF was nowhere to be found. I surfaced again and found BF on another line floating at the surface with another instructor and BF looked how I felt. We looked at each other and wordlessly decided that we were DONE. We kindly asked to get back on the boat and quickly took off the gear and unzipped our suits and felt immediately better.
I felt a little bad for not doing better, but you know what- I just cannot stay calm when I cannot breathe properly because breathing techniques are usually what get me through my panic attacks. Also, there was no freaking way I was going scuba diving without BF . So there. So BF and I got a lovely boat ride while other people dove, but we were perfectly fine with it because it was a lovely day and when we anchored for the next dive I just swam around the boat at the surface and looked at the turtles and fish. We also learned on this boat excursion that some people get crazy seasick, even though the water was relatively calm that day. I felt so bad for this one girl who was sick to begin with, then dove and was fine and then, as soon as she got back up from her dive and got on the boat began puking pretty immediately until we reached the next dive spot. Actually, the majority of the people on our boat got seasick. I asked one of the instructors if that was normal and he said, "No! We hardly ever have multiple people get sick. Usually it's just one every few times out". We were so glad it wasn't either of us.
We also did a ton of shopping in Waikiki, Honolulu, Kailua and at the Aloha Stadium swap meet. One of my favorite finds was my wedding band! I picked out a white gold band that has a wave and Maile leaf pattern on it. I was hoping BF would find a similar one, but the patterned rings looked a little girly so he ended up finding a great titanium band as well.
And speaking of weddings... 30 days. Oh. My. Gosh. I may have thrown up in my mouth a little as I typed that. Here's what I'm working on now:
1. Finding garters. I forgot this was a thing! Like, you know, towards the end of the night when I throw my bouquet and BF is supposed to throw a garter? Well, that means that I actually have to have one or two which I realized the other day. I've looked around online and haven't found anything amazing yet. Any suggestions?
2. Underwear. I need to find some comfortable underwear to wear underneath my dress. I haven't really started looking so I probably should. Gah. Again, Suggestions!!!
3. Meeting with our DJ. One of my old friends also DJ's on the side and has agreed to be our DJ so I just need to get together all of our music and give our song selection to him.
4. Get a facial. Sometimes my skin is great and sometimes, like when I'm stressed, it explodes. Right now it's mostly contained, but I need to make sure it stays that way.
5. Even out my tan. Oh the TAN LINES! If there is one thing I should have done better in Hawaii it would be to have completely gone topless (LOL!) or worn a tube top because I have a million different tan lines of varying degrees that aren't going to look great in my strapless dress.
6. Figure out the final head count. I have a spreadsheet that I'm using to track this, but it's really down to the fact that people don't send RSVP's in a timely manner which is so frustrating. BF and I are trying to track down the stragglers and get straight answers. So. Much. Fun.
7. Not stress over the little things. Up to about a month ago things were peachy and then BAM! One day I started getting stressed out over this wedding so I'm making a conscious effort to NOT STRESS over the things that I cannot control or that I shouldn't even bother with.
So that is just the top few items on my list, but mostly I feel like it's all under control for the most part.
I was going to tell you about this book I read on the flight and my new thoughts about Feminism, but I am thinking I should save that for it's own separate post, but I will leave you with a recommended read: How to Become a Woman by Caitlin Moran. Read it.
What's new with you all?
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