T-Shirts for Triathletes, New Glasses, Self-Healing House?

Note: This is another blog based on my weekly emails to my family on the mainland. Since much of my news these days relates to trying to age gracefully, this series might be called The Geezer Gazette.]

9/27/25

Aloha Fellow Time Travelers!

 

Fall?  Really?  I guess so -- the Halloween decorations in Lowe's and Costco, which were on display a month ago, have now been joined by Christmas stuff.  Christmas in September! Actually, maybe having an extended season of good will, charity, and humility might be a good idea this year.....

 

Early in the week Karen and I participated in an "Only in Kona" activity -- serving as volunteers to help

Hard at Work

with preparations for the upcoming annual Ironman Triathlon World Championships.  This will occur on October 11, a few days after we have departed for our trip to sail down the Mississippi, so we will miss the actual race.  However, most athletes will have arrived in town the week before, and we'll be seeing them everywhere.  They are very easy to spot, standing out rather obviously from our typical tourists -- zero body fat and physiques like inverted triangles.This year the competition is only women, about 1500 or more of them, with 60 qualifying professionals. Our job, along with other volunteers from Karen's women's club and their spouses, was to fold athlete t-shirts and stuff them into bags. These shirts are only for the finishers of the race, which these days is nearly all of those who participate. It took our group about three hours to get the job done, so it wasn't really very onerous.  Karen and I rewarded ourselves with a slice of pizza, a salad, and a beer at Kona Brew Pub.

 

In Geezer Gazette news, I visited my optometrist on Wednesday and got a new prescription for glasses. The exam showed definite changes since my last prescription in May.  That one was about 3 months after my cataract surgery.  Since then both eyes show a bit more astigmatism, and both need additional magnification for distance vision, particularly more for my left (good) eye. A new pair of glasses have been ordered, and hopefully they will arrive before we leave. However, the optometrist showed me a preview of what I can expect, and it really doesn't seem that much different.  Sigh.  On the close-up problem, we worked hard trying to come up with a prescription that would help me see small detail, but nothing seem to help more than what I have right now.  I'll return for another visit to assess this when we get back from our trip. 

 

We did another workout at PF this week, and yesterday we played golf again, this time with our golf buddy. The workout was less painful, which means our muscles have resigned themselves to the effort.  Golf was enjoyable but my game was pretty lousy after a good start.  Still, there were enough moments of competence to make it fun.

 

 In the Department of House Maintenance Puzzles, I may have observed a case of temporary self-healing in one of our solar-powered ceiling exhaust fans.  We have two of these that we installed shortly after we moved in as a way to reduce daytime heat inside the house.  As you may recall, our construction is different than mainland houses in a number of ways.  We have no insulation in the walls or ceiling, something that works in our climate but would be unheard of on the mainland.  In fact, our ceiling is the underside of the roof -- there is no dropped ceiling, just open beams and planking.  Heat can build up near our ceiling just like in your attic, and these fans draw the hot air up and blow it outside.  Being solar, they crank faster when the sun is strongest, a very positive feature.  One of ours stopped working about a month ago and it was on my to-do list to have my handyman go up on the roof and remove the unit so we could test it.  But the other day it started working again -- kinda sorta.  Today it's immobile again.  The worst kind of problem is one that is intermittent, so I'll have to wait to see what happens for awhile.  I'm hoping that a gecko got tangled up in the mechanism and is slowly decaying so that eventually the self-healing will be permanent.

 

Ok, off to the market and then to the beach for breakfast.  Carpe Vitam! 

Muscles, Eyes, Skin, and Lava Episode 33

Note: This is another blog based on my weekly emails to my family on the mainland. Since much of my news these days relates to trying to age gracefully, this series might be called The Geezer Gazette.]

9/20/25

Aloha Everyone!

 

This was a very physical week -- by my standards, anyway.  Karen and I returned to Planet Fitness and also played golf, neither of which we had done for over a month because of our trip to the Northwest. Even though we tried to ease back in to them, both activities resulted in same experience -- being pooped and having very stiff muscles.  The golf actually went pretty well at times -- I got two pars and a bogey. Karen got a par on one of the same holes that I did -- a dual achievement.  Unfortunately I couldn't keep up that level of performance, and on several holes I was absolutely lousy.  Part of the problem was that if I had a good shot that went a long distance, we couldn't find the damn ball, a frustrating result of a recent downturn in my vision caused partially by my retinal edema.  I had an injection on Tuesday, but the medication really hadn't kicked in yet by the time we played golf on Thursday. I have to say that of all my current health problems, the one that concerns me most is my eyesight. Hopefully a new pair of glasses will help somewhat, and I have an appointment next week with my optometrist.

 

In other geezer news, yesterday I had my 6-month checkup with my dermatologist.  It went pretty well, but I do have a thingy on my neck that might be a basal cell carcinoma, a very treatable form of cancer. I'll go back in November to have this spot checked again, along with some other suspicious areas.  Isn't this fun?

 

My final bit of news is that Kilauea acted up again this week, Episode 33 in this ongoing eruptive period

Just Gurgling

that began last December.  The volcano had been quiet since Sept, 2, but according to the scientific measurements, it was building up pressure for another fountaining event.  The prediction was that it would start sometime between 9/17 and 9/22.  Sure enough, on the 17th it started spitting up new lava for brief periods of what is called "dome fountaining" -- low gushes that would come and go for short periods.  Then a continuous fountain began early Friday morning, reaching 800 feet before settling back to about 300 feet high. 

Main Event

Around noon, after just nine hours, it was all over, but current measurements suggest another episode will occur after a period of recharging.  Also, the volcano spits out more than just lava.  S02, the gas that is the main component of Vog, also gets ejected in huge quantities.  During this latest episode it was measured at 50 thousand tons of gas per day.  Once this gets around the tip of the island and up along our coast, we get a period of increased pollution, which is what we are experiencing right now.  This probably won't last long, though -- maybe a few days.  Don't breathe and you'll be just fine.

 

Ok, that's it for now.  Have pleasant dreams of our fading liberal democracy -- it may yet come again. In the meantime, Carpe Vitam. 

Smoky Trip, Sunny Week, Maintenance Catch-Up

Note: This is another blog based on my weekly emails to my family on the mainland. Since much of my news these days relates to trying to age gracefully, this series might be called The Geezer Gazette.]

9/13/25

Aloha Everybody!

 

We got back from our quick mainland trip last Saturday evening. Overall it was a good trip, though our

What do you see?

drive through the Cascade Mountains turned out to be more of  a drive through the "Smokies." Smoke from wildfires in the area dulled the view of the countryside, particularly the day we drove through North Cascade National Park on our way back to Seattle.  A recent fire in the area reduced visibility even to the point that driving was a challenge at times.  Normally that route is supposed to be beautiful, but we'll have to rely on the guide book photos to verify that.  In addition, the six days we spent in Rainier Park and on the Cascade loop coincided with a hot and sunny spell that produced 100+ degree days. We had to limit our outdoor activities to either before noon or after 6 pm.  Despite the heat, the night time temps dropped to the low 50's, well below my Hawaiian comfort level. Note, that makes for a daily swing of nearly 50 degrees!  If all this sounds like our experience last summer in the Canadian Rockies, it was indeed very similar -- minus the passing out and visit to the ER, of course.

 

Chihuli Glass

    I don't want to sound too negative, however, because there were also some very enjoyable aspects of the trip as well.  Seattle was great, as were our quick visits with our friends in Portland.  We found Seattle to be a very enjoyable place (good weather there, by the way).  It was easy to get around, and very inexpensive with our Golden Geezer bus passes.  We stayed in a comfortable historic hotel in Pioneer Square called The Arctic Club, near another historic building, Smith Tower, built in 1914.  Smith was the Smith in Smith-Corona, and for decades his building was the tallest skyscraper outside of New York. Our anniversary dinner was at a nice French restaurant tin the famous Pike Place Market overlooking Eliot Bay  We also went to three museums that were a "hoot" -- not a term I usually use to describe a museum. One was a museum dedicated to the work of renowned glass sculptor Dale Chihuly. He personally curated the pieces

Trust me, it's ok

that are shown here, and they are absolutely stunning.  A second museum was one that just recently opened, The Museum of Illusions.  There are several of these around the country, including one very fittingly located in Las Vegas.  As the name implies, both classic and novel illusions are very effectively and informatively presented, and many of them are interactive and large-scale.  We enjoyed this place very much.  The last museum was the Boeing Museum of Flight.  This huge facility not only has an amazing collection of real planes, there are two simulators that allow you to try your hand at the controls. One involved trying to land the Space Shuttle, which I crashed three times in a row.  The other was a jet fighter simulator that would actually turn upside down if you wanted to (or weren't skillful with the controls).  I quickly discovered that being Top Gun is very hard -- I didn't crash, but I wasn't able to shoot anything down either.  

 

Back home, this past week has been peaceful and uneventful.  Several days have been clear the whole day, with the result that our PV system is well ahead of the game for the first time in months.  The pool temperature has risen to the high 80's, which feels very comfy.  My projects around the house have mainly focused on fixing things that I've been putting off.  For example, I spent several hours one day repairing our outside garden lighting system to get a couple of lights working again.  I also got caught up on cutting back a clump of bamboo that quickly gets out of hand if you don't routinely keep it under control. With my recent health issues preventing my from whacking it back, it had done just that.  

 

Ok, that's my news for this week.  Hang in there and keep a tight grip on what you know is true and good. Carpe Vitam!