Camellia Korean Buffet and the Dangers of Driving After

After today's 2h 45min recovery ride (which was more like a 40 mile slug fest due to some excess of testosterone from 3 other peoples), I went to eat an early dinner at Camellia Restaurant with my bicycle-insider friend and my wannabe bicycle-insider friend.

I haven't been to Camellia's Yakiniku (cook your own) Korean buffet for so long. The last time I was there was when it was located on Beretania Street.

I cut out a 10% off coupon from the Dining Out section of today's Sunday paper and it was a super good deal at $16.75 - 10% + tax and tip. All the kalbi and rib eye and flank steak and sashimi and kalbi and kalbi and kalbi and rib eye and rib eye and rice (the one with the red beans inside) and rice and rice and ice cream and you get the picture... The food was so onolicious!!!

The only problem, however, is that with buffets you really wanna get your $'s worth so you keep on eating and eating and u never really know when you've eaten toooooo much until it is too late!!! Man, I was so totally STUFFED that I was seeing double and delerious driving home...man, I don't even know how I made it back in one piece! Good thing a cop didn't pull me over otherwise I could have gotten hauled in for driving under the influence of being too stuffed!!!

Thank goodness I put in those 2 long rides this weekend.

I would say 5 Stars * * * * * in my book...just be prepared to cook your own food and to be totally stuffed. Oh yeah...and to wash your clothes and take a bath when you get home. Huh???...go there and eat and you'll know why...it's worth it though!!!

Saturday 10/28...Riding and Autocross and Camera

Riding: After a couple arduous 2 hour rides last week Sat and Sunday, today, I went for my first 3hr plus ride. And surprisingly, after being sick for so long, I felt really good. While veging at home over the last couple of weeks, I decided to adjust my on-bike position to improve my aerodynamics, and, I think it's really helping...I think...

Autocross: Last last week Sunday started with a lot of rain, then with some 6.7 rocking and a rolling, then, for an encore, an islandwide blackout. So...would the autocross still be happening with all that going on??? Surly no...NOT!!!

Click here for my October Autocross Report: http://mycarpage.blogspot.com

Camera: I still have no camera and it's driving be crazy...missed a really interesting shot and a really depressing shot the other day. I have my sights set on a Canon sd700is but...I may go for the sd800is...but...

Got Flu Shot???

I detest needles. I hate needles. I've never took a flu shot. I...I...I...

During my one month cold, I promised myself that I would get a flu shot this year. But on the day of the free flu shot at work...I...I...I...almost chickened out.

However yesterday, with a steely reserve, I went down to the lobby and took it like a real man...sort of like that kid in the picture.

From what I can figure out, the young guy who gave me my shot was not that good as most people could really feel it. I knew I should have gone to the older, more experienced guy...next time.

As for possible flu-like after affects, I didn't really have any (knock on wood 3 times), HOWEVER, I do have a really sore shoulder that I can't even sleep on! Other people who got the shot from the older guy had no such after effects while another person in my office also has a real sore shoulder.

At least it wasn't as bad a the TETANUS shot I got a couple of years ago...OUCH...now THAT was something to scream about!!!

Vote "YES" on City Charter No. 8

Got this in the e-mail bin recently from HBL. Apparently they want everyone to vote YES on City Charter Resolution No. 8.

This resolution will mandate that the City and County of Honolulu Department of Transportation have "making Honolulu a pedestrian and bicycle friendly city" added to their job description, so to speak.

What a laugh...it would be good enough if they just kept the d@mn roads clean and swept and paved!!!! Now that would REALLY make this City bicycle friendly...


But...I digress...better to have this resolution than none at all. Vote yes on 8.

For more info click here: HBL Page on this Resolution.

Malloy's Back!!!

FINALLY, after suffering from withdrawal symptoms for weeks and weeks, the best talk show host on the airwaves is BACK. (I mean...who can STAND listening to Al Franken who, since deciding to run for Congress, has cut off the second of his own gonads to be more...shall we say...politcally correct??? I mean even listening to him before, you could tell he only had one to begin with...)

And...it couldn't be any sooner with all the BULL going on with, Foley, Hastert, the Idiot and his rendition, kangaroo courts and tourture, and Iraq, N Korea, Iran, etc, etc, etc. Click here: My Politics of Peace Blog. If you need your Malloy "hit", there are some special links there :-).

6.7

7:07am...a 6.7 earthquake wakes up the Aloha State (and me).

Thank goodness it happened on an early Sunday morning. Lots and lots of damage on the Big Island with many landslides, damaged buildings and homes, toppled down stone walls, and cracked earth. But most of all...no serious injuries or death directly caused by the earthquake.

On Oahu, there was an ENTIRE island blackout. 291,000 customers with no electricity...18 hours for us. Now, I can understand that HECO had to shut everything down to protect the system...but what I cannot accept is the ridiculously slow effort in getting ANY information out to the public. Even if just to say that they have experienced a major island wide shut down and to be patient as information will be forthcoming asap. In fact, it took over 3 hours for any HECO person to get on the air at about 10:30am...WAY slower than should be. And even after that, the information was not well done IMO and mediocre as best. Shape up HECO!

There was also NO or VERY LIMITED cellular service from T-Mobile. Gotta look into changing service as I heard that Nextel was working fine!

On this page KITV News Article, check out the "viewer images" for lots of pictures of what happend.

Honolulu Century Ride - A Different Perspective

I've done the Honolulu Century Ride many many times, and back in the day, there were few, if any Nihonjin. But ever since JAL began promoting this ride very heavily in Japan, there have been more and more riders. This past ride had over 1,500 people from Japan! So out of a total of 4,000, people from Japan made up almost 40% of the people.

Who knows...maybe in a couple of years, this ride may be like the Honolulu Marathon where MOST of the participants are from Japan.

One of my friends, Kushima-san and his wife, have done this century 5 times. He told me that back in 1998, there were hardly any Japanese people and the ride had a very "local" feel. But now, the feel is not like before...



For a real Nihon-jin perspective, click here: Kushima-san's 2006 HBL Century Ride Report. If you can't read 日本語, convert it in www.worldlingo.com and you can get a pretty good idea. Also check out the がんばれ Round-the-Island Ride report which he and his wife did only 4 days after the Century. Now that's more than I have ever done...and I live here!

Cycling West Maui

The day after Haleakala I rode to the West Maui Mountains. Went counter clockwise as far as I had time too. Click here to see what I saw: My West Maui Recovery Ride.

Nuclear Arms Race

Holy crap!!!

Because of the Idiot's foolish and irresponsible disengagement policy, Kim Jong Il made good on his threat to test a nuclear weapon tonight.

May a Greater Power help us all...the human race.

Sleep tight my friends...

Baby Gecko

Baby Gecko
Originally uploaded by dancedream2002.

Don't know about you folks, but around here, there have been a ton of these little geckos running around. So much so that like the disarours, I hope they don't eat themselves out of existance...

FinePix A203 Camera

Fuji Camera
Originally uploaded by dancedream2002.

Lost w/o a camera???

My ol' faithful camera finally gave out a couple of weeks ago when the lens froze in the out position and wouldn't focus at all. And it's almost entirely the camera's fault...though...as a couple of months before, it decided to launch its self of the roof of my car while I was going about 35mph or so...

So now I'm on the search for a new one. Looking at the following:

Canon SD630 for a very cheap $299 at Costco
Casio S600 for $299 agian at Costco
Casio z750 for ???
Fuji Z3 for $249 at Circuit City
Sony W50 for $229 at Shirokiya (used my brother's cam to take this pic)

All the above are in the ultra-compact catagory with the Casio S600 coming in at a skinny 0.6" thick.

Also looking at some little bigger cameras that might be a pain to haul around but would provide a higher quality picture:

Canon SD700is w/ image stabilization
FinePix F30 w/ super fast 3200 ISO

Which one?????

Why Train???

They say you can buy speed...as in better aerodynamics.

Hopefully it's true: Neat TT Stuff.