In Hawai'i 4/28 to
5/26
(29 days - 430 total)
This will be a first: I usually
enter these accounts after the fact, going back to look at notes and
letters sent home during our stay. But this time, I am going to enter it
straight into the website while we are away. To separate the entries, I
will indicate the date of the entry.
May 3rd, 2014
It is our sixth day here in Hawai'i, on the Island of
Hawai'i, locally known as the Big Island. We were picked
up early Monday morning by a driver and taken to the
Oakland Airport where we boarded a Boeing 737 stretch
owned by Alaskan Airlines and five hours and five
minutes later we landed
in Kona, Hawai'i.

Our first sighting of Hawai'i is poking up through the
clouds, directly to the south of us. The highest
mountain in the world... if you measure from it's base,
which is the bottom of the ocean. Only 13,000 plus
change above sea level, is Mauna Kea with the white
specks on top which are a dozen international
observatories. Another one, the world's largest, is
scheduled to be built very soon. The USA and another
country are splitting the costs on that one. This is probably the bluest Blue Hawai'i
that you will ever see. We are westbound headed to Kona
Airport (KOA). The spots you see are not on my lens...
they are on the window of the aircraft. They frown on my
opening the window to take this shot. :-)

A small course correction and we are turning south-west
and crossing over the furthest northern part of the
island. The town of Hawi (Haw - Vee) is below us. Once a
large sugar cane growing area it was almost a ghost town
after all of the sugar cane and pineapple went to the
Philippines, until a decade or two ago people started building up the
tiny town and it is now visited regularly by locals and
tourists alike.

A little further south and we see the Kohala coast. The
Brown's home is toward the left, near the cloud bank. At
2,100 feet elevation it looks out over this bay. The
white protrusion along the coast is filled in to allow
more area for the Kawaihae (Kah - wah - ee - haw - ay -
ee) Shipping Harbor, where many
of the ships come in to deliver and pick up freight.
Mauna Kea is still in the distance, we are dropping down
along the west of the mountain at this time.
It was an uneventful flight except for the fact that I
was reading a book on Rosalee's e-reader titled: "Heaven
Is For Real", written by the father of a 4 year old
boy with a serious medical condition that required
surgery to correct. The doctors gave him little chance
of survival before surgery but he pulled through,
amazing everyone. The 'fun' part of the book was that
for the following year the boy continued to talk about
events that happened before he was born, and never was
told about. When asked how he knew these things he said
that he had been in Heaven while he was in surgery and
met the people he talked about. His dad is a pastor at a
church and knows scripture fairly well, and when he
asked questions about Heaven, the boy described it as it
has been told in scriptures. Mom and dad said that at
the age of four, the boy has heard very little scripture
about Heaven.
Seeing the family go through the tribulations of the ill
child, and the mother reliving the loss of the boy's
sister who died before delivery was very emotional, and
I have to say I wetted a few napkins reading the book.
I have believed in the existence of God and of
Heaven for quite a while now, but some things just don't quite hit you deeply
until something comes along to shake you. The boy
described meeting his great grandfather, whom he never
knew, and his sister, whom he was never told about. I
could not help but think about the fact that I had a sister that
I never met, and the thought of my meeting her one day
just set a little closer to my heart. On top of that, I
know that my mother always talked about seeing her baby
girl again one day. I could not hold my emotions when I
thought about the possibility that she is with her as I
read that book. And my brother and dad are with them as
well. And I'm tearing up as I write this so I had best
move on.
It was a good flight, and Donna met us at the airport
with a couple of leis and a big hug. On the drive 'home'
we had a good
catch-up chat and discussed the recent loss of her own
beloved mom which we also were missing. It will be a
little less sunny in Hawai'i this time, with our sweet
Miss Clyde now gone.
As we drove into "the Ranch" where the Brown's live
(the gated community where they live is called Kohala
Ranch), we
were delighted to see what is usually straw-yellow hills
actually tinted with a bit of green from heavier than
usual rains. The annual average of rainfall in this
location is around ten inches. Not what you expect to
hear/see when Hawai'i is the subject. Twenty miles from
here, around the mountain, it is one hundred ten inches
a year. Major difference. Anyway, as I type this, the
rainfall from July first last year to today is 16.29
inches, and we had some rain today.
This is the view to the north from the Guest Room Lanai.
Mount Hale'a'kala on Maui would be out there on the
horizon were it not a bit overcast. Below is a view to
the south from the Master Bedroom Lanai. The crest of
Mauna Kea is buried in those clouds just above that
little standing of trees.

Dennis had a few small projects waiting for me, but
neither he nor I could locate the small electric meter I
brought to him a few
years back (to make it easier to do his projects). I will look deeper over the next few weeks.
I have a couple of projects possibly waiting... the
Palace in Kona has a music box I have talked about in
previous visits. I worked on it to get it to run again.
If you don't remember, it is a large cylinder music box
that plays five different songs and was given to the
Crown Princess Kaiulani by Robert Lewis Stevenson on one
of his visits. She was in her teens and he became very
fond of her. She enjoyed writing and he would critique
her work. I have a meeting with the ladies that run the
palace to see if I can bring the box to the Brown's home
and do more work on it. Many of the tens of thousands of
pins on the cylinder have been bent and now that it
runs, the music is really messy. I have a tool to
correct that... but it takes a lot of time, and I can't
be running to Kona (45 minutes) again and again, plus
they have no place to work there.
The puppies were glad to see us... they didn't eat our
legs or bark more than a few moments. That is good. LOL.
It has been 18 months since they have seen us. They are
a bit older... more mature. The Brown's have been
working on their barking. I believe they also remember
that we are 'those-people-that-don't-like-us-to-bark',
and after the Brown's left on their voyage, they really
do show patterns we remember them having with us the
last time we were here. The proof will be the first
night when we go to bed in the Master Bedroom, where the
dogs also sleep. The Brown's tell us that the dogs sleep
on the bed with them, and are concerned that they will
bother us. Last visit, the dogs remembered that we were
'those-people-that-don't-let-us-sleep-on-the-bed' and
never gave us any trouble. So... the first night we
slept in there, Rajah was on his bed, Rufus was on a low
chest at the foot of the bed while Rosalee turned down
the bed. When she turned out the light, Rufus 'tested'
her by placing one foot on the bed... and waited. She
told him "no, you have to sleep in your own bed". She
heard four paws hit the hardwood floor and then four
more and the dogs went out to the Living Room and got on
the couch next to me. They have not tested us since.
These are very intelligent dogs... and they have better
memories than we do that is for sure. LOL.

We are 'Home'. That rainbow went from sea shore to sea
shore. I did not have a wide enough lens to get it all
in.
Dennis has pulled more of his plantings out to cut down
the watering he has to do. It is not a matter of work,
as he has a sprinkler system with something like 18
stations, but it is the expense. Water comes from wells
and there is not a lot of subterranean water-bearing
soil on an island of lava. So it is expensive. He told
me he has turned the sprinkler system off for the last
few months, and his water bill is tiny. We will have to
take care to turn it on if it starts to get dry.
Yesterday we got 1.20 inches of rain in less than an
hour and a half, so we are ok for a few more days.

The Brown's have done a lot of work on the house. To our
eyes it was a lovely home already, but after nearly 18 years
they likely desire some changes. Donna has a new kitchen
with all new appliances, new darker cabinets, but the
layout is pretty much similar to what they had before.
They have done more wood flooring (hallway, previous
exercise room, Master Bedroom) which matches the Living
Room. They also added new cabinets on the Dining Room
side of the Kitchen counter.
A new 'alabaster' light hangs over the Dining Room. We
expected to see that as we tried to buy it for her last
trip over. A store they frequented was closing out
before they were to return. They stayed open a little
longer and Donna talked them out of it... and a few more
things as well.
We are getting to expect the entertainment center to
change each time we come over. We were not disappointed.
LOL. The new Panasonic is as wide as a billboard, and
the controls are somewhat simpler to operate. Plus there
is an option to watch either Satellite feed or Cable
feed, so when their pre-programmed recorder takes over
we can still watch by switching to the Cable feed. Both
feeds seem to have pretty much the same things to watch.
At least they both have things that we enjoy watching.
Dennis said to push the red button and we get Netflix
which is pre-paid, so it is unlimited viewing. I have
used it a couple of times. Cool!
The new wider screen required a newer piece of furniture
so they put in a nice set of cabinets that match the
Kitchen cabinets. They look very nice. Also, they put
new cabinets (matching the Kitchen cabinets) in the Guest
Bathroom as well as the Master Bathroom.
Thursday evening we went down to
Kawaihae
shipping port (Kah - wah - ee - haw - ay) about ten
miles away and tried a new restaurant Donna told us
about. When Kent and Linda were here a few years ago we
ate breakfast there. It was the first time I had
actually had Eggs Benedict. They are now called
Plantation Grill and we tried (sampled) their fish tacos
which are fabulous. They use Mahi Mahi (Maw - Hee
Maw - Hee), and it is thick and
tender and flakey and wonderful. For dinner I had Fish &
Chips with the fish made again from Mahi Mahi and it was
like some of the best Fish & Chips I have had. Some day
I hope to try some in England so I can find out what
they are really supposed to taste like. Rosalee had
Shrimp Fettuccini and we were both delighted. They told
us that Wednesday nights are Lobster nights and Friday
nights are Crab nights... we will be back.
Rosalee's niece Andi and her husband Ed are scheduled to
join us for a bit on the twelfth of May so I'm sure we
can talk them into checking this place out on one of
those nights. I was checking out their room yesterday
and noticed that the new screen door on the Lanai was
not working well and it jumped out of the track when I
tried to open it. I turned it up and noticed that there
was one wheel broken on the bottom and one on the top
that was broken...
two for two. So next trip into town I will see if I can
locate a couple of wheels for it.
No critters to report yet... at least inside the house.
Outside we are seeing some large black beetles that we
seldom
usually see... maybe one or two... but not this time. There are
several on the front step almost each time we walk out
there. The small fish pond has nearly one hundred of
them floating on the surface, with a few actually
moving. Donna said that they are "Dung Beetles" but they
are larger than any we have seen. But hey... they IS
Hawai'i so who knows? LOL They certainly are no trouble.
They move about slowly and most seem to be on their
backs with legs in the air on their last throws. I guess
there is not enough 'dung' for them. That sounds like it
is a good thing. LOL
There are no open range cows in 'the Ranch' so far. They
have a lot of grass up in the higher parts of the
mountain I hear, and it may be a while before they come
down here. Most likely when it gets warmer and drier.
|
.May 7th, 2014
We have been
taking care of some of our scheduled jobs here.
HEDGE
TRIMMER: Dennis had some concerns with a
gas-powered hedge trimmer. He said that once
running, the switch on the handle would not turn the
machine OFF and to kill it you had to let it run out
of fuel. The way it works, a wire comes from the
ignition system down through the handle down to the
switch and then back up through the handle to a
grounded connection. Turning the switch to STOP
should ground out the ignition and it would stop. I
discovered both the wire going to ground was broken
as well as the wire coming from the ignition system
to the switch. No way to make it stop, other than to
ground the wire coming from the ignition system
temporarily to the engine case. Job done.
P.S. The
gardener used the trimmer and said that it worked
fine and dandy.
CHAIN SAW:
Dennis has a nice, small chain saw that he said
has trouble keeping the chain on. Upon looking it
over, nothing looked obvious, so I took off the two
bolts holding the chain bar to the saw motor and
took that part off. I did notice that the bar was
upside down, but that is how you get more (longer)
life from
the bar if it is used up. I doubt that his saw is
used enough to warrant that so I cleaned everything
up and re-installed it, adjusted the chain tension,
and fired it up. The chain stayed on. I took it out
back and cut a six inch log that was in the burn
pile and ugh! That was the dullest chain I have ever
used. But the chain stayed on. I put it away and
moved on. The next morning something was gnawing at
me so I went out and looked at the chain saw once
more. I'm gonna tell a secret on me... I put the
chain on backwards. LOL. No WONDER it was dull. I
turned the chain around the right way, re-adjusted
it, and it cut through the same log like it was hot
butter. And it stayed on. I did notice, however,
when I put it on, the chain seemed to prefer to get
stuck on the outer side of the drive sprocket, which
is way out of line for the chain bar, and THAT could
very well cause the chain to jump off the bar. I
believe that was the cause for the problem. Job
done.
MOWER:
The famous mower. I have spent some hours working on
this guy over the years. I sure enjoy driving it and
mowing the lawn with it though. Dennis said the
gardener will mow the lawn when he comes if I don't
want to do it, but I enjoy doing it. So if the
gardener comes on Friday, I will mow Thursday
and then he won't mow. Dennis has other things for
the gardener. Now, if he ever shows... it was
raining last Friday and he did not come, but he has
not shown all week. It is Wednesday night and it is
raining again.... half an inch so far... so it may
be too wet to mow tomorrow. I will check it. Anyway,
Dennis started up the mower before he left to show
me that it was working. The battery barely turned it
over, but it started. I fired it up a couple days
ago and it started right up but the battery was
weak. So I backed it over to the corner of the
garage that has the charger and hooked it up. It
will charge until I need to use it.
SCREEN DOOR:
The guest bedroom has a small lanai that looks to
the north, and on a clear day Mount Hale'a'kala on
Maui is clearly visible. Several years ago the Browns
placed a second sliding glass door at the outside
edge of the lanai floor, which allows the lanai to
be part of the bedroom. It makes it nicer, and that
is the bedroom Donna's mom used a lot, so it helped
her out. This is the screen that had two broken
wheels, so I
tried the Ace Hardware in Waimea and... Bingo! I got
them in yesterday and it is working again.
Unexpected job done.
The Gridley
class of '59, Ken's graduating class, is planning a
week-long cruise in June to Alaska and a dinner in
September. I have set up a website for the group,
thanks to Ed Myers' help and great assistance...
plus his work place hosts the site on their computer. Yesterday I worked on
that for most of the day. I built a worksheet with
names of: ___those we have sent notice of the dinner by e-mail,
___those we have not sent e-mail and may have to be
snail mail or phone, and ___those that have
pre-deceased us. It is fun doing that work, but it
can be time consuming. Like what do we have that has
to be done in Hawai'i? LOL
I mentioned
that I have been
trying to arrange to work on the Crown Princess
Kaiulani (Kah - ee - oo - law - knee) music box. The box is pictured and discussed at the
end of [Kohala 2010 Fall] on this site if you wish
to review. The cylinder
is 19 inches wide and has tens of thousands of pins
sticking up that pluck the notes on the comb of the
music box, but many are bent and need corrected to
make it play better. Rosalee and I had a meeting
with the lady that runs the Hulihe'e Palace in
Kailua-Kona (Hoo - lee - hay - ay) today, where the
box is displayed. They had it boxed and packed in a
huge cooler for us to pick up. We had to sign away
our Fortune, our Estate, and our First Born to take
it home with us, but I am delighted that they
allowed us to do it. That is a very precious item to
them and their history after all. We were rather
nervous driving home with it.
We put it in
Donna's office (one of the bedrooms) where it is out
of the way and has plenty of light, so I don't go
blind looking at all of those pins. After working on
it for a while, I discovered that every single pin
has been bent out of alignment and must be
straightened. (sigh) We have it for several weeks...
I think it will take me that long.
We have keys to
lock that room and shades to pull, so hopefully it
will be secure there while we are in town or asleep.
Nervous time here. |
May
18th, 2014
I had
success in the search for the electrical tester
meter. It was in a large, plastic carry case for a
power tool... no
idea why. I just started looking in anything
large enough to hide it and I found it. So, I
headed for the electrical job waiting for me. An
outlet in the kitchen had a new outlet two feet
away from it, but Dennis said neither of them
worked now. The old one used to work... ?? I
opened it all up and found that first of all,
the original box now has a GFCI installed, but
the LINE wires were connected to the LOAD side
of the GFCI,
and vise versa. I fixed that, and was able to
determine that the new box was indeed connected
to the original box, but no power was in the
outlet.
I checked
the wires coming into the original box and there
was 120 volts between the black wire and ground,
but between the black and the white there was no
voltage. I traced these two wires back to the
main electrical distribution panel and black,
white, and ground wires were all connected and making
contact, but somehow the white wire does not
make it all the way... at least electrically.
That job will have to be the responsibility of
the electrician that wired that system. He can
dig that one out of the walls. So... job
postponed.
I was able
to get one lawn mowing in, between the rains.
The mower worked well. We had to get things
looking spiffy because... company is coming.

ALOHA
from The
Big Island
of
Hawai'i
Ed and
Andi Myers are here. Andi is Rosalee's niece,
and this is where they came from their plane
at the Kailua-Kona Airport on May 11th.
We went
on down into Kailua-Kona which is 8 miles south
of the airport and had a nice lunch at a
restaurant named the Kona Canoe Club. We drove
back to the house to get the Myers settled in.
I spent
a bunch of hours on the music box, straightening
the pins on the cylinder. This is what I was
facing:

The
large drum on the left with gear teeth around it
houses the mainspring that drives everything.
The part on the lower right quarter that looks
like a comb is called the... um... Comb. :-)
That makes the music, when the tiny point at the
upper end is lifted and released (plucked) by
the pins on the large cylinder... upper right.
You can see the tiny pins, and you can also see
that some of them are headed in other directions than
straight toward the comb. My goal was to
straighten each pin that was bent. To complicate
things, the cylinder actually plays five songs
as it rotates five times. A cam shifts that
cylinder to the right, to five distinct
positions, and all five positions occur in the
distance you can see between any two 'teeth'
tips of
the comb. Five distinct positions within possibly a sixteenth of an inch.
Any pin
that is bent to the side one fifth of one
sixteenth of one inch... or about 1/80th of an
inch or 0.0125"... will play the note of the
next selection during the playing of the first
selection. The melodies are not very pleasant.
During past
decades steel was made in many ways, and
sometimes the steel they used on the pins were
very brittle, making them susceptible to
breaking off if they are bent. Some break at
first impact. Some break the second time... when
they are being straightened, and some straighten
out ok. I am sure they are easier to break the
next time they are bent. Some pins are bent
almost completely over. Those are extremely
likely to break when straightened. Some years of
manufacture the steel was softer and more
favorable to being straightened without
breaking. It appears that late 1800's when this
box was made, they used the more brittle steel
for the pins.
My purpose
to attempt this job was to make the box sound
prettier when it played. It has the capability
to sound elegant and majestic. But, if
straightening the pins will just break them off,
nothing is accomplished by my attempt. So,
sadly, I will cease my work on the box and
return it to the Hulihe'e Palace in Kona.
The ladies
that run the Palace were very appreciative of
the attempt, and now they are aware of what it
needs. I suggested that should they have a
benefactor stop by with a couple of thousand
dollars to help them out, the cylinder could be
completely re-pinned to the same melodies, but
the cylinder would have to be sent to
specialists on the mainland or in Europe. I
offered to do the labor to remove and re-install
the cylinder should they attempt that task. So,
I guess this job can be considered 'attempted
and postponed'.
Ed and Andi
have been to the Big Island several times, and
have been to Hilo as well as down to see
Kilauea, so we concentrated on the north end of
our island. They did express an interest in
learning more about the Waipio Valley. Rosalee
and I took our first trip down into the valley
during our Fall 2009 visit, and Kent and
Linda joined us on that trip. You can look back
there to read about that and see the images
taken. I took a few more images this time that I
can share.
With the
extra rainfall Hawai'i is getting this winter,
the young woman that took us around the floor of
the valley (she lives down there) indicated that
she had seen at least seven different waterfalls
dropping into the valley. I was delighted to see
the
Hi'ilawe Falls (He - ee
- lah - way) because there was a second falls flowing.

A few
decades ago, the falls on the left was diverted
at the top to supply water to the sugar cane
that was being grown in the area, closing off
that flow of water completely. However, with the
extra rainfall, it was again flowing when we
were there. I'm sure it is only during extra-wet
times that it flows.
We took Ed
and Andi over to Honoka'a (Ho - no - kah - ah)
about twenty miles from the house, on the
Eastern side of Kohala mountain, where we went
through some pretty heavy rain. But we were
forced to do that because that is the only way
we can let them experience the famous
Malasada... just like it sounds. It is
Portuguese and is basically a pillow about three
inches by four inches by an inch and a half
thick. It is made like the old "Spud-nuts" or
"raised donuts" are made... light and fluffy and
a taste to die for, with confectioner's sugar on
the outside, of course. They make them right
there in full view. Not something one should
make a habit of enjoying, although it would
certainly be very easy. You can ask them to
inject creams and jellies and goodies if you
like. Me? I like my Malasada straight.
We also
made it up to the north end of the island, only
fifteen miles from the house, to the tiny town
of Hawi (Hah - vee) where we had lunch at the
Bamboo Restaurant. Rosalee and I have eaten
there several times before, and enjoyed it. It
is another of Clyde's suggestions that she
shared with us some years ago. On the way out
Andi could not pass up taking this image:

We saw
nothing like this, but I'm a bit puzzled as to
how I walked in, sat at a table next to this
post, and walked out without seeing this sign. I
must be getting old. LOL
Last week
we took a lazy day and hung around the house to
be here when Lowe's showed up to correct an
installation job they have been trying to
complete. D&D had a lot of new shades and
valances installed, but some were incorrectly
sized. So, being a rainy day anyway, it was fine
for us. After the installer was here for a
couple of hours he had to bundle up the new ones
and take them back. Every one of them were the
wrong size. Like ten inches wrong, not just
'kinda' wrong. This was the third time they were
measured... he measured them last time and his
boss came out and she measured them as well...
still the jobber that made them could not get it
right. Donna tells me this is try number three.
Well, we met a nice guy anyway. He felt so badly
for the Brown's. It was certainly not his fault.
I have not
done a second mowing of the lawns once since we
have been here. Not sure why it is not growing
up past our ears, because I always mow every
week. I will mow again the day before D&D
return. The place looks so nice with the lawns
all spiffed up. We are just short of 19 inches
of rain this year, as of today. The sprinklers
usually run a lot to keep things green here, but
they have not been turned on for three months.
And everything is still green.
We had to
stop by Plantation Grill Wednesday evening to
partake of their Lobster Special. It was a very
large lobster, and we had one of the fabulous
Mahi Mahi taco to go with it. We also shared
some delicious Lobster/Crab chowder that was
fabulous. No wonder we have to start our diet
early. |
May
20th, 2014
We
dropped Andi and Ed off at the airport
yesterday. It was a lot of fun having them
here. We enjoyed sharing "our island" with
them. Sad to see them leave, but looking
forward to getting back to something more
sensible for meals. LOL
I
have had the clock running that I picked up
from Susan Harris, the lady in Waimea that
contacted me through e-mail to see if I
would look at the clock. I looked at it last
trip over, and could not find the 'smoking
gun' that was not only causing the chime to
stop but it was forcing the clock to stop as
well.
It
is a wall clock about five feet tall, and
when Susan moved over here from
Fresno, CA, the preceding year, the moisture in the air made the
door on the clock case swell and bind. It
was almost impossible to close and re-open
the case.
This
time over, we brought the complete clock to
the Brown's home and Ed and I fixed the
case. Last year, I had to spend some time getting the
clock into 'beat' so it would run, and then
there was little time left to find the
problem and fix it. This year I have just the movement
mounted on a board attached to the Kitchen
cabinet counter top (on the Dining Room
side, out of the way... sorta) and that
allows me to hang the weights, the pendulum,
and run it without the case. It ran 24 hours
fine. I found a gadget that was installed to
keep the cables straight on the drum that
drives the chimes dislodged from it's
location and put that in place. Then it ran
and chimed. Cool! But I remember seeing
something potentially wrong with the
movement the last time, but I cannot for the
life of me remember what that was.
The
next morning, when I checked the clock, it
was no longer running. Oops. After running
(chiming on cue) a whole day, the original
problem showed up. The drum that hangs the
cable that holds the five pound weight to
drive the chimes was goofy, and it not only
bound up the chiming cable, it spread out
and wedged against a wheel (gear). and that
stopped the time gear train. Finally! The
smoking gun... but how to fix it? Well...
"This Is The Way We Fix The Clock, Fix The
Clock, Fix The Clock... This Is The Way We
Fix The Clock........ "

Yes,
it makes me just as nervous as it does you,
just looking at it. The problem was that the
drum and arbor upon which the cable that
supports the striking (chiming) weight was
bent from damage way back when. It got worse
with time and finally got to where it would
allow the cable to slip down between two
parts, spreading the drum and forcing it
against another wheel (gear).

The
arbor (shaft) on the left is the part that
you turn when you wind up the clock. On the
left side of the large wheel that is on the
arbor (shaft) is the small plate with two
holes that goes on the shaft, and the drum
slips on the shaft after that. Missing in
this view (on the left) is the part in the image on the
right. It fits on top of the drum. See
another plate under the drum that looks like
the one in the picture on the right? Two
plates and the drum go together... like an
Oreo cookie... and the two long screws
behind the arbor hold all four pieces
together. Spacers go between the two round
plates with nine holes in them, so the
screws will not cave in the two plates.
Notice
how the plate on the right is depressed more
than usual in the center hole to the left of
center. That allowed the plate to get wider
than the drum should be, and the cable that
holds the weight winds up on that Oreo
cookie. With that bend in the plate, the
cable could slip between the center of the
drum and the plate, and the weight would
force them apart, wedging it against the
adjacent wheel (not shown). I explained that
so that I can review this the next time
there is a problem, because I will likely
forget what I did... again. LOL.
If you
are wondering where the spring is to wind up
and drive the clock... there is none. This
is not a spring-wound clock, but a
weight-driven clock. When weights are used
they are hung on a chain or a cable. This
clock uses cables, and they wind around that
large drum in the picture on the left. The
cable is removed in this picture. That cable
is the one that wedges the drum and disk
apart.
I
flattened down that extra depression and
reassembled the drum assembly, then
reassembled the clock movement. This is not
an antique clock, but without this type of a
repair it would require a new replacement
movement for the clock, and that is not an
option. $$$ :-)
 
As
you can see, it did go back together. It is
running again, and striking very nicely. The
cage in front of the clock is to keep little
doggie noses out of the works. I want to run
it in, to check if it is fast or slow. Susan
will be able to fine tune it when it is at
its home. On the right is a side view of the
movement, viewing the left side. You can
just barely see the white face and black hands to
the right, and the white arrows are pointing
to the center of that drum and arbor that
was just repaired. You can see the cable
wound around it, and the brass pulleys that
are below the movement. Hopefully, we have
found the problem and it will serve Susan
for a good long time.
Last
evening we ran a load of clothes in Donna's
washer, and it has all of that electronic
stuff. A front load Maytag, it is likely the
age of the house. Anyway, it stopped and
beeped at us with an error code of "E3"
showing. I hit Google to find out what I
could, and basically everyone indicated one
of three things... bad connection in motor
wiring harness, bad motor, or bad main
circuit board. All of those are not good
news $$$.
After an hour of research, I suggested
Rosalee try a different 'cycle' to wash the
clothes that were still in the machine, and
it did complete the cycle. Yeah! So, this
morning, she put in another load and tried
it on the 'normal' cycle that she usually
uses, and we got all the way! Super Yeah! As
I started typing this paragraph, Susan's
clock struck three o'clock, and the washer
announced itself as having finished a second
load today. Now THAT is a Very Super Yeah!
And an AMEN! |
May 24th, 2014
...and she is home!
The
clock has run for two days straight
without fail, far less than the week or
two that I prefer to test a newly
serviced clock, but our time in Paradise
is running out. Rosalee and I returned
it to Susan's home, where we hung it
back on the wall. It ran and chimed for
a full hour before we left, so hopefully
it will continue on.
Note to self: Bring lubricant and check
the clock on next visit. I foolishly
left home without having special
lubricant in my pack of clock tools and
materials that I frequently bring to the
Islands.
The
door had swollen after Susan moved here
from Fresno, due, most likely, to the
higher humidity in Waimea where she
lives. Ed and I removed the door and
planed down the top and bottom of the
door about 1/32" and re-treated it with
a couple coats of clear poly finish to
seal it up from the moisture. Now the
door can easily open and close.
Susan told us before, and I had
forgotten, but we talked about it again
and it appears that when she moved here
from Fresno, a gentleman helping her to
move in hung the clock badly, and when
she hung the heavy weights it came down.
Susan took some of the energy of the
fall but the case was broken. That has
to be the reason for the drum being
messed up. Just the empty case weighs
nearly fifty pounds, so the painter
installed a more secure attachment bolt
on the wall to support the clock.
When Ed and Andi were here, we stopped
down at the Waikoloa Village Shopping
Center where there is an upscale ABC
Store. If you are familiar with Hawai'i,
you know that there is an ABC Store on
nearly every corner, and it is a sort of
Hawaiian version of the Seven-Eleven
stores in the mainland. Just a bit of a
convenience store. This one has some
high-dollar condominiums surrounding it
so they made it a little bit better than
the others. I snapped a couple of shots
of the displays in the store:


Now if you want
a loaf of bread in the somewhat restricted area they
will have a couple different selections. But if you
want Band-Aids... they have thirteen different
patterned Band-Aids. I actually found the "normal"
Band-Aid boxes in another location.
The image below
shows another five foot wide display full of... Golf
Balls. They do have a course in the area, but these
are all fancy packages and the balls are all
engraved with the layout of the Hawaiian Islands on
each ball (like that seen on the larger boxes, upper
left in the image). We thought that they were boxes
of candy. I'm having trouble imagining the Kahuna on
the golf links that reaches into his bag of clubs
and pulls out the box of Sponge Bob Square Pants
golf balls. LOL.
And speaking of
overkill... when in Waimea, there is no doubt it is
heavily influenced by the local cowboys, what with
what was at one time the largest cattle ranch
in the US (over half a million acres of land under
control), and the Parker Ranch Shopping Center that
was named for the ranch. But across the street from
that shopping center, in front of the OTHER shopping
center in town, we find this:

That is one big hombre that fills that shoe. Cowboys here are
referred to as Paniolos. When cattle first were introduced in the
islands, they were a gift from one king to another, and they were
allowed to roam freely and were considered Kapu... forbidden to
anyone. Later kings decided the cows were too wild and literally
were a threat to life, limb, and garden spots. So a young (19 years
old) man named Parker sailed into town and jumped ship. He owned a
rifle and shells, and after he gained the blessing of the king, he
was allowed to control the cows... which means hunt them for leather
and meat. He turned that into a career and new industry for the
islands and they had to hire handlers for the cattle. No one on the
islands knew how to do that, let alone how to ride those things
someone brought in called horses. So the ranch hands that handled
the cattle were brought in from "Espanola", but the Hawaiian people
had trouble pronouncing the "Es" part, and the new people were just
called "Paniolos".
Mother used to tell Cody and I
(when we put off doing things): "Are you waiting until the cows come
home". We never understood that because our cows never left home. We
figured she meant 'home' to be the barn. With all of the rain we
have had here this year, the upper fields in the mountains have been
heavy with grass so the cows that normally have free-range grazing
in the Kohala Ranch area have not been brought in yet. Well, this
morning, when we woke up, this is what we saw outside the bedroom
window:

Mom, The Cows Have
Come Home
We pick up the Brown's at the
airport tomorrow evening late. They will likely be glad to be home.
On this trip they did a lot of flying, train raiding, bus riding,
and cruising. They likely will be glad to be home as well. We should
be winging our way back to Pleasanton Monday afternoon.
This stay has been one of the
more interesting times we have been here. We have not seen one
scorpion or centipede (yet) and have seen very few geckoes. We did
have a lot of large black dung beetles and many gnats that invade us
in the evening to be by our lights. You have to cover your drink or
they fall into it.
Donna has a blender she said
would make my frozen berry/banana/almond milk smoothies, but the
rubber drive coupling that drives the blade in the bottom of the jar
was showing that it was starting to come apart. I checked online and
there were more than fifty different couplings that all looked alike
but all had different order numbers, and none of them fit the model
number of Donna's machine. So I gave up on the smoothies, but they
are pretty much the most crucial part of my diet plan I am trying to
maintain. So we picked up a new blender to contribute to the
household. It worked so well and so quickly Rosalee thought that I
must have broken the new one because it was not making noise long
enough to do the job she thought.
It has been a 'normal' trip to
"the ranch" in that there were things waiting to be fixed and things
that needed fixing after we got here, but abnormal with the rains
and the green pastures. But, as usual, it has been fun, and never a
day goes by without some kind of excitement.
I asked Rajah if he were
excited about mom and dad coming home. He was clearly overjoyed
about it:

The
day we went to the airport to pick up
Donna and Dennis, we ran across some
activity along the road in the gated
community. There were a couple of
Francolin birds and a bunch of little
ones, and then along with them we saw
this little guy.

This little suckling pig was
all alone, but you can bet that momma was somewhere near. And I
would not want to be walking with her in the area. Over the six
years we have been coming to this area we have only once seen a wild
hog, and it was pretty quick to leave our sight. It was in this same
area, more or less, and it was adult size. This little guy was quite
quick. I'm sure I would never be able to catch up with it.
Winging our way home, as we
leave the Sandwich Islands I look over our port wing and can see
Mount Haleakala on Maui (Haw - lay - aw - kaw - law). It is just
over ten thousand feet elevation at the tallest peak. It is known
for its incredibly large caldera that is seven miles wide and half a
mile deep. We are told to view the sunrise from the top is to die
for. It is a lengthy drive to get to the top so on would have to
start rather early. We were seeing sunlight as early as 0530 this
month.

It
was great getting back to our "home in
the islands" and getting our "Doggie
Fix" after a longer than usual period of
time. We did miss our dear Miss Clyde
very much. We thought of her constantly.
We visited several of the great "holes
in the wall" places that she introduced
us to. They are still good places to
eat. Rest In Peace Dear Clyde. |
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