Aloha shirts and Christmas creep

Never fear underblog is here! Er, I mean, an update of our blog is here? I mean, blogging done be happening here? erm, I be bloggin' 'mun. Yea.

So, nothing as exciting as hurricanes which bring long days of rain going on these past weeks (or was it just a week?). Honestly, it has been fairly uneventful this past bit in Hawai'i (well, boring for us, I suppose).

Deanna left you off with that we went out for the anniversary of the beginning of our relationship. Ten long years we have made each other suffer, er happy! =) It was a very tasty dinner with appetizers and desserts at a restaurant in Kailua, much delicious and so date.

Here are some pictures of us enjoying ourselves that night.

Me looking as doofy as can be.

Deanna, beautiful as alaways

This is going to be pretty scatter brained as far as blogging goes. Fair warning given. It's still early in the morning (7am-ish) but on a whim I thought to blog, so blogging will continue.

Just in case anyone was worried that there were "signs of the creep" in Hawai'i, I can verify there are. (sidenote, "sign of the creep" basically refers to when stores start putting up decorations for a holiday WAY WAY WAY too early and before other holidays are completed, e.g., Christmas decorations going up in October). I do not understand the rationale behind this, not one bit. I took this picture in the middle of October. IN THE FREAKING MIDDLE OF OCTOBER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!11

One of the small '1st world' issues with our society

I do not understand this. Not one bit. It also created this really awkward moment on October 31st, where Deanna and I were grocery shopping and decided to hop in the Marine exchange to get some coffee (they exchange has a slightly better selection than the commissary) and you have the jarring juxtaposition of all the cashiers dressed in their scariest Halloween costumes with Santa Claus and Christmas trees in the background. It was enough to make my head want to asplode. Shake my damn head. When will we stop hurrying to the next thing and just enjoy the thing we are doing? 

OK, that was a bit of a soapbox diatribe, but I make no apologies.

That being said, this past week needed more snorkeling, because, it had no snorkeling. Actually, we did not make any trips to the beach. Bad Stephen and Deanna! BAD! Thankfully we already have plans to snorkel at Hanauma Bay again next week on one of Deanna's days off. Gonna go in early the day after the park closes (it closes once a week to give the ecosystem a break from plodding and inconsiderate humans), additionally there will be a hike included in our week.

It's not called the "Rainbow State" for nothing!

Well, a quick synopsis of the week would be pretty simply, Deanna worked, Stephen did stuff at home (cleaned, laundry, applied for jobs, mailed out forms to be filled by the Rhode Island Department of Education to be then sent to the Hawai'i Department of Education to then hopefully work toward me netting a HDOE Teaching License!).. you know, errands and whatnots. 

Saturday was a crazy day, well, long for me anyway. I had National Guards stuff with the 111th Army Band. It was an ALL day type affair. It was "military appreciation" day at the University of Hawai'i football game, so we were going to march out onto the field and play with the UH Marching Band for pregame and then at halftime there was a little ceremony where a few units from all of the branches of the military marched onto the field and were recognized, along with a few individual members. It was neat, but it was also a LONG day. We had training that started at 9am and some rehearsing to do, and then we arrived at the stadium around 1pm to rehearse on the field around 2. Then we changed into our dress uniform and sat around for a few hours before pregame. Thankfully, I like the people in the band, so this wasn't as terrible as it sounds (and not nearly as boring). We played the pregame music and then went to sit in our military appreciation seats to watch the first half. 

Um, definitely feeling "appreciated" There were no rows
behind our seats, and with the overhang, you could see none
of the scoreboards. Though, I will admit, watching football
from the endzone is great, you get to see the plays develop.
That being said, UH football has fallen far from the June Jones
days... yikes...

We left after halftime, bussed back to the NG Armory and changed briefed on what was coming up in our schedule and headed out. Now, there was a social gathering of some of the Navy musicians that Deanna wanted to go to. Dubbed "Scotch-toberfest" it was to incorporate all things "scotch" like oatmeal butter'scotch' cookies, 'scottish' eggs or just the good 'ole single-malt. So we had to work out some crazy "she drops me off at the armory at 830 and I keep a key for the car and she then does what she needs to do to make shepherd's pie (that's scottish, yea?) and whatever other errands she needs to do then drops off the car and gets picked up by the host of the gathering because the gathering starts around 5pm and Stephen won't be done until 830" jerry-mandering.. but it worked. We got to socialize, meet some new people and be more or less adult-y types who like to have conversations with other people.

Sunday we had a concert with the Honolulu Wind Ensemble. It is a community band, if you google it I'm sure you will find information. The only real exciting part about this was the uniform for the concert was "aloha" shirt with some kind of pants (or skirt or shorts, basically, some kind of bottoms).. however, Deanna didn't have anything "aloha" except for this dress she bought way back shortly after we moved here, and we decided while it's a great dress, it's not quite concert appropriate (it's more date appropriate, or going out appropriate)... so after watching the Browns game (this time at Whole Foods.. which, side note, that wasn't the greatest decision, because they do not actually serve breakfast, HOWEVER, it did put us very close to the "aloha" wear store and for that, it worked out) we hopped over to the island wear shop and Deanna picked out a shirt for the concert. I do say we look rather dashing!

Welp, aloha for now! Until next time =)

A bad selfie attempt

Much moar better picture. New
shirt for Deanna