Sunday, February 17, 2008

Ich bin ein Swapper



Last weekend Kaddi's sister Suzi came out to visit us here in Laie. It was a whirlwind trip, and since it rained most of the time we didn't even get to go to the beach. No matter. It was just as much fun to stay in our apartment and watch The Mummy Returns. Again.

The highlight of the trip was to be Oahu's famous swamp meet. Every weekend they set up a huge outdoor market at Aloha stadium where you can buy as second-hand merchandise to you heart's content. As we drove down to Honolulu, all packed into the Saturn, we dreamed of the fabulous bargains we might find on stuff we wouldn't really use. I was planning to get a baseball hat with flames streaking down both sides.

Imagine our disappointment when we arrived at the stadium to find our beloved swap meet displaced by the NFL's Pro Bowl. I tried to console the family and explain that this was a good thing. Instead of wading through crowds of human roaches digging through each other's garbage, we could spend the afternoon watching the best of the National Football League sleepwalk their way through a game whose ultimate objective was not to get injured. Alas, there were no takers. Our group opted instead to spend the day at the Ala Moana Mall.

After a couple hours of browsing through the ABC stores, we decided it might be exciting to find the bail bonds location owned and operated by Dog the Bounty Hunter. But, since we didn't know where that was, and since we didn't even know where we were, that ultimate prize proved elusive. Our day has started out with such promise, and yet we had failed to realize our most important objectives.

Was it worth missing church? That is for history to decide.

4 comments:

Anne said...

one word for you, my friend.

Google.

Da Kine Bail Bonds
1381 Queen Emma St
Honolulu, HI 96813
(808) 921-2245

m-strat said...

Great idea, Anne. Except that our 1997 Saturn doesn't come equipped with internet capability. And neither does the cel phone that I don't have. Even if we had known the address, we would not have known how to get to it from our current location, which we also did not know. Would google tell us that too?

That might have been helpful if we had look it up BEFOREhand, but...

Anne said...

you sound hostile, my friend.

Maybe if you head out today you catch a glimpse of Chelsea, or Obama's half sister. I'm not sure if one is more exciting than the other. You should be soaking up the Barry Obama Spirit today, my friend.

I was just trying to be helpful. sniff, sniff. sounds like you need some more of that aloha spirit, friend.

m-strat said...

I think it's Barak that is making me so irritable. This morning I tested positive for high levels of hope.

Or it might be the fact that you're speaking in John McCain...

...my friends...