Another Year

Another year has passed and I’m still enjoying Hawaii!

I see the occasional post now of people on the mainland fighting cold weather and snow flurries and ice have started. I feel your pain but like to remind you that I don’t have those worries. Normal temps here go from 65 to 85.

I am getting my share of aches and pains though. My hip hurts when I weed whack because I tend to swing the the thing back and forth to cut through heavy weeds. My wrist hurts today because yesterday I was yanking vines away from some of the coffee trees.

I am trying to get the farm looking better because I have a lease-hold inspection coming. They tell you a few days before the month they will inspect, so unless you contact them quickly, you get anywhere from a few days to a month to prepare. I have some dead coffee trees I want to replace and have some areas where certain fruit trees did not do well and will be planting something else there; probably starting with some finger limes.

I have 20 solar panels I’ll be installing soon. They will be configured to replace as much of the daytime usage as they can without sending any excess power back to the utility. I won’t get paid for any excess power, however I also will not need a contract with the utility for net metering, etc. My 2Kw system cost $3,100 and with a couple hundred dollars of mounting materials, I’ll have them up and running with little hassles. I’ll be mounting them near the ground as I have room for them there without any obstructions.

I am still managing a number of websites for neighbors, friends and relatives. I help out on occasion at another farm; generally drinking coffee and giving my opinion of how things should work. Sometimes I am right and sometimes I’m wrong. They seem to only remember the suggestions that worked 🙂

I am still suggesting people install Voice Over IP (VOIP) to have cheaper phone service at home, however many people just rely upon cellphones.

It is 1:30am at the moment. I went to bed early and then woke up at midnight. I’ll be heading back to bed soon as the alarm is set for 5am. It seems the dogs like an early morning walk.

My day today looks like this: Up at 5am and take the dogs out. Clean out the accumulated items from the truck. I have been working on a few projects lately and taking items around in the truck.

At 7am I’ll be driving to Holualoa to pick up a young worker who will be doing some weed whacking for me today. Meanwhile I’ll be on the tractor re-mowing areas that look crappy (I like to have it looking nice for my inspection). This land inspection will be used as the basis for renewing my lease for 30+ years.

I have been cleaning out the storage under the house and will need to fix a few things in the downstairs bathroom. This will give the worker a bathroom without having to interact with the dogs who will be inside during the farm work.

I need to recharge the car battery I mounted on the ARV for my sprayer and need to finish spraying areas of the farm today before the rain.

A neighbor is having garage door issues and I’ll go by and see if I can fix it. I don’t know if it is the electronic opener control I recently fixed or a physical issue.

Since my friends farm is on the way, I’ll pick up the trash bags and put them in the truck bed.

I’ll need to go into Captain Cook at lunchtime and will take the worker with me. He probably won’t have lunch with him. I’ll stop by the post office and get the mail. I have a new pillowcase arriving. It was one of those free-just-pay-shipping deals and supposed to be pretty good. My female Lab, Olena, has a tendency of licking pillows and I hope this may help stop her.

Somewhere around 4 or 5pm I’ll take the worker back to Holualoa. On the way will be a stop at the transfer station to drop off the trash.

One of the workers there has a moped whose lights went out. I offered to bring my tester and see if it is just a bulb or fuse.

The workers are going to be having a get-together after coffee pulping and I may attend. There will be a pool 🙂

Sometime later I’ll head further north into Kailua-Kona itself. Things there have slowed a bit now once the Ironman race was over and people started to leave the island.

My main reason for hitting town before midnight is that I get a free meal at Denny’s for my birthday. I try never to pass up a free meal!

So that is my schedule for this birthday. As you can see, I have a pretty easy day, unlike most days!