Here and Gone

Here and Gone was Originally Posted on January 3, 2006 by lavarock

In Hawaiian, Aloha means many things, most often used to say “Hello” and “Goodbye” and “Love”, etc. The New Year has come and gone and there were lots of Aloha’s to go around.

Gone is 2005 and in front of us, a brand new, unused 2006.

Hawaii allows the public to purchase and ignite fireworks and this year was no exception. I don’t know of any major problems, like brushfires or medical problems, but I can tell you that driving around the Big Island was like driving in a fog. There was smoke and bangs all over.

I rang in the New Year down in Kona town by the wharf with perhaps a hundred others, all lined up along the sea wall. Certainly not the crowd that would normally end up there on July 4th, but then again, New Years seems to have been spent at home for most, or at least, not at the sea wall.

A month ago a friend moved to the island and stayed at my farm, helping cut trees in preparation of new coffee being planted. On December 31st he moved into his room in town. As I was helping him move his stuff, we were invited to dinner at the house. Having a great time with new friends sure beat trying to find a restaurant open and without a line on New Years Eve.

In concert with the ending of the year, the Kona Coffee Council has been changing their website with a complete makeover. We sent out a RFP, reviewed proposals and chose a local guy to redesign and host our new site. To avoid heavy charges from the previous site for another quarter, we performed a flash cut (immediately switching facilities with no looking back) on December 31st. Although we were still modifying pages and especially member record formats, we had visitors using the site within minutes and even had a new member sign up (as we quickly finished testing processes).

I am in the process of cleaning up my computers and found that I am still running a few programs in background that I probably don’t need anymore. One useful program was “POW!”, which would stop pop-ups in their tracks. Now I have other processes to do that, but the program served me well over time.

Searching the disks also showed up a store of my old dial-up bulletin board software and messages I have not seen in years. I still keep in touch with some of those online users, but many have gone separate ways.

The same holds true for friends whom I have met on the Internet. Some stay put and others drift away; sometimes to appear when you least expect them.

A few years ago, I found my Uncle’s online FCC license entry and had it updated to reflect that he had passed away years ago. That modification triggered an unexpected chain of events. A Ham Radio writer found the entry and updated a story about some of my Uncles accomplishments. He had done some neat things with bouncing radio waves off the moon and also to communicate over the difficult path between Hawaii and California via meteor showers. I have also a number of contacts related to my Uncle, at least one just a few miles from me here on my island, who is trying to break my Uncles record! I have also been told to expect an audio recording, apparently between one guy’s Father and my Uncle! Of course, these communications will give me a reason to contact my cousin on my Uncles side to pass the information along.

I have been painting the back bedroom to prepare it for my Moms visit. She is expected here late this weekend. I tried to get her here in time for the KonaWeb party on Friday, but it was not to be.

I checked on the coffee beans I planted on Thanksgiving, but see none of the sprouts above dirt yet. I am waiting patiently, but would have hoped for some action by now. It could take up to 2 months.

I have had a couple Ebay auctions for my Pele’s Passion coffee and some sales on the website. I continue to receive very nice comments and reorders. That makes the start of the New Year filled with even more Aloha!