Escape to Maui

The successful entrepreneur exhibits hope, critical thinking, and determination. These are the traits you will see in this short home movie of what my 10-year-old did over his holiday break (click on the Full Screen option for the HD experience)...

Watch this on Vimeo.

Stars by the Sea

The first night of my birthday trip to Hawaii was a glorious tribute to the heavens. It started with a divine meal on the beach serenaded by Nino Kaai's Izzy rendition of Over the Rainbow. Then my friends and I strolled to a torch-lit lecture arranged by the Keck Observatory, where astronomer and author Timothy Ferris -- undeterred by the evening's thick volcanic haze -- guided us through the stars with HD clips from his film Seeing In The Dark.



Professor Ferris' mantle displays more fabulous trophies of achievement than I care to list at this late hour. I will point out only that his contributions will likely outlast those of anyone else in history, as he produced the phonograph containing music, sounds and photos that now hurtles through inter-stellar space aboard the Voyager spacecraft. (Too bad Ferris couldn't include Pogue's MacWorld performance this week, accompanied by Ge Wang on the spacey Ocarina.)

Tonight's lecture kicked off Keck's celebration of the International Year of Astronomy, commemorating the 400th anniversary of Galileo's invention of the refracting telescope. (Gordon Moore and lots of other Big Island immigrants were there to support Keck.) Here are three gems I picked up from Ferris' talk:

"Bringing our model of the universe into better accord with the facts is a pursuit worthy of adults."

"All of human evolution occurred in less time than it takes light to traverse the Andromeda galaxy."

"You couldn't get a murder verdict from a Texas jury on the scanty evidence we have of alien visitation."

Heavens, it's late! Better get to sleep if I'm to catch the voggy sunrise and early tee times...

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Diving in Hawaii

With our streets blocked by the triathlon yesterday, there was only one way off the island...




Son snorkeling





Nathalie's the best swimmer in the family.




I'm feeling at one with the Spaghetti Monster.



Thank you Robert for taking us on this dive!

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Experiencing Nature

My family didn't pick the Big Island of Hawaii to be adventurous--it was supposed to be a relaxing vacation. But this morning our jet lag awoke us before dawn to see meteors relentlessly pelt the earth's atmosphere. During the day we couldn't venture outdoors as high winds rehearsed for tomorrow's visit by Hurricane Flossie with 120+ MPH gusts. And then about 15 minutes ago, an earthquake registering somewhere between 5 and 6 on the Richter scale jostled our dinner, chasing us out onto the windy lanai.

We find ourselves in mortal danger from meteorites, earthquakes, flash floods and high winds. But as Maxwell Smart always said, "And loving it!"

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