Sunday, December 30, 2007

Hawaii Video!

Sweet! Here are 4 short videos (15 - 45 seconds each) from my trip!

Big Island Rainforest


Swimmin' Sea Turtle!


Humpback Whale Watching in Maui! (We saw much more than this, but it'll give ya a flavor...)


Full Moon Solstice Party on the Beach, Maui!


And coming soon, My First Time Surfing!

Hawaii pics!


I feel like I've learned more about computers in the past three days than in the past decade. For some reason I just chose to have as little as possible to do with any of this. Well I've taken a (brief) hiatus from my self-imposed technological exile to learn to do all sorts of things, including uploading and posting photos and videos from my recent travels to Hawaii.

It was an awesome trip: spontaneous, relaxing, adventerous, and stunningly beautiful. I saw many whales, sea turtles and two
gorgeous dolphins, swam at amazing beaches, hiked in the splendor of the rainforest, spent good alone time, met great people, gazed at the stars and awesome sunsets, and topped it off with one thing I wanted to find for sure: a full moon drum dance solstice party on the beach!

The pics will say much more. You can check 'em out at www.flickr.com/photos/22247862@N03/sets/72157603682991764/ or by clicking on any of the thumbnails below.


www.flickr.com






Also I'm negotiating YouTube right now, an incredibly complicated new website I'm sure you've never heard of. It allows you to post videos on-line! Incredible. Complicated, but it's worth all the trouble. Stay tuned...

Friday, December 28, 2007

Titles, Sickness and Trouble in Pakistan

My blog has a name! For now at least: Krouzin'. I like it. Deb wins the special prize! Her other suggestions were quite good as well. I also want to thank Eldad (not surprisingly) for the funniest suggestion - "Red, White and Jew" - and Lindsey (not surprisingly) for the most obscure: "Diaries of a Cantonese Necrophile".

So I guess on Blogs are like a diary. Well, today I was weathering some illness. I don't like to ever admit I'm sick unless I'm really, really sick, and I'm not. I slept from midnight till 11am, then napped from 1pm to 2pm and again from 4 to 5pm. I was very tired all day, but it was cool, because I got to read and write and work with my photos, and of course, blog. Again, as if you cared.

Finally, I want to give my take on the troubles in Pakistan. Former Prime Minister and opposition leader Benazhir Bhutto was assasinated there yesterday. I felt sad. I don't know much about Pakistan, but I do know a lot about US foreign policy, and I'd bet the farm the US probably had something to do with it. Who knows? Either way, if it was current Prime Minister Musharaf and / or the Pakistan Intelligence Service, we've had a long, sordid history of supporting both with weapons, training and intelligence. Either way, what few Americans know is that nuclear-armed Pakistan, nestled between Iran, Afghanistan and India, is teetering on the verge of collapse as its US-backed dictator faces a growing domestic rebellion and is responding with brutal repression. My guess will be Musharaf won't be able to weather this storm. God knows what will happen.

Thanks mom for reading! Mom?

Thursday, December 27, 2007

3 Hours later and I'm still on my blog

Shit I'm getting sucked in WAY faster than I anticipated. It's 3 hours later, and I still haven't taken that shower. I've gotten 2 whole comments, engaged in a few email exchanges, made a few minor tweaks to my blog...and yet something feels missing, like when Homer gets the computer and is like, "That's it?! That's all it does?!" Well at least it was free. I need to go now. I'm starting to stink. And get hungry for lunch! So now I'm off for real. I think. As if you cared.

Holy shit! I have a blog.

Wow it was remarkably easy to create a blog. Maybe a little too easy?

I really don't like technology. Don't get me wrong, I'm no dummy - I could do it if I wanted to! When I was 9 I programmed my Commodore 64 to calculate New Jersey State Sales tax on any item. It was quite complicated! When I was 17, I came home from school one day, learned how to program the TI-82 graphing calculator they made us use in calculus class, and created a crude Black Jack program, all before dinner. On Monday I came into school and "shared" the "program" through a "network cable" with a good portion of the advanced students in my grade (the less advanced kids just used really playing cards). It was a big hit, except doubling down sometimes caused the whole system to crash. That, and a week later a kid who now earns more in a week than I have since 2002 programmed a racing car game complete with graphics and sound. And there went my short lived coolness amongst advanced math students at Fair Lawn High School.

So back to the point here. These days I just don't like to use computers anymore other than for work, and even then hate it. I have many reasons why perhaps I'll share one day. On a gut level, the scene in office space where they beat the shit out of the fax machine is one of my favorite moments in movie history (I do own a TV, but it's not plugged in - just for a movie here and there). I don't own a cell phone or a digital camera or an I-Pod or an I-Phone or an I-River or an I-anything that would confirm I live in a 21st century developed (though crumbling) nation. I'm so behind my 62 year-old (doesn't look a day over 49!) MOTHER recently invited me to join FaceBook! For real. That's sad. And good for me.

So why am I creating this blog? Actually that's a good question I may want to sit with a bit longer before I get sucked in to this world. I can feel it starting to happen, like Anakin being seduced by the dark side, or Matthew Broderick's tragic decent in Election, or that weird guy putting his wife in the meat grinder in Fargo. Yikes!

Anyway, what's the worst that could happen? Those guys turned out just fine, right?

OK so I'm creating this "blog" so I can tell you about my trip to Hawaii. That's it. No grand intention to save the rainforest, no deeper purpose to explore my alter-ego or open my heart to strangers. I just want to show you pictures from Hawaii, because I just got back and it was fucking awesome! OK and I imagine in the future you'll also be privey to additional postings, like future trips to Hawaii, and other places, and the occasional heartfelt, left-leaning yet pragamatic and well-written political analysis, and perhaps updates on various gatherings I enjoy hosting, like Hanukah, Passover, and sponatenous cuddle party of the month, and a bunch of other stuff I will spend way too much time creating for way too few people to read.

Cool, so there it is, my first "post". 18 minutes of my life, gone. I'm gonna go take a shower.

Peace,
Roni

PS - I haven't figured out how to "upload" my pictures from Hawaii so you'll have to wait.