I'm back from Hawaii...

12 hours later, I am finally home. Flying to Hawaii from Oklahoma is no joke. I now know how spoiled we were, being able to get to Hawaii in 6 hours from CA.

Anyway, it was a long, long 10 days in Hawaii. Thankfully I had a wonderful room at the Hilton Hawaiian Beach Resort and Spa in Waikiki. It was my refuge from the 16 hour work days. My feet will never be the same, I am sure of it. I had 1.5 days off, which I used exploring the island and hanging on the beach. I was also able to meet some of my internet friends from TheKnot.com's Hawaii Brides Board. These are the ladies I connected with when I was planning our wedding in Hawaii and we've just kept in touch via email, Facebook and The Knot over the past two years. I finally met them in person over some yummy local grinds (food) at the Side Street Inn:



From Left to Right: Evonne (MrsBabySalute), Lisa (LisaKeiko), Nicole (MrsNicole&Brian808), Me (Married2MrWright) and Sarah (MrsZiz)


That was the most fun I had all week. The food was delicious and the company was even better!


Let's see, I won't get into the nitty-gritty...the first part of the week was spent in Board Meetings and then an all day festival for girls aged 25 and under. The rest of the week, I was the backstage manager for the quartet and chorus contests. That was all well and good, except that I soon discovered that I am very allergic to the fire retardant chemical that was on the stage curtains and I broke out in a nasty rash all over my body. Good times. And then, in my exhaustion, I left my carry-on behind in the rental car along with my house/car keys, camera and eye glasses. Thankfully, my colleague found it and it will make it's way back to Tulsa later this week. I did have to take a cab home from the airport because J was at work when I arrived. Later, he took me back to the airport to get my car out of long term parking. WHEW!


To recap:


Average number of hours worked each day: 12


Average number of daily shoe changes to help my aching feet: 3


Number of hives on the parts of my body that came in contact with the stage curtains: hundreds


Number of tubes of Benadryl cream: 3


Number of bags left behind: 1


Missing a once-in-a-lifetime history-making election: PRICELESS.


I voted absentee, but I was basically in a convention vacuum and missed all of election day! I got text message updates from J and during my dinner break was able to see snippets of the McCain's concession speech. But that was about it. I tried to catch up on the action later that night, as much as possibe on CNN, but with an 8 hour difference between Hawaii and the East Coast, I feel like I missed the whole thing. That's pretty sad.


I wrote to our OK Senator and former Congressman, Tom Coburn, and requested tickets to the Obama-Biden Inauguration in Washington D.C. Hey! It never hurts to ask, right? Apparently, the only legitimate way to get tickets is from your state respresntative. I mentioned our being an interracial couple and that J is bi-racial. I also mentioned that I had sung with his opera singer daughter, Sarah Coburn, at the Metropolitan Opera competition back in 2001. Who knows, we might get the tix! He's a Republican anyway, so I am sure he'd be happy to give them away, right!?


More pics of my week in Waikiki to come, once I get my camera back. I never thought I'd be anxious to leave Hawaii, but I must say, it's good to be home.


UPDATE: Here are some pics from my 10 days in Honolulu:


On the balcony of my suite in the Rainbow Tower overlooking Waikiki Beach and Diamond Head in the distance



Sunrise


View of the main swimming pool and Ali'i Tower and their rooftop pool



Pinneapple growing at the Dole Plantation

1 comments:

Events by Evonne, LLC said...

It was great meeting you, Lori! Hopefully we'll see each other again either in the bay area or Tulsa! :)