I love SUMMER! I always feel like I'm able to do a million things during this time of year! A few weeks ago, Mike came to visit. Some days I just need to get out of town, so we headed to North Shore, for a relaxing day at our beach. I'm not sure what this beach is called, my friend Erin introduced me to it awhile back. Mike and I like because it's not crowded like Waimea or Haleiwa. 


On this day the sky was clear and the sun was blazing! Perfect beach weather! There was a lot of turtles on and off shore. We caught this guy lying on the shore break.


This is what I love about my island, town and country is only 45 min. (without traffic) away! If I ever move this is probably what I'll miss the most, the convenience of having EVERYTHING (well everything that I enjoy doing) at my fingertips, so easily accessible. 


OH summer I wish you could last forever. 


Summer Loves (in no particular order):
tan lines. dog sitting. time off. re-watching Friends on dvd. catching up on movies. home cooked meals made by my sister. birthdays. night outs. blogging. photog-ing. happy hours. shopping and big sales. boat trips. closet cleaning. zumba classes. runs around the park. bicycle trips. long days. 

this is the last of my Canada pics, I got so bored of posting them haha. I promise more interesting blogs to follow! Not too mention that I figured out how to make my photos x-large! Without the help of wayne too!

Has everyone been keeping up with world cup soccer? I kinda have, always cheering for Landon Donovan and team USA! But unfortunately they loss and my two back up teams (Portugal and Japan) also loss. I don't know who to cheer for anymore. Back to watching baseball I guess!

Off to another interview tomorrow! I'm still wandering around trying to figure out what I'd like to do with my life. Just another quarterlife crisis. I'm really considering joining WWOOF, an organization that puts you in contact with organic farms and businesses, I'd like to work in Japan with some of the organizations there! We will see.

More Canada photos... I've been slacking on my posts. On this day we went to Granville Island and Lynn Canyon. Granville Island was great! Big public market, lots of local foods and eateries. I could've stayed in there trying all the different foods ALL day. My favorites were the meat places and the granville tea company.

-----

Life has been tiring lately. Over the past couple of weeks, I've been applying for jobs, eating good dinner cooked by my sister, enjoying the beach, etc. I haven't been to Maui in awhile. I'm just trying to figure out what to do next, where I want my life to go and how I will get there. I'll never find a better job than working at the Advertiser and I can't work retail forever. What's my next move? I have a lot of thoughts to sort through, but there hasn't been a whole lot of jobs out there. It's like I need the money but I am enjoying this whole one job thing.

That's right I snowboarded the famous Blackcomb Mountain at Whistler. For my second time snowboarding, that's pretty cool right! Let me just tell you I WAS DYING. It was end of season, snow was icy not slushy, and it was so much harder to stand up because it was so icy. My knees took a beating and it took me about 2 hours to get down on my first run! I felt really bad for my sister because I was totally holding her back, come on 2 hours! The bunny hills were already closed on the mountain, so I HAD to go on the so called beginners routes. After my first and only run, I told my sister I would wait at the bottom while she went off and explored the other stuff. This part was seeing snow fall. When we got off the ski lift, it started to snow. It was my first time which was so coo but, towards the end it was almost like hail which is not so cool. OH Whistler I will be back, and next time I'll go down more than once!!!!!

I also found a BILLABONG, and stocked up on my Billabong Canada merch. Sadly no discount....LAME.

Now it's time to say goodbye... and I absolutely HATE goodbyes.

It's my last day here at the Honolulu Advertiser. I've been lucky to have spent the last four almost 5 years here, working in both the Sports and TGIF sections of the newspaper. I almost don't believe that it's over, it's very surreal.

What more could a girl ask for? Job straight out college (technically still in college, I graduated in August of 2005), in the profession she earned her degree in Journalism. Wrong! I totally hated working here the first couple of months, I was 21 just out of college ready to party, and this night time job of mine (weekend night time job!) disrupted my plans! I look back now and think about how dumb I was, such an ungrateful 21 year old. Now after four years I'm grateful for my time here, for the relationships I've made, and the experiences we've shared. There were a lot of laughs, inside jokes, rants and raves, debates, and complaints.

After working three years for UH Sports Media Relations I knew I wanted to go into sports journalism. I was lucky enough to be hired here in 2005 fresh out of college. I'm grateful to Stephen Tsai for letting me know about the opening for this position, and to Curtis Murayama for taking a chance on the girl who never even played a sport in high school (AHS marching band WHAT!) and only really knew about surfing and UH sports. Even though we (us sports clerks) hated waiting and waiting and waiting for those scores to come in, I'll miss gossiping and joking around with Seryna and Tiera. I'll miss our UH football potlucks, the entire sports staff (watching games, matches, and even the news will NOT be the same without sarcastic, witty comments coming from every direction), rooting for whoever is leading late in a game so there won’t be overtime (makes it tough to meet deadlines), Warren our No. 1 fan and caller, cheering on our favorite teams and celebrating wins, complaining over horrible calls and tough losses, keeping tabs on pop culture with my fellow clerks Seryna and Tiera. I could go on and on.

I'll also miss my TGIF/Island Life family. Even though I was only there for one year, it was one of the best. It was much more different from sports, in sports it's like you work in this little sports bubble, I can't really explain it but working in TGIF was a real learning experience professionally and personally. My TGIF family was small and close knit, and that is probably why I loved working there. I loved talking about the randomest subjects like Nick's beard, the latest celeb gossip with Diane, Gossip Girl and Project Runway recaps with Kawehi, listening about the good ol Advertiser days with Wayne and Deb, and everyone's favorite topic of conversation the latest, coolest, yummiest places to eat on the island. I learned about the business side of journalism, how networking and social media is so important, and I got a taste of making this as my career, not just a cool part-time job. I'm so grateful for your encouragement and thank you for always believing in me and my work.

Mostly I’ll miss the camaraderie and being a part of the BEST sections of the state's BEST newspaper.

Honolulu Advertiser, thanks for the memories.

Canada Pt. 2

Our second day in Vancouver started bright and early. We spent the whole day in Stanley Park! Did you know that Stanley Park is 10% bigger than Central Park? This park is CRAZY huge. Unfortunately I forgot my DSLR so I had to use my mom's point and shoot, I know if I had my camera the photos would have came out WAY better.

We started the day at the Vancouver Aquarium. It's probably one of the coolest aquarium's I've been to, you know me a sucker for those marine animals. The weird thing is they also had like alligators, frogs, and birds, I totally didn't get it. My favorite part was the dolphins, seals (that were able to do high fives, how awesome are they!), sea otters (too cute), and the belugas. You know the song "Baby Beluga," (the one that Michelle Tanner wouldn't stop singing on Full House) was inspired by one of the belugas at the aquarium.

After the aquarium we walked out of the park to rent bikes and ride around the park. This was my idea, since I'm so bicycle happy right now. I can't believe my entire family went along with it, even my dad, the ride was 5.5 miles! We rode around the park in 1 hr. and 15 min. (I would've probably done it in less time, if I didn't have to keep stopping and waiting for my family to catch up to me).

Canada Pt. 1

Let me just start by saying when my family voted for Vancouver as our trip this year I wasn't all that thrilled. I went on a day trip to Vancouver from Seattle, and I wasn't all that impressed. And to spend a week there didn't seem too exciting. I wanted to go to Chicago or New York City or Disneyland (I'm a sucker for Disneyland). But no Vancouver won, and now after my trip I'm glad Vancouver won.

We got into Vancouver late, so our Canadian vacay started late afternoon the next day (we have a couple of late starters in my family). Because we only had a half day, we spent it walking around downtown and doing what I do best, shop. The best thing I found was Ernie and Bert shoes at the New Balance store, sadly they didn't fit.