PEARL'S BLOOD LILY, THOSE OBSTREPEROUS GREEN PARROTS and an ENHANCED LOCO MOCO

Pearl's sunburst has again  bloomed.  This is the 36th year, which is kind of amazing, because I've gone on two-month trips and there were times when no one was around to take care of it.

Here is the full story from a previous posting:

In 1983 Pearl was diagnosed with breast cancer.  Her doctor recommended surgery followed by chemotherapy.  While she was recuperating at Kuakini Hospital, I saw in a flower shop a red, spherical flower with no leaves.  I learned that this was an African Blood Lily (Scadoxus multifloras) and grew from a bulb.  I called it a sunburst to inspire her.  I told her that as long as she could re-grow this flower, she would live.  While chemotherapy lasted for a terrible few months, she mothered two more flowers the following year, and they almost kept doubling each year.  That's the view of Punchbowl from our Craigside penthouse.

Two sunbursts are blooming today.  Here is the one on exhibition in the elevator lobby on the 12th floor of 15 Craigside:

In a third pot I just saw this bonsai sunburst.  Never seen one so small before:

See in the top photo that tall building to the left?  That is the habitat of the rose-ringed parakeet, a green parrot that screeches around and eats my plants:

More recently, they have chomped on the leaves of my calamansi plant and crapped on my lanai eating table:

They don't touch the fruit itself, or the basil, and luckily enough, the sunburst.  Perhaps I should get Aibo, that SONY pet dog, and teach it to scare away that nuisance.  However, I hear he costs around $3000. 

Something cheaper like this pinwheel might work.  I wonder where they sell it?  Amazon, of course, but I only need one.

Totally changing subjects, if you don't live in Hawaii, you certainly don't know what loco moco is.  This hamburger based delicacy was invented at Lincoln Grill in Hilo almost 70 years ago.  The sauce is the leftover grease which is collected from the grill, to which flour is added, making the dish, arguably, the most dangerous fare consumed by normal people, like me.  Lincoln Grill disappeared a long time ago, but Club 100 in Hilo is now known as the place to go, for they have 30 varieties.  They are featuring a kalua pork special this month.

15 Craigside serves loco moco for breakfast every Thursday.  We're old enough to have it. However, they have rules here that irritate me.  In the buffet line are scrambled eggs.  The only way to have loco moco is with sunny side-up eggs.  I can't order this absolutely necessary item.  An advantage of being a couple, for one can get the hamburger and stuff, while the other orders from the kitchen the eggs, adding portuguese sausage if they wish.  Sure, I know I can pair with anyone on the dining room table, but it is customary to grumble on anything that isn't fair.  In any case, here is why I take-out this meal.

Heat wagyu beef fat from Miyazaki (the rib eye can cost you around $150/pound, but the fat is occasionally sold for "only" $10/lb at Marukai), using one pan for the eggs, and the other for my selected ingredients with the supplied hamburger and sauce:

Those are:  hamachi sashimi with myoga, onions, shiitake mushrooms (check-out the nutritional benefits), my eggs (they don't supply whole/fresh eggs, only if they're first boiled, another gripe) and garlic slices:

Friday night after an agonizing 18 holes of golf in 90 degree heat, I had this awesome loco moco with sashimi, plus Kirin beer and hot sake.  Then, I watched the sunset.

On this sparkling Sunday morning I continue to be in a high state of E3, surrounded by my personal aquarium and a view of Honolulu and the Pacific Ocean:

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The death count from Typhoon Lekima, which made landfall over the province of Zhejiang as a Category 3, is now up to 33, with 16 missing.  More than a million evacuated ahead of time, including a quarter million residents of Shanghai.  Power was lost to 2.7 million homes.

Krosa has weakened into a tropical storm at 60 MPH and is moving very slowly at 8 MPH,  but is expected to regain typhoon status and is currently predicted to pass between Kyushu and Shikoku onto Honshu from Wednesday into Thursday.

That Sendai you see on the left side is not the Sendai where I go to have not so expensive wagyu beef.  That is the Sendai nuclear power plant complex, which was the first one to re-start operations in 2015 after that Fukushima cataclysm.

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