Adventures in Life

We finally arrived in Honolulu on Sunday morning. We caught an early flight (8:00 a.m.) out of LAX. There were 48 people on the wait list for the 8:00 a.m. flight. It arrived in Hawaii around 11:30 a.m. If the times do not make a whole lot of sense, California is 2 hours behind of Illinois and Hawaii is another 3 hours behind, for a total of 5 hours. Once we arrived in Hawaii two of our three pieces of luggage did not show up. The airlines had no record of the luggage. The two pieces were all of our snorkeling gear and my clothing. Gabe's suitcase with his clothing made it. The only thing that we wanted to do was get to the hotel and take a shower and I had no clean clothes. At this point we had been in the same clothing for about 2 days...yuck! So, when we arrived at the hotel, we spent $50+ on a pair of shoes (flip flops), a t-shirt, and a pair of shorts. Then I showered and I waited while Gabe went to the laundromat in our hotel (the Marriott Waikiki Beach Resort & Spa) to wash my clothes. Once they were ready I put them on and we decided to go to the beach. There was just one problem with that idea; I didn't have a swimsuit. So, we spent another $50 on a swimsuit, had lunch at Cheeseburger in Paradise, and we went to the beach. Somewhere in this entry I should say that our hotel is very nice. We are on the 23rd floor (out of 25) and have a great view of the ocean. We have actually been setting outside on our lanai enjoying the scenery. Back to Sunday...while in the ocean I managed step on a sea urchin. I have about 8 nice puncture wounds and one spine still in my foot to show for it. After pulling out the urchin and removing all of the spines that I could, there was one that was really deep. After using a needle and tweezer in an attempt to remove it, I went to the doctor. They came and picked us up from the hotel and brought us back. When we called they asked if I could be down in front of the hotel in about 10 minutes. I told them yes and we hopped in the elevator. The elevator decided to quit working and we were stuck in it for about 10 minutes. They sent help and it started working again. Oddly enough, it let us off on the 13th floor. I made it to the doctor and he wouldn't remove the spine because he said that it was too deep and it would become infected if he removed it. He had me soak my foot in vinegar and said that it would turn to a powder and come out in about 3 weeks. Let me tell you at this point, walking around with a sea urchin spine in your heal is very painful. It was at this point that I decided that the island was trying to kill me. My Dad just told me to come home. Gabe and I decided not to go back out and to order pizza from room service. Then we went to bed. I will say that the weather here is really nice and it is very beautiful. P.S. If I have learned anything from spending forever in an airport, I have learned that it is very handy to have a laptop with a DVD player and some movies to watch. We watched Red Eye and started The Good Shepherd.