Fresh off the press! I've found a place to plop a squat! Yippee! It's in the lovely city of Portland, ME. (It's no Hilo, HI....but Maine is about as close as you can get...weird right?!) My Mother sent me an e-mail today that said, 'I'm going through Nautie Withdrawl Syndrome - and I'm tired of looking at Wethersfield, CT'.

Fair enough however; I only half way apologize for the lack of posts. The good news is that today is October 1st and my air card is full of gigabytes just waiting to be eaten up!

I had my first glorious 'living on the Mainland' experience this afternoon.

I needed to go grocery shopping - I went to Trader Joe's! (That alone is glorious.) I FILLED my shopping cart up - because I had to get the 'necessities' all at once..coffee, laundry detergent...you get the picture. I was really nervous when I got to the counter. I was feeling super guilty about buying so many organic items, combined with doing all my shopping at a 'specialty store'. When the final item was scanned my total was only 115.00! I couldn't believe it. I would estimate that is less than half as much as it would cost in Hilo. Holy Toledos!

However, the really glorious thing happened while I was paying and the bagger was organizing my goods. The final item was a carton of eggs. He looked at me and said, 'did you check your eggs?'. I of course replied no....I mean really, do you guys check your eggs?! Then he says, 'Jeezum Crowe! You didn't check your eggs?! What Kind Of Main-ah Ah You?!' No lie! He really said Jeezum Crowe and then called me a Mainer....dropping the 'r' and adding an 'ah' and then he said 'ah' instead of are. It was GLORIOUS!

(For the record...I've never ever had someone ask me what kind of Hawaiian I am....)