Friday explorations in shopping

June 29, 2012

Aloha auinapo! (Good evening, after midnight)

Busy day! I went in to work early to make up for my shortened afternoon on Wednesday and going to the meeting Thursday. I spent the entire day working on the childhood obesity data for Ann. She was off most of the day so it was something to work on that I could do on my own. The format was very time consuming but I followed instructions. I finished the extremely time consuming part today. Just one last bit to do and I will finish it on Monday. I ate lunch in today, I had the Amy's Burrito Especial I picked up at the store. It has rice, black beans and tomatoes. It was GREAT. I will have to get more of those for lunches. Lisa, Lori and I ate together. Lori shared her apple slices with me as well.

As the day drew to a close Shu came into my office and told me to hurry and follow her. She had seen a little kitten sunning itself on the wall, visible through the open grating of the stairwell. It was a beautiful light orange tabby, probably about 3 months old. Just sprawled on top of this tall stone wall and snoozing int he sun. It woke up when it heard us and I called it and watched it look our way. It was adorable. It scampered off shortly after that. It was so nice to see a kitty. There are so very few of them to see here. If you look very closely you can see it on the wall in the very center of the picture. My phone camera has no zoom option. regardless, this is the view from the stairwell outside my office looking to the side of the building. The front view is towards the ocean :)

Lisa was going to a store called Marukai and offered me a ride. I thought for a minute then said, "Ummm Lisa... Isn't that an island???" She laughed and then explained to me that Marukai is a STORE... MOLOKAI is an ISLAND and part of Hawaii. Yeesh. That was Melissa Making A ;)

Marukai is a Japanese wholesale market for members only. Lisa is a member so I went with her. It was SO FUN. She showed me all these Japanese candies, snacks and a million other things. Here are some picture I took of things I did not get. Hershey kisses with macadamia nuts! I'll have to bring some of these home. Also these neat looking things called Chinese pretzels. Lisa says they are tasteless but they look neat so I took a picture. I could have spent much longer there just learning about all the things but my ankle was pretty painful. 

Papa George (Lisa's dad) was with us. He made their purchases and went outside to the tables to wait for us. Apparently he knows Lisa loves to spend time looking at things in the store and this is their pattern. So we finished and went outside to meet him. He had bought me 2 sets of nice chopsticks (one for me and one for my boyfriend back home). Poor Scott, guess he's going to have to learn to eat with chopsticks! HEHEHE! He also bought me a bag of these puffy crispy chip things. They are called Shrimp Chip Crackers. They don't taste like shrimp at all. They remind me of munchos but not as salty. They are pastel shades of pink, yellow, green and cream and are super light, crispy and not oily. They are REALLY GOOD. I wanted to just eat the whole bag but I was hungry and wanted to actually eat dinner.

We left there and stopped by McDonald's. They had the haupia pies! This is only a seasonal thing and they have them now so I wanted to be sure to try one. Haupia is a pudding type dessert made of coconut milk. This was REALLY REALLY good and I want more of them before they (and I) go away!

This sign was inside the McDonald's.They have Rolo McFlurries which are good but I had those before. However, they have newly introduced chocolate dipped soft serve ice cream. I loved the sign so I took a picture, "Cremosos y chocolatosos"... chocoloatosos sounds like a disease. If -itis is inflammation and -osis is condition then chocolatosos maybe is a condition of craving chocolate! Sorry, just had a nerd funny moment there.

At the McDonald's they had an ATM. Tomorrow is Farmer's Market day so I needed to get some cash. I thought this screen was really funny so I took a picture. Welcome to Bankoh! Bankoh convenience! hehe

We were only stopping there to grab a haupia pie and then head out. We then stopped at Jack in the Box. Ok, so we don't have these in Kentucky. First off, this clown thing as a mascot looks freaking creepy. Second, the food is super cheap and I have heard it is good. So I was up for trying it. They serve breakfast all day which I will have to try in the future. The first thing I saw was this on the counter:

Thanks, but no Spam for me tonight. I asked for suggestions from Lisa on what was good. She recommended the tacos. The tacos are like Taco Tico tacos back home. They are cheap at 2 for $1.00. The shells are super crispy and the hot sauce on it is spicy but not unbearably so. So I got 2. These were SO GOOD! I loved them. Then she recommended the eggrolls, also on the cheapie menu. So I got 1 of those. The eggroll was also super delicious, I was very impressed. I've rarely had a better eggroll, even more amazing since this is a fast food place. She said neither of these were large items so I also got a burger called the Jumbo Jack. This was a delicious seasoned beef patty with lettuce, tomato, pickles and very light mayo and ketchup. I loved the spices on the beef patty, very tasty. The bun was nothing special but it also wasn't bad or soggy. All in all for around $5 this was a VERY good meal! I was surprised at how tasty everything was and now desperately want one in Lexington.

We also dropped by the post office so I could pick up a couple of flat rate priority shipping boxes so I could mail some things back home. I can pay for shipping online and print off a label and stick it on the box and ship from work. So I won't have to make a special trip to the post office. Or at the least pack it all up and then just take the prepacked box to the post office to ship.

I am very tired. I have muscle fatigue from hula class yesterday (nice though) and my ankle is painful. I am so very thankful for Lisa and Papa George driving me around and sharing the delight of finding all these new things. I have a bunch of things to ship home but I'll wait a bit before sending things. Don't want people at home getting spoiled, and they just got a package this week!

So I'm off to bed with maybe a bit of Angel on Netflix first. Not sure what I'll do tomorrow but I'll figure out something fun if at all possible.

Malama pono, (Take care)
~Melissa