Kona Trip Report days 6-9

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[day 5]

I don’t expect anything special to happen between now and bedtime, so I’ll post this shortly before suppertime.  I can’t talk about the meetings yet, so this will be mostly about the hotel and the surrounding area.

Kailua-Kona, HI [wikipedia] is a town with a population of about 20k that’s the main tourist destination on the west side of the Big Island.  I’m staying at a hotel on the north end of Aliʻi Drive, the main drag along the shore, which is where most of the tourist stuff is.  At the southern end of the tourist area is the Royal Kona Resort where our group held its meetings until a couple of years pre-COVID.

Heading south along Aliʻi Drive, there are the Kailua Pier, then a beach where lots of surfers ride in, numerous restaurants, and shops that sell the unsurprising faux-Hawaiian kitsch.

Some pictures that I’ve taken in and around the hotel are below the fold:

[Read more…]

Kona Trip Report day 5

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[day 3]
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2023-11-05 09:00−10:

The Kona meetings are starting half an hour earlier than normal:  08:30 on Monday and 08:00 Tuesday through Saturday; so they were half an hour into the Monday plenary by the time I was all set up and ready to go.  That was clearly stated in the agenda, and so it was entirely my own fault for not checking that beforehand.  Fortunately, the Monday plenary is mostly administrivia and I didn’t really miss anything.  I’ll get with the program for the rest of the week.

As usual, I can’t say anything about the meetings until adjournment on Saturday.

After the meeting on Monday, I went back to my room to get caught up on my non-meeting reading.  I have a WiFi hotspot I got from my cell phone provider that I use when traveling so that I don’t have to use any public networks, at least not in the U.S.  The hotspot’s battery was running low; and when I looked for its power cord, I couldn’t find it.  I’ll bet a dollar to a doughnut that, when I get home on the 15th, I’ll find both the hotspot’s power cord and the one for my laptop sitting together in some place “where I won’t miss them on the way out the door.” 😎  The bottom line is that I’ll be stuck with public WiFi networks outside the meetings until I get all the way home; and I’ll be totally offline for the entire trip on Amtrak’s California Zephyr.

The universal power cord that I bought for my laptop seems to be working just fine.  Indeed, I stupidly left it plugged in overnight and I haven’t fried the laptop’s power supply yet.  Aside from being careful when I insert the power cord into the laptop, I think I can quit worrying about that.

I had a bit of trouble connecting to the hotel’s WiFi.  For some reason, I have to use airplane mode instead of WiFi mode, which makes no sense to me, but it’s working.

[When I logged in to the meeting room WiFi to post this, I found that it’s a public network, too.  Oh, well…]

Kona Trip Report day 4

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[day 3]

2023-11-05, 05:00−8: (we’re off daylight saving time in the U.S. now)

Things got off to a good start today.  I stopped by a snack shop not far from the hotel’s front desk for breakfast and opted for a ham and cheese croissant, not really breakfast fare, but I wanted something more substantial than just a Danish.

07:00:

I had everything packed and was all ready when two of the hotel staff arrived at my room at 07:00 to collect my baggage and wheel me to the front desk where I checked out.  At the front desk, I was transferred to three hotel staff—I guess one was supervising…or something—who took me on the AirTrain to terminal 3 and all the way to the United checkin counter.  After checking in, I was left at a place where I awaited wheelchair assistance from an airport employee who took be through security, to the gate, and all the way to the airplane’s door.

The first class section on this plane had those seats that recline all the way, even allowing you to lie flat, which was a surprise.  The plane must be pretty wide because there were two such seats on one side of the aisle, four in the middle, and two on the other side of the other aisle.  I had booked seat 2D which was in the middle on the port-side aisle.

We pushed back from the gate about five minutes late but didn’t get very far when the whole airplane shook, and there was a sound like we had run over something.  We sat there for over half an hour wondering what the heck was going on.  One of the flight attendants eventually made an announcement saying that the drawbar that connects the front landing gear to the vehicle that pushes the plane back had broken and we had to wait for another one (which surprised me—seems like airports would have lots of those hanging around).  I was worried that we had lost our takeoff slot, but that turned out not to be the case.  We zoomed down the taxiway, held at the runway for less than half a minute while another plane landed, and were in the air about one hour after the advertised push-back-from-the-gate time.

They served us a late breakfast.  I opted for what was said to be scrambled eggs and sausage; but what I got was a pastry shell holding what was supposed to be scrambled eggs, but was nothing of the sort.  There was no egg flavor and no yellow yolk color.  There was lots of red and green in it, though.  It was edible, but IMO yet another example of food that was more pretentious than tasty.  The sausage was a bit mild, but otherwise OK.

The rest of the flight “met expectations”, and we touched down a bit after 13:00−10, just about half an hour late.  (Anyone who enjoys riding on Amtrak certainly can’t complain about that! 😎 )

ca. 13:30:

After a while, the equipment that lowered the wheelchair passengers from the aircraft door to the ground showed up, but it wouldn’t lower all the way.  Two airport employees, the operator of the equipment and I guess a maintenance person, kept trying and trying but couldn’t get it all the way to the ground.  The old saw about trying the same thing and expecting different results came easily to mind.  Finally, one of the wheelchair pushers noticed an external microswitch that hadn’t closed, so he flipped it up with his fingers and everything worked as designed. 😎

About that time, I noticed that the pocket I usually carry my wallet in was empty.  Oh, no!  My driver’s license, credit card, debit card …!  I distinctly remembered putting my wallet in the tray that goes through the TSA scanner at SFO, but I had no memory of putting it back in my pocket on the other side.  Suddenly my stress level went way up; and because I was wearing a suit* (not the proper attire for Hawaiʻi when it’s 80°F in the shade), I was now sweating like a pig.

Fortunately, I had enough cash with me to pay for the taxi from the airport to the hotel; and I was able to check in to the hotel because they already had the credit card info from when I had made the reservation, and I had brought my passport along “just in case” and so was able to prove that I was indeed the person I claimed to be.

My room wasn’t quite ready yet, so while waiting, I had occasion to reach into a front pocket, and lo and behold, there was my wallet.  I had stupidly put it in the wrong pocket in San Francisco (*duh*).  Please feel free to laugh at me; I don’t mind a bit being laughed at when I deserve it:  it’s a learning experience, and that’s a Good Thing. 😎

So I’m now stress-free, all cleaned up, dressed in more Hawaiʻi-friendly attire, full of a good supper, and ready for my meeting in the morning.

*I always wear a suit when I travel, partly because I guess (without evidence) that I get treated better, but mostly because I like having the coat pockets for all my stuff.

Kona Trip Report day 3

2023-11-04, 04:00 UTC−7

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[days 0-2]

I had crashed early last night and got a good night’s sleep, so I woke up at 4 in the morning wondering what to do with myself.  I got caught up on my e-mail and wrote and published the days 0-2 trip report.

07:00:  the “complimentary breakfast” was a dismal affair—paper plates and plastic utensils, you’re supposed to bus your table when you’re done.  They had the usual breakfast buffet stuff, but nothing special.  I had scrambled eggs, potatoes and sausage which was real food; but it was cold by the time I got to it.

Hyatt House Emeryville:  convenient to the Amtrak station, and the folks at the front desk are very nice and helpful; almost no food service.

12:00:  check-out time.  I was expecting to have to be out earlier than that, so that at least was a good surprise.

13:30:  my taxi arrived.  I decided not to try to use BART since my old back was complaining a bit.  When I said that I was going to the Grand Hyatt at SFO, the driver asked me for an address.  That surprised me:  surely he knows how to get to the airport, and surely there’d be signs directing us to the hotel once we got there.  That was indeed the case, but the signs pointed only to “Hotel”.  I guess the Grand Hyatt is the only hotel on airport property.

The freeway was stop-and-go at least half way to the airport, maybe more.  That didn’t bother me since I had all day to get to the hotel, but I was sorry that I had put the taxi driver through that.  I gave him a $40 tip, which was probably too much since it was almost half the regular taxi fare; but I was very happy to get an easy (for me) ride.

All the folks at the Grand Hyatt were very nice and helpful, even lugging my luggage all the way to my room.  I was even able to arrange for wheelchair assistance all the way from my room to the terminal for tomorrow morning.

The room itself is very nice, but I needed to close the drapes to keep folks from looking in:  the AirTrain rolls right past my window.  Also, there’s not a proper desk for setting up my computer.  There’s a table with a comfortable chair, but it has a marble top which doesn’t allow my optical mouse to track well.  Fortunately, I had an A-size sheet of paper left over from the Varna trip which worked OK as a mouse pad.

17:30:

The restaurant opens for supper at 17:00, but I decided to let my laptop battery charge completely.

The menu should have been a warning:  they handed me a tablet-like device that was much more flashy than useful.  This old fart would have preferred a conventional menu.

I opted for the pork fried rice which was the only dinner entrée that I could identify.  The waiter warned me that it came with kimchi which I hadn’t had since I was stationed in South Korea near the end of the Vietnam war.  I was expecting a fermented cabbage salad, but what I got was just bits of rotten cabbage mixed in with the rice.  There were rather large chunks of pork sitting on top of the rice.  It was all more pretentious than tasty.

I don’t think I’ll bother with the restaurant for breakfast, mostly out of fear that I’ll run out of time:  the restaurant opens at 06:00 and my wheelchair assistance will show up at my room at 07:00.  There’s a shop that sells snacks and beverages on the fourth floor which is open 24/7.  I’ll probably just stop in there for a Danish and a cup of coffee in the morning.  I expect that I’ll get fed again on the airplane.

My goal for the rest of the night is to repack for flying rather than riding trains.  This mostly involves moving anything that might freak out the TSA folks to my checked bag, principally my scanner, various cables, and a box that I can plug into the earphone jack on the scanner which generates a bluetooth signal that feeds my hearing aids.  I’ll probably get some more blog reading done, but that’s not essential.

The good news is that the U.S. is switching from summer time to winter time in the wee hours of the morning, so I’ll get an extra hour of sleep.

Kona Trip Report days 0-2

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2023-11-01:

Everything started well.  I had packed everything except my computer and toiletries the night before, and I arrived at the St. Louis Amtrak station in plenty of time to catch my first train to Chicago.

We departed St. Louis right on time; but as soon as I started getting my usual computer setup in order, I discovered, as I reported earlier, that I had stupidly failed to pack my laptop’s power cord (*sheesh*).  I still had a few hours of battery power available, but that clearly wasn’t going to get me to California.  I was off-line all the way to Emeryville and took no notes, and so I have almost nothing to report until the antepenultimate stop on day 2.

ca. 13:30−5:

We started boarding the California Zephyr and, amazingly, departed Chicago right on time at 14:00.

My sleeping car [train] attendant (TA), O. C. Smith, was very helpful all along the way, the food and the [food] service attendants (SAs), not so much.  The quality of the food service on Amtrak trains has taken a nosedive in the last decade or two.

2023-11-02, ca. 07:00−6:

It’s been at least twenty years since I last rode the Zephyr and, unsurprisingly I guess, the Denver station was all different from what I remembered.  We still had to pull quite a way north of the station and shove back to the stop, but this time there were several more tracks and very attractive platforms, and we were spotted on track 4 or 5 (I don’t remember which).  The last time I rode this train, we were shoved onto track 1 and spotted on a dingy platform near the headhouse.

I would later notice similar improvements at the Salt Lake City and Emeryville stations.

All the way from Denver to Grand Junction, the conductor made frequent announcements on the PA about the various sights along the way; and he was often amusing.  Most of the things to see were on the engineer’s side of the train (off to the right), but my room was on the fireman’s side.  I still appreciated the announcements, though.

2023-11-03, ca. 15:30−7:

Amazingly, we were right on time, even waiting for scheduled departure times at several stations, all the way to arrival in Martinez, CA.

We seemed to be having a really long dwell time in Martinez, surprising because the westbound Zephyr is discharge-only all the way from Sacramento to Emeryville and so doesn’t have to wait for scheduled departure times.  After about fifteen minutes or so, the conductor made an announcement on the PA saying that we had a medical emergency and that the train would be in Martinez for quite a while, but that passengers for Richmond and Emeryville would be handled on a Capitol Corridor train that was about an hour behind us.

I got off the train and followed the conductor to the baggage car where I claimed my one checked bag; and a station agent graciously allowed me to ride along with him with the other checked baggage to the headhouse.  He wouldn’t accept a tip.

I was working up a sweat, though.  I always wear a suit when I travel, principally because I like having all the pockets; and I was also wearing a St. Louis Cardinals baseball cap* and an overcoat on what turned out to be a warm day in the Bay Area.  This was going to be a problem because I’d be wearing the same suit and dress shirt all the way to the hotel on the Big Island.  When we got to the headhouse, I threw the hat and coat into what had been my checked bag, but that didn’t help much.

When the Capitol Corridor train arrived, the same station agent collected me and drove me to trainside where he got me a one-up seat on the lower level with a place to put my bags for the short ride to Emeryville.  My stress level was beginning to subside. 😎

On arrival in Emeryville, I’d be spending my first night at the Hyatt House just across the tracks; but the station agent couldn’t assure me that the elevators to the pedestrian crosswalk over the tracks would be working and suggested that I take a taxi.  I was reluctant to stick a taxi driver with such a short fare, but fortunately, the one taxi that was still waiting was the Emeryville Taxi Service.  The driver immediately understood my predicament, and I made it worth his while.

After checking in at the hotel, the clerk at the front desk said that there was a Best Buy not far away.  Fortunately, the taxi driver had given me his business card; so I called him back and he graciously drove me to the Best Buy and waited while I bought one of those universal laptop power cords.  On the way back to the hotel, I told him that I’d have a much longer fare for him tomorrow if he wanted it:  the Hyatt House Emeryville to the Grand Hyatt at SFO.  He agreed to pick me up at 13:30 and take me to SFO.

Recommendation:  If you ever need a taxi in Emeryville, CA, call the Emeryville Taxi Service, +1 510 612 9000.

The folks at the hotel’s front desk were very nice, the room is comfortable and convenient, and somebody in the housekeeping staff was happy to provide me with a stool to sit on in the shower (this old back complains if I’m vertical for more than a minute or two).  I do have one caveat emptor though:   the Hyatt House Emeryville doesn’t have a proper restaurant where you can get lunch or dinner.  They do offer a complimentary breakfast from 07:00 to 11:00.

My goal of getting caught up with my blog reading wasn’t accomplished.  PZ, Mano and Marcus have some interesting posts with comments that deserve careful reading; but I wasn’t up to that.  I verified that my new power cord worked corrently, played a little solitaire on the computer (as you might imagine, not something I do to improve my mind 😎 ), and crashed about quarter to nine.

*I have a red Cardinals cap.  I’ve been thinking about getting a blue one since folks who see only the red baseball cap might think that I want to Make America Hate Again.  I really like the red one, though.

Kona OOPS More Info

Success (I hope).

In Emeryville, I stopped at a Best Buy and got one of those universal laptop power cords.  I’m not sure I found the right tip in the box, but it fits, and the battery is charging as I write this.  The tip doesn’t fit quite as snuggly as my regular power cord does; let’s hope I don’t damage the socket it’s plugged into.

My goal for tonight is to get caught up on my e-mail and FtB reading.  Tomorrow night I’ll write a proper trip report.

Kona Trip Oops

Oh, dear!  I stupidly forgot the power cord for my laptop.  I have 90% of my battery; but that won’t get me to California, let alone Hawaiʻi; and I have no clue what I’m going to do during the meetings.  I might have to buy some cheap tablet and figure out how to use it.

I’m going to be silent at least until I get to Emeryville.

Kona Trip Report day minus one

Tomorrow morning I begin my trip to Kailua-Kona, Hawaiʻi for a week of meetings [itinerary].

I’ll start out on one of the Lincoln Service trains from St. Louis to Chicago where I’ll catch Amtrak’s California Zephyr all the way to Emeryville, a suburb of San Francisco.

I’m leaving a day early to give myself a buffer in case the Zephyr has any delays along the way, likely if there’s much snow on the ground.  If all goes as planned, I’ll spend two nights in the Bay Area.  The Hyatt House Emeryville is just across the tracks from the Amtrak station; and the Grand Hyatt at SFO is just a short AirTrain ride from there to the terminal.  I should have a whole day to get from Emeryville to the airport and so not be stressed at all.

The return trip will basically be the reverse of that, except I’ll spend only one night in the Bay Area and a second in Chicago.  The eastbound Zephyr will likely be late, and so the extra night will give me plenty of time to catch my preferred train for the last leg back to St. Louis.

I’ll have a decent camera with me this time, so maybe I’ll take some pretty pictures.  We’ll see whether I’m any good at it. 😎

[timetables for Chicago-St. Louis and Chicago-Emeryville]

Chemo Three

I have now officially completed the third of four rounds of chemotherapy for the cancer.  The drips finished yesterday just before noon, and I had a couple of pills to take this morning after breakfast.

After the infusion yesterday, they stuck a small boxy thing on my abdomen that gave me more medication to stimulate the bone marrow, in particular to ward off a low white blood cell count, another possible side effect of chemo, giving an increased risk of infection.  I was instructed to take it off when the green light stopped flashing, which it did about 4:20pm; and I promptly took my first real shower in six days. 😎  (It was a little disconcerting the first time I woke up to see my stomach flashing green; but after a beat or two of cognitive improvement, I knew what it was and could laugh at myself.)

As before, I’ve been fortunate to experience none of the horrible side effect of chemo.  I expect my bowels to be all stopped up for two or three days, but that’s just an annoynance.

Next up is to get all ready for my trip to Hawaiʻi that starts on Wednesday.  That trip will get in the way of my fourth and final round of treatments which will be delayed a few days until the Monday through Wednesday before Thanksgiving; but I was adamant that I wanted to make the trip.  These ISO standards committee meetings are what’s keeping my brain exercised during retirement. 😎

The New Speaker of the House

FtB already has plenty going on about Johnson (R-obviously) [Mano, PZ]; and I won’t repeat any of that; but I was taken by one possible dystopia in which all of our corporate media maybe have only short bullet lists of Johnson’s looney bits at the ends of stories that are mostly about how the Republicans “got it together.”  I had planned to watch a bunch TV news shows to see how that’s playing out so far.

PBS’ World Channel has an english language broadcast from DW News at 4:00PM my time (UTC−5).  They’re usually more concerned about what’s going on in Europe, but they did have a short story about the new speaker that contained the expected bullet list at the end, and they lumped a lot together under the rather bland “conservative Christian” label.  (Maybe that’s a red flag for Europeans—I don’t know.  It doesn’t sound particularly ominous to us US folk until you’re reminded of all the various bits of it.)

Unfortunately, I hadn’t slept well last night, and I had to get up early for a normally 35-minute drive (but during the morning rush hour today) to the hospital for the beginning of my third round of chemo drips; so by the time that BBC World News America came on, this old fart had to take a nap for about an hour, expecting to skip the BBC show and my local TV news.  When I woke up, all the news was over; but I stayed up for the World Channel’s repeat of PBS NewsHour and the local news on my NBC affiliate.

PBS NewsHour covered the speaker vote only during the initial “headline” part of the show, but that can often expand on particular stories.  This time was mostly Lisa Desjardins talking about how Johnson is “well thought-of among Republicans”; and she also grouped a lot together as “conservative Christian.”  (She did eventually break out the LGBTQ+ and abortion issues, but there was no mention of, e.g., creationism or Christian nationalism, the latter being particularly scary for me.)

There was also an interview asking a Republican representative some softball questions.  She wants to “keep the government open” and described Johnson as humble and one who puts the best interests of the country ahead of party (I’m not making that up).  We’ll see…

That was it.

I was hoping that my local TV news, after the leads that bleed, might have a bit from NBC News about the House vote, but no such luck.