stock here, just my third day back, so still just getting rolling. I went to deal with a minor nightmare of DMV bueracracy, the “Safety Check” for vehicles. I missed the registration by 4 days, and then you go into the “trick zone”. Vehicles must pass an ANNUAL safety check, which is not a horrible idea, as people in Hawaii don’t have to worry about their vehicles breaking down in a snow storm, and so they drive cars past their useful life with hillbilly level maintenance. Many people have no insurance even though required by law and a $1000 fine or more. Cops don’t really enforce it, and if you do have to go to court, and you temporarily put insurance on the car, and show that, it is usually thrown out.
Now since Registration and Safety are expired, you have to go get a provisional Safety Check, set up an appointment with the DMV (they love the power they got in COVID for controlling access to basic government services, and kept it in place. This also makes sure they are not “overworked” by a continuous line of annoying slaves. So I set an appointment for Monday, online. Then I will have to go in show them the provisional safety, pay for the registration $570 a year for a regular truck, and then return into the city to the safety place, and finally pay for and get the safety sticker. On the way, noticed that Honolulu is really turning into a Shit Hole. Lots of homeless, people living in their cars, all medians and edge of the road covered in trash and weeds and grass not cut for months. Many local people are being forced to just leave as they can no longer afford to live here. Milk is $7 a gallon, A chocolate bar is also $7, Gas is right around $5 per gallon. Rent that used to be $800 is now $1600. Call any business or government agency and leave a detailed message, YOU WILL NEVER get a call back, it just doesn’t work that way. They want you on the phone in person calling them, so they can berate you on why you missed the deadline, why did you wait to “the last minute” aka the deadline. I am not sure all the reasons, but they will not call you back.
The breaded chicken “Katsu”is $12.50 and the box is smaller, the mac salad is smaller, the rice scoop is smaller…..although is still tastes great.
And they “want to vaccinate you”, some places still have the “stay 6 feet apart” signs up (I try to remove any that I see). And quite a few people continue to wear masks, sometimes I think it is fear, other times I think it is more of “I care”. Even a sole person driving in a car, masked up. And most often they are just the fake masks that stop nothing.
After being gone for a year, I have to remind myself that people are quite friendly, you can just start up a conversation with anyone anywhere, and if someone looks your way it is totally appropriate to give them a smile or even a Shaka. Much different than a kind of friendly but coldness (gotten colder since COVID) in Wisconsin. So note to self….go out of your way to be friendly and acknowledge people. People from Starbucks remember me from a year ago, collective coffee grounds for compost amendments. If someone else just got the grounds, several workers will say “Sorry” and really mean it.
But back to the Shit Hole, I’ll chime in more in a few weeks. Also noted, even the rich customers are now acting cheap.
