Blue Hawaii

Marge and I returned Sunday from a week in Hawaii, the island of Maui to be specific. We had postponed our scheduled February trip to celebrate our 40th wedding anniversary. 82 degrees on Maui, 52 degrees in Portland. Tough to take.

Blue Hawaii is a 1961 musical film set in the state of Hawaii and starring Elvis Presley. I'm not exactly sure why they called the movie Blue Hawaii, but it probably had something to do with the blue sky and the color of the water.

Lanai is Hawaiian for porch or patio. We spent the majority of our time on our lanai, reading books and looking at sunsets.

Lana'i also happens to be one of the Hawaiian islands. It is one of the least visited of the major islands. Lana'i is immediately west of Maui, and just as Sarah Palin could see Russia from her house, we could see Lana'i from our lanai. Coincidental, I suppose.

We had nonstop flights on Alaska from Portland to Maui and back. The flight attendants were generous enough to give each of the passengers a soft drink and a small bag of macadamia nuts. They didn't charge us for going to the bathroom on the plane. Weather aside, Maui has many things in common with Portland, Kaiser Permanente and Costco among them.

We saw both the Northern Cardinal (Cardinalis cardinalis) and the Red-crested Cardinal while we were there. I suppose the taxonomists thought the Northern Cardinal was so nice they named it twice. The male is a brilliant crimson red with a black face mask over the eyes, extending to the upper chest. The common name, as well as the scientific name, of the Northern Cardinal refers to the cardinals of the Roman Catholic Church, who wear distinctive red robes and caps. We don't know if the Northern Cardinal preys on young males of the species.

The Red-crested Cardinal (Paroaria coronata) is a bird species in the tanager family and is not very closely related to the cardinals proper (Cardinalidae). Although Hawaii is not part of the original habitat of either the Northern Cardinal or the Red-crested Cardinal, both have been introduced there. Who can blame them for wanting to live there?