Day 2 in Hawaii (J&C) - 9/20

Yesterday was a beautiful day in Hawai'i - is there any other way? While Charlie was busy being a Navy man, I was inside my hotel doing homework and watching class - yessssssssssss! I did take a quick break to do a few laps in the lap pool nearby, but then it was back to the grind...or so I thought. Charlie called about 1.5 hrs earlier than expected for me to come pick him up from work, so that was a very pleasant surprise! With our newfound "extra" time we decided to hit the USS Arizona Memorial just down the road. We entered in record time, and as a side note: the ticket-counter lady commented on my wedding ring and how pretty it was - it went a little something like this:
Lady: Is that your wedding ring????
J: Yeah, it is.
Lady: DAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAANG, Diamond Jim! DAAAAAAAAANG!
C: She's pretty lucky, isn't she?
Lady: DAAAAAAAANG, Diamond Jim! You don't spare NO expense!
...the key here being that Charlie's new name is "Diamond Jim". Love it!

Let me tell you, folks, that it is a beautiful testament to the lives that were lost on December 7th, 1941. We watched a brief historical video on the events surrounding that day (from the previous Japan/American relation hardships up to the attack on Pearl Harbor and the recovery efforts), then took the boat out to the monument itself. It was very sobering, but beautiful and extremely peaceful. I was moved to tears .

The day concluded with us having dinner on the patio at Sam Snead's Tavern, a nice restaurant on the golf course. It was to bed early again, as 4:45am rolls around pretty fast - especially when you're on vacation!!

We'll see what tomorrow brings!

ps: For the USS Arizona Memorial, we had heard many things about it being hard to get into with long, LONG lines and so forth. Maybe it was the time of year, but at around 2:15pm when we showed up, we got tickets right away to get on the last boat (leaving at 3:00pm) for the day. It worked out perfectly and we recommend hitting the "after lunch" version of the tour since getting there right when they open only means LONG lines!
pps: We may have little-to-no internet access after we leave our hotel tomorrow, so the blog entries may cease until we get home...just an FYI :)

PICTURES AT: http://picasaweb.google.com/marshiks/2007_09_20Day2Hawaii