Aloha and howzit?After a year's interruption (to rid ourselves of mold and my life savings) the Levines returned again to Hawaii. This year to the Grand Wailea on Maui. Picture Heart's Castle with water slides and a grotto bar. As usual it was glorious. NFL games start at 8 in the morning over there!!!
Paris and Nicky Hilton were staying at our hotel. I guess among the many amenities the Grand Wailea offers is a meth lab. (Sure an improvement over Fiona Apple at the Kahala. We got the better anoerexics.) The Four Seasons next door usually has the big Hollywood crowd. Maybe they didn't want Paris. After all, she did make that infamous sex tape...and worse, she has a show on Fox.
Their signature restaurant is Humahumanukunukuapua's (actual name). But people call is Humahumanhukunu's for short. Lobster was $59 a pound (again, this is true). They should change the name to Hubrishubrishubrishubrischutzpah.
I forgot to ask Paris how much Maui Wowie was these days.
Cabanas were $125 a day and there was a waiting list. But for that money they brought around free fruit and water so it was a bargain. We opted for cosabellas which are lounge chairs with a hood. $40 and a half hour wait in line to sign up. There's a rumor that at the Four Seasons the lines start forming at 4:30 a.m. All the nannies and assistants have to really get up early over there.
Nothing more relaxing than turning on the TV and seeing there's a heightened Terror Alert. Yeah, like who would ever want to attack Hawaii?
Monday morning Santa Claus arrived on a long canoe bearing candy canes for the kids. He was clad only in a traditional cap and red skirt. The children were confused. Not like any Santa they had ever
seen. What I didn't realize until that day was how many tattoos Santa had. Or how scary his heavily-tattooed Samoan elf was. You shouldn't be thinking about the Terror Alert when Santa arrives on shore.One of the many great things about this paradise -- you never hear Paul McCartney's inane "Having a Wonderful Christmas" on the radio. Instead they play Paul Anka's "Christmas in Japan".
Although McCartney was represented. At the art gallery in the next door high end fashion mall a big sign boasts an exhibition of paintings from Paul McCartney, Tony Bennett...and then in much smaller letters, Picasso.
Paris Hilton's bodyguard was spotted at the pool Wednesday getting a pedicure. Even during this high Terror Alert.
It amazes me how many women put on make up to go to the beach. And Botox is very "in" this year. But it is keeping with the Hawaiian spirit since they all look like Jack Lord.
The pace on the islands remains blissfully slow. There's a little church on the grounds of the hotel and every morning its chapel bells would ring promptly at 8:10ish.
Yes, I went down a water slide. Matt took a picture. You will never see it.
This being the busiest season of the year there were lines everywhere...except at the health club. Had no problem getting a treadmaster, no problem finding empty weight machines. The guy selling ice cream dots was mobbed.
Why is it the fatter the person the louder the Hawaiian shirt? Or the bigger the implants the louder the hair dye?
Book of choice at the Grand Wailea was "the Da Vinci Code". At the Four Seasons it was the biography of Lew Wasserman.
They sell jewelry down at the pool. Women with their guts hanging over their bikini bottoms trying on pearls. I have no idea whether they like the stuff or not. Because of the Botox they can't make an expression.
Went twice to Roy's restaurant. Best food on the island and never disappoints. And the view? Spectacular. Roy's is in the parking lot of a shopping center. You know you're in Hawaii when you see the crimson sun set behind the Safeway and the Crazy Shirt Emporium.
Commercial seen during Hawaiian newscast: a new retirement village featuring golf, recreation, pools, and year round sunshine...in Florida.
A Levine Christmas day tradition is to go to a movie. So we ventured into Kihae. First was dinner at Tony Romas where we were the only table to not order a five-pound onion loaf. Then to the cineplex to see "Paycheck". It's McGyver meets Memento. The Hawaiians who sat behind Annie and Matt were completely baffled. Bad enough there was the concept of time travel, they were just thrown because everyone in the movie was wearing long pants.
How Hollywood is Maui these days? There are academy screenings at the Castle Theatre. (No joke) Just show your DGA, WGA, or academy cards at the door.
Matt just turned 21 and loves being carded since he's now legal. There's a swim-up Grotto Bar and he wondered if he'd be carded there (and if so just where do they think he'd keep ID). So as an experiment he and Annie swam up to it, he ordered a White Russian and was served no problem. Annie ordered an Oreo smoothie and the bartender asked "You want any booze in that?" Annie is 17.
Debby had a hot rock massage. That's where the masseuse puts hot relaxing rocks on your back then sits off to the side silently chuckling and reading magazines.
Happy holidays and I leave you with this:
A' ohe 'ai pani 'ia o ka 'amo.
(no particular food blocks the anus).
What, no Tony Curtis paintings?
ReplyDelete(wv: drame - dame who likes a drink).
"drame"--the only G-rated term ever used to describe Tallulah Morehead.
ReplyDeleteSorry you can’t be there on Dec. 22 for Chanukah when Judah Maccabaccacaccabee arrives with a red prayer shawl in a Chrysler. They do it on the island of Maury. They’re celebrating the miracle where they thought Jack Lord’s hair only had enough oil to last one day. Then they realized you could drill horizontally and get beneath the shale. (Hey, we only have until the 29th to milk this story line.)
ReplyDeleteBTW, since you brought it up, few realize that the mystery of Lew Wasserman was actually revealed in the Da Vinci Code – along with the fact that Mary Magdalen’s middle name happened to be “Zeta,” and the 5th station of the cross was crudités. Also that you can’t not giggle pronouncing it in the actual Latin, “DaWinky.”
Legend has it that when the Pope of Hollywood and his wife Edith hosted the Pope of Rome (John Paul, Jr.) at their home in the late 1980s, the DGA strike had Universal way behind schedule. So Lew went for the deal. He offered the Holy Father a million-five to change the words in the Lord’s Prayer from “give us this day our daily bread,” to “give us this day our daily rushes.” Pope said they just couldn’t swing it.
So Lew ups the ante to $5-million plus points. Pope can’t believe his ears. Lew explains, “Look Johnny, we’re not talking a major re-write here, just one word – bread to rushes. If ya’ want, we won’t even need a whole new word. What say we just go with “dailies” and lose the bread? How ‘bout $7.5 mil, back-end deal, and Europe?
By the time Wasserman gets up to throwing in 50% of home video, the Pope turns to the Archbishop of L.A. and says, “Archie, ring up the Morris Agency and see how much longer we got on the Pepperidge Farm deal.”
True story. OK, not. But do you know how hard it is to work a bit like this into the conversation?
Mahalo, gotta go rake leaves, but nice checking in with you.
What exactly is that in the upper left hand corner of the top group of pictures? Is a pool, or a giant blue runway for alien spacecraft?
ReplyDeleteMaybe that's what's behind the terrorist alert!
Spacecraft, lower right? Plain as night.
ReplyDeleteYeah, you're right! Just like in Close Encounters!
ReplyDelete:) I do believe that's spelled " Humuhumunukunukuapua'a ". But close enough for horseshoes and hand grenades, which should in fact be the standard of measurement in all situations.
ReplyDeleteJust the fun things you pick up when on station.
Recently, I tripped over [i]Wheel of Fortune[/i] doing at least a week's worth of games from Hawaii. The contestants were alledgedly Islanders, not Mainlanders.
ReplyDeleteThey actually gave away a Caribbean Cruise, to one of the big winners. How many kilovolts, pre-wired to the sandals, does it take to get the Lucky Contestant, to jump up and down, at [i]that[/i]?
Mahola! It snows, where I live. Free of charge, even on Christmas Day, now and then.
Roys is very good, but you know they have them here in LA, too. Best food in Maui is Mama's Fish House and the views truly are spectacular.
ReplyDeleteMy standard Hawaii caveat: DON"T go to the Polynesian Cultural Center.
ReplyDelete