Belated

So, sometimes if it's been almost four weeks since an event has passed, I will skip posting it, but I love these pictures, so Happy Belated 4th of July!

We drove into town and parked on the top level of a mall parking lot facing the ocean (Ala Moana, if you are ever on Oahu on the 4th). Then we went shopping! (we had 4 1/2 hours to kill)

When we returned to the car a few hours later, we discovered that we had found the perfect spot. There were locals everywhere, tailgating and chowing down. We had just stuffed ourselves at Islands, but that didn't stop them from force-feeding us some of the local cuisine. It was cool to try some "real" Hawaiian food (rather than the buffet stuff they give you at the luaus). I'm just guessing at the names here, but I tried some katsu chicken (japanese style fried chicken) and some ahi poke (pronounced po-keh, basically raw tuna. maybe marinated?). If my gag reflex wasn't on overdrive, I would say it was delicious! Dave also tried a couple of other things, including tako (pronounced like taco, but it's octopus, so be careful what you order in Hawaii! :).

We had our little Ford Edge backed in like everyone else (they even thought we were locals at first, hah! that was probably until they saw our awesome bumper sticker inside the trunk - dead giveaway on a rental. here's the rule, if you are a tourist, don't leave valuables in your trunk. if you are a local, leave the car unlocked, you don't have any valuables anyway. it's hawaii!)

After we tried taking our own picture, Evie wanted a turn.
"Smile Owen!" What is it with this kid and his winks?!

Then Owen wanted a turn.
A little off, but it's cool. He just keeps shooting...

When Owen gets his hands on the camera, you're guaranteed to get at least eight pictures.

After hanging out for an hour, we got to watch some cool fireworks - bonus!

Well, bonus for some of us. Evie gets nervous around fireworks.
She ended up being okay with these ones, because I told her they were way out over the ocean, so no one could get hurt. She was absolutely beside herself watching the fireworks over Cinderella's castle at Disneyworld, convinced that it was going to catch fire.

Concerned, but still curious.

And eventually the finale (sorry about the tree on the lower left).
It really was a great show. A lot of fireworks. For a long time. And I love fireworks. I really don't know why, but I do. And it wasn't the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra (in fact, it was a dj playing Sheryl Crowe and Miley Stewart and Lady Gaga, and who knows who else, which kind of distracted from the normally patriotic mood), but it was cool. We had a great day!

(and p.s. if you are ever on Oahu on July 4th and decide to go to the Ala Moana mall for the show, note that it took us an hour to get out of the parking lot.)