On Vacation

Aloha!  Tomorrow morning I will be leaving for a week long vacation at beautiful Oahu.

I’ll be staying in the heart of Waikiki with my wife, sans our son.  It should be a dream trip. I plan on doing absolutely no work the entire time, including anything connected to comics.  This will hopefully be a very relaxing time that allows me to recharge some of those creative juices.  You may not realize it, but drawing/working on other aspects of the comics can become all consuming.  When I dedicate myself to something I do so fully, which means it bleeds into all other aspects of my life and I spend a lot of time thinking about ways to improve it.  At least for one week I hope to switch that off and just soak in my surroundings.

I’ve always loved the Hawaiian culture and style, thus the nick name Hawaiian Mike.

I’ve always had a penchant for Hawaiian shirts, though that has shifted towards bowling/rockabilly shirts in recent years, and I like pork pie hats, though I normally don a baseball cap (pork pies seem a bit audacious for a lot occasions, and not quite as versatile as the true blue cap).  I have quite a few carved tiki gods and related paraphernalia (masks, mugs, etc.) as well as books on the mythology.  Lately I’ve geared up by watching shows and movies set in or about Hawaii.  Hawaii for me, as it is for many, represents the ideal escapist paradise.  I have felt that way since early childhood.  Here’s the funny thing about it.  I’ve only been there once, to Kawaii, in my early teens on a massive extended family vacation.  So this should be really fun.

One of the things I’ll be doing is snorkeling in world famous Hamana Bay.  I’m really looking forward to that, as I’ve always enjoyed tropical fish.  I’ve kept countless tanks over the years and spent several years working at pet stores selling fish.  It’s really cool to see the things you’ve sold actually out living in the wild.  Another planned activity is all be going on a ghost tour.

A lot of people don’t seem to realize this, but the Hawaiian islands  are steeped in legends of the supernatural nature, and are well known for being quite haunted.  One of the most famous phenomenon are the Night Marchers of Oahu.  The Pali Highway itself has several tales of ghost.  You probably know I’m quite interested in the occult, and have recently taken a walking ghost tour of Old Town San Diego and spent the night at the haunted Brookdale Lodge (not to mention my childhood hauntings, trips to local cemeteries, and sneaking into some old abandoned areas), so hopefully this will be a nice addition to my previous supernatural vacation adventures.

So what does this vacation mean to my work rate vow? Hopefully nothing.  My vow of one comic strip per week (Sunday through Sunday) this year has been achieved so far, usually surpassed by doing 2 or 3 strips!  I’ve already done 2 this week, and I’ll be coming back the following Friday night.  I should have time to do one that weekend, thus keeping the streak alive.  You won’t be getting anymore until then!  So sad.