Brian Michael Bendis, �Ultimate Spider-Man: Hollywood�
This is part twenty of a 25-part story about Hawaii. The story begins here. Part five is located here. Part ten is here. And part fifteen is here. Other parts you'll have to find yourself. So there.
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The Girlfriend has always been fascinated with biology. I took her to the beach once in Santa Cruz, and she spent the majority of time stopping every two feet to pick up another seashell or oyster shell, until both her pockets and mine were filled with various-sized shells. This morning, she woke early and combed the beaches before I even thought about getting up.
But we�re both still burned out from the day before, and we know we�re going on another hike tomorrow. Today seems like a good day for being lazy.
Which means it�s a good day to drink out of pineapples.
On the drive to the center of town, we see a girl hitchhiking by the side of the road. I pull over and she tries to jump in the back.
When we first rented this car, the guy warned us that the back passenger door only opened from the outside. That turned out to be wrong. It wouldn�t open at all. In fact, sometimes the window on the back seat would pull forward from its duct tape prison and lock the front passenger, meaning The Girlfriend, inside as well. The back driver side, he warned, only opened from the inside. I reach behind me and pull on the handle to let her in.
Nothing happens. The girl stands there, waiting. Finally, I rolled the window down and she climbed in the back, Dukes of Hazzard style.
�Oh my god, look at all these great books!� she says as she makes herself comfortable. The piles of books I spread out over the backseat to dry are scattered everywhere in the back. �Burroughs, Chomsky, Steinbeck... wow! I never see these kind books any more. There�s no good bookstores around here!� She finds a copy of my book that I was planning to give my father�s friends, and starts flipping through it.
She has good taste!
Actually, she�s probably thinking that if I was reading things like Burroughs and Chomsky, this Dean Carrico guy must be somebody good that she doesn�t know about, and is trying to fake being cultured.
�My name�s Sky,� she says. It was about that time when we catch that smell � the smell of hippy.
Okay, perhaps she doesn�t have good taste.
We introduce ourselves, and she asks what year we moved here. It�s obvious why she thinks we�re locals � our car is so thrashed, it could only come from somebody who lives here. We set her straight and tell her we�re camping nearby. She mentions that there will be a party a little further up the road, and they�re going to bring generators up and play music.
The thought of a bunch of hippies flailing around to reggae does not sound appealing. The Girlfriend and I smirk at each other, and don�t ask any other questions about the party. She takes the hint.
We drop her off and head further south for drinks in pineapples. But we also need to eat. For no reason at al, I pull into a parking lot and we see a sign that says �Phở Kauai.�
For the Ethnocentric amongst you, �Phở� is pronounced like �fa.� Now say the name of the restaurant. Phở Kauai.
Say it faster.
Don�t get it? Say it again.
It sounds like �Fuck Hawaii.� Man, you people are fucktards.
Anyway, that sealed it � we had to eat here.
The first couple of days that we�ve been at the campsite seem to have helped Arlette with whatever she was bothered with, and she�s been more amicable toward me. But she�s sliding slightly back into her quiet mode, and she�s not telling me what�s on her mind.
There isn�t much I can do, so I enjoy my drink and read Bendis�s revamping of Spider-man that mixes fact with fancy, using a story line that has an appearance by Sam Raimi. Speaking of Hollywood productions, tomorrow�s plans involve hiking up a trail in the area where Spielberg filmed the gate entrance scenes for Jurassic Park and using boogie boards to shoot through some tunnels eventually spilling into a pool located underneath two waterfalls.
If this doesn�t brighten her mood, there isn�t much that will.
