Boy, it sure didn’t take long for the holidays to become a distant memory. It was all business at IOLANI yesterday with end-of-the-year accounting, inventory, and personnel issues keeping us busy. The Year of the Dragon has been kind to us so far … but then again, there are still 362 days to go! And what’s with this weird weather?? For the last couple of weeks we had nice strong trade winds, then on New Year’s Eve the winds died and now there’s a thick vog in the air. Very strange …
Our good friend from Osaka, Fujii-san, came to visit us at IOLANI and brought me & the boys a very nice surprise – our own personal bottles of sake! Â 
 How cool is that?! He and his wife visit Hawai’i quite often and Fujii-san likes to collect aloha shirts – in fact, when we last performed in Osaka he showed up wearing a Robert’s Hawai’i aloha shirt! I’ve only seen Robert’s employees wearing them so I wonder how he got it … hahaha! Anyway, I want to thank Fujii-san for the wonderful gift and I look forward to seeing them again either here or in Osaka very soon! By the way, he’s got an awesome yakiniku restaurant …
I’ve really been enjoying this much-needed break from music. After our final few performances in 2011, I wondered why people would come up afterward and ask me, “Papa, are you ok? You look so tired!” I didn’t realize how exhausted I was by that time and it must’ve showed on stage – which is not a good thing when you’re supposed to be entertaining people! Well, after the first week off I could already feel a difference – my energy level soared and my whole outlook improved. But vacation time is almost over … even though ManoaDNA is still officially on vacation til February, we’re already starting to work on our plans for 2012. Should be another exciting year … so stay tuned, everyone!
Have a great day, my friends!
Aloha, “D”