We were in the post-walk coffee-and-newspaper stage of the morning yesterday when the cats suddenly rose in unison from their sleeping positions and went into alert mode, sniffing, standing, then heading for the cat door and the back deck. I went over to open the door to the deck and relieve the congestion at the small cat door. Romeo’s short fur was standing on end, Harriet peered down the stairs and then made a dash down and under the house. And then Meda let out an exclamation and I turned back to see what was happening just in time to see a very large dog walking happily through the open door from the front deck and heading right into the kitchen. A few split second swipes of a large dog tongue took care of any remnants of food in the cat dishes, and then the big yellow Lab with serious wagging tail decided to just flop down in the middle of the kitchen and show his stomach in case there might be some tummy scratching available. That only lasted a few seconds, though, as I leaned over the grab his collar and he decided that following the cat scents into the rest of the house might be fun. Luckily, he was a very nice dog and allowed himself to be walked out to the deck. The tag on his collar said his name is “Homer”, and I called out the phone number also on the tag while Meda dialed.

Actually, we recognized Homer. This is perhaps the third time that he’s wandered into our yard, although the first time he’s decided to walk right into the house.

Homer actually lives just one street below us, and apparently takes the back door route through the undeveloped 4-acre lot next door. Ours is the first yard that he can reach that isn’t surrounded by a fence, explaining why he ends up here.

In any case, I grabbed a short rope that we keep for just such occasions, looped it through his collar, and off we went for the short walk around the corner. Homer was happy to see his person, and the cats were happy to see him go. One of these visits I’ll remember to grab the camera and get a picture of Homer before he goes home.

Lesa Griffith, communications director for the Honolulu Academy of Arts, called my attention to the big New York Times spread on the Academy’s new headline exhibition.

I wonder which hidden interest is behind House Bill 2966 that would allow charitable groups that lease public land to enter into short-term subleases without going back to the Board of Land and Natural Resources for approval. The first clue that special interest pressures are involved is that when the Committee on Water, Land, Ocean Resources & Hawaiian Affairs failed to schedule the bill for a hearing, it was re-referred to bypass the subject matter committee and go directly to Finance.

In Finance, the Land Board expressed “serious concerns about the potential for abuse o f leased property as an indirect result of this bill.”

This measure contains no mechanism for ascertaining and ensuring that the leased premises will, in fact, be used under the sublease for the purposes designated in the lease. Moreover, there appears to be no limitation on the number of consecutive instances that a particular lessee and
sublessee could invoke the provisions of this bill, thereby allowing a string of subleases that could be set end-to-end, and effectively circumvent the Board’s purview over longer term use of
the premises.

There is no record of any public testimony in favor of the bill, either in the scanned testimony or the committee report, leaving those who are pushing the bill behind the scenes unidentified.

We were driving home yesterday afternoon when Meda suggested we pull over so that I could try to get a picture of the sunset looking across Kaneohe Bay towards Kualoa.

I had just enough time to stop, park, grab the camera, hurry out to the shoreline and grab a few images before the light faded.

Click for a larger version of the photo.