On this Sunday, in my 17th year of this blog, I thought, my life is now not as exciting as in the past.  While I did last month return from a nearly two-month long trip that took us from Honolulu to Seattle ( by air ); then a very long cruise through the Panama Canal to Southhampton, UK; another flight to Amsterdam, Netherlands; a European Christmas Cruise to Budapest; flight to Zurich for a couple of days; then a 27 hour return by plane to Honolulu; certainly more than virtually every one of you reading this has accomplished the past year, relatively, my earlier experiences were more memorable. So I thought, over the next few months, I would select a few of my past postings to re-share with you, utilizing mostly my nostalgia day, Tuesday, for this purpose.  But I'll begin today with a grand summary. My first blog was published on 29April2008.  How long ago is that? Go back to your first day of kindergarten. Imagine how long it took to get you to become a senior in colleg...

Twenty years ago today, the deadliest tsunami in recorded history inundated Asian countries and killed about 230,000 people.  The  Sumatra-Andaman Earthquake, also called the Boxing Day Earthquake  ( Boxing Day is a holiday celebrated after Christmas Day, mostly in Europe and Commonwealth nations ): Was caused by a subsea earthquake possibly as high as  9.3 magnitude  ( this was #2 to the largest, which was the 1960 Chile earthquake at 9.5 ) off the coast of Sumatra, Indonesia. Waves were as high as  167 feet  in Aceh province, and two hours later, Sri Lanka saw 20 feet ( with run-ups as high as 41 feet--there is a difference in these two terms ), and  Thailand had run-ups of up to 64 feet.   At Phuket, Thailand, the second wave was the largest at 20 feet.  Also two hours after the earthquake, India saw heights as much as 33 feet.   3100 miles away in Somalia, there was a run-up of 30 feet. The maximum height above sea lev...

The big news of the day is that  Israel and the Hamas reached a deal to release 50 civilian women  and children held in Gaza .   Details on equivalent Paletinian prisoners are being worked out, but 150 women and children could well be in that mix.   There will also be a four-day pause in fighting.  Thank Qatar, especially lead negotiator and Minister of State, Mohammed Al-Khlaifi, plus Egypt and the White House.  Photo above. Additionally, an average of 42 aid trucks per day have been going into Gaza through the Rafah gate since October 21. Israel remains recalcitrant and indicated that there will be continued warfare until ALL hostages are returned. Big day for Joe Biden. The overwhelming relief to the above is that expanded hostilities seem now to be unlikely, and the path to a two-country solution appears on the horizon. So back to our Japan Rail Pass.  I mentioned yesterday that all we saw were banks of clouds when our Bullet Train passed...