Aloha - Makuka Heiau "Hill of Escape"

Aloha... Matsumoto's Hawaiian Shaved Ice

Matsumoto's was a refreshing stop along the way during our sight seeing tour of the North Shore. Harmony's looking forward to finding the vanilla ice cream at the bottom of her's Yum!!! Katrina tried the beans and ice cream in her's. We all enjoyed the treat!!! Yum, Yum...

Aloha... Dole Plantation Pineapple Garden Maze

We arrived at the Honolulu airport and were greated by two beautiful children with traditional Hawaiian Leis. My great nephew Justice placed a tropical leis over Jerry's head and Harmony placed a colorful, flowery, frequent leis around my neck. What a great time Jerry and I had on our vacation, visiting my niece Katrina, and her children, my great nephew Justice (7 yrs. old) and great niece little Harmony (4 yrs. old). Katrina took Jerry and I all over the island. Our first day we traveled from Ewa Beach, HI (where Katrina's family lives) to the Northshore. Our first stop was the Dole Plantation where we enjoyed finding our way out of the Pineapple Garden Maze which was officially recognized in the Guinness Book of World Records 2001 as the World’s Largest Maze. We were all successful and made it out of the maze which covered an area of more than two acres with a path length of 1.7 miles, it is made of 11,400 colorful Hawaii plants, including varieties of hibiscus, the official state flower.

Aloha ...

Jerry and I are getting excited, anxious and looking forward to our long awaited vacation in Hawaii. Justice and Harmony are the little ones that we are looking forward and excited to see and enjoy. Of course we are also anxious to see Katrina (my niece, my older sister Kathy's daughter) and spending time with her. Unfortunately, we are disappointed that Jerry (Katrina's husband) was been called away on business in Virginia. We will miss celebrating Jerry's February 11th birthday and visiting with him, during our stay. I purchased a new digital camera especially for this trip. After some extensive research I decided on a Canon Powershot SD700 IS. IS stands for imagine stabilization. This will be particularly important taking pictures of these two active children. Justice and Harmony are active in gymnastics. Justice is also in Soccer. On February 19th, the day after we leave Honolulu, Katrina, Justice and Harmony will participate in the Great Aloha Run, an annual event. The picture shown above was Harmony at last year's Great Aloha run. During our vacation we will so a lot of sightseeing on the Island. We will no doubt spend time at the beach, the picture below is Justice and Harmony enjoying an afternoon sun on the beach in Ewa Beach, HI, where they live. We have tentative plans to go whale watching, snorkeling, taking the North shore island tour and taking the kids to the local water park. We look forward to a relaxing on our vacation and enjoying some local culture and enjoying valentines day with these little cupids.

ONCOLOGIST APPOINTMENT

Jerry is on his way to his second oncologist appointment (Century City, CA) of this year. I was kinda concerned if he would go today. A few days ago I received a call from PharmaCare. PharmaCare is the distributor of the drug Avastin which is administered through an IV in the doctor's office. PharmaCare said that our insurance (United Health Care) was denying the claim with an "Unqualifying diagnosis". Jerry has been receiving Avastin since March, 2006. I explained to PharmaCare that Jerry's appointment was in two days and that the product needed to be sent immediately. PharmaCare said that they could not ship the product unless I would guarantee payment, that would mean that if the issue was not resolved Jerry and I would be responsible to pay the $16,500.00 cost of this drug. As you can imagine, immediately I contacted our HR/benefits department for assistance in this matter. At the same time, I contacted the oncologist office to tackle the problem from their end. So far there has not been a resolution to this situation, however the oncologist office does have a supply of Avastin, in their office and Jerry will be receiving the drug, today. Once the insurance determines they will cover the cost of this drug, PharmaCare will replenish the oncologist's inventory. If the insurance company decides they will not cover the drug, Jerry and I may be responsible to pay the oncologist for this drug. In the past, these issues have been resolved without Jerry and I having to pay these outrageous costs.

Jerry's oncologist has also ordered a chest (PA & LAT) x-ray at the outpatient imaging center in Century City before his visit today here. Even though Jerry feels he does not need an chest x-ray I am glad they ordered it. Even though Jerry is not as sick as he was, he continues to have coughing episodes and a lot of congestion. He is on his second week of antibiotics.

I will update you on how Jerry does, after his appointment, and how he's feeling for the next couple of days.