Hawaii
AS my friend Dwayne Cargill, a former running back with the Oregon Ducks about 100 pounds ago, loves to say, "Have a ducky day." That could well apply to Saturday when 20,000 little rubber duckies float down the Ala Wai in the Cerebral Palsy Association's Great Hawaiian Rubber Duckie Race. They used to have a flotilla of boats parading on race day, but this year they've been relegated to a parade on land. The route is special: It'll be the shortest parade in isle history, a scant 200 yards, according to the permit. Though it'll be over before you can sing "I Love a Parade," it'll include a police escort, the Kaimuki High School Band, a truck full of duckies and assorted guests and patients from the Child Development Center. The head of the parade surely will reach the McCully Street Bridge before the last marchers have left the starting line, the McCully Shopping Center parking lot. So if you like parades, but don't want to spend a long time watching one, join in at 8:30 a.m. Saturday. Place ducky bets, too.
WE talked about the Big Isle's salute to Hawaiian cowboys coming up on Memorial Day, but you don't have to wait to watch paniolo in action. The unique paniolo tradition will be celebrated at the Molokai Ranch Hawaiian Heritage Rodeo this weekend. The competition will include bronc riding, bull riding, double mugging (which has nothing to do with O.J. Simpson) wahine steer undecorating (which sounds a bit risque) and keiki barrel racing. The annual rodeo is tomorrow and Saturday at the Maunaloa Arena and you can get more info by calling 552-2741 on Molokai ...
Kimo McVay
AS he does each St. Patrick's Day, Kimo McVay came out of piano bar retirement to play tunes at Columbia Inn. "Knuckles," as he's understandably called when playing piano, was at first upset when one customer broke his large snifter "tip jar" until he found out it happened while the guy was stuffing a $20 tip into it. All was immediately forgiven ...
LeslieWilcox
SPEAKING of morning news, Channel 2's maintains a huge lead over the other stations in the market with the always pleasant Leslie Wilcox. This despite news partner Ron Mizutani daily stumbling over words on his TelePrompTer (dyslexia? poor eyesight?) such as when he said, "Those injected with or infected with HIV..." A poor cover to a glaring mistake. Then there was stockbroker Jay Itagaki yesterday talking about the vernal equinox, pronouncing it like "heck-win-ox" instead of "eek-quinn-ox." Even that early in the morning, it's like rubbing fingernails on a chalk board as far as I'm concerned. And as for reporter Mary Zanakis, the least we can expect is for her to put on her microphone before she starts talking. Is that too much to ask? ...
