Drag racers are different. Maybe I should say that “motorheads” exhibit personality traits that aren’t typical of the population. Vacations, nice furniture, expensive clothing, and bars typically are eschewed by those of us afflicted by the quarter mile bug.

Until very recently, I was four-for-four (sounds like I’m stuttering) in those areas.

During my nearly 11 years in the elevator trade, I believe that I took maybe 10 total days off to visit my relatives back east. All the rest of my vacation days went to racing. As a matter of fact, I actually didn’t take any days off that weren’t necessary. I usually cashed the days in for extra pay, and THAT went to racing! Sound familiar, guys? All you need to change that is a good woman.

Jenna and I decided to take a trip to Hawaii back in 2005, a real-live vacation. Her father Bill and his wife Joan have a time-share in Ko’olina on Oahu, and she had been once before in ’04.

Anyway, we were to go the week following the Dallas national event, where I was driving Dexter Tuttle’s Top Fueler. Long story short, the race was postponed due to the hurricanes, as was my vacation. We would have gone in ’06, but by then Jenna was five months pregnant and it didn’t seem like a good idea. If you do the math, Jason was eight months old by November ’07, and THAT didn’t seem like a good idea.

2008 was the year, so off we went on a bona fide vacation. In addition to Bill and Joan, Leia and Eric (Jenna’s step-sister and brother-in-law) brought their son Jack. I think we’ll wait until Jason is a few years older before we head over next time.

I definitely want to go back to Hawaii, just not with an infant. Before you conclude that Jason misbehaved, he was great. It just isn’t a “vacation” planning everything around his schedule and needs.

Our first day, Saturday, was greeted with rain, so we took the kids to the aquarium to look at all of the beautiful sea creatures that now live in glass cages (okay, I’m being a bit sarcastic … it was a cool trip).

Sunday we hung out around the hotel, taking the kids to the pool and to the protected lagoon at the beach. I love my son more every day, and he and dad enjoyed our swim time together immensely.

Jason and his cousin Jack then hung out by the water geyser in the pool and played with their sand toys. Jack is tall and thinner, and Jason definitely isn’t. Our little man is plump and proud of it. While at the beach he met his newest buddy Nathan, and even helped me bury Nathan up to his neck. How come kids don’t mind having sand EVERYWHERE on their body, including in the mouth, face, and buttcrack? It drives me nuts just having a crumb on my face. Wouldn’t it be cool if we adults had no sense of pride or embarrassment, just like the kids? (Jenna might tell you otherwise about me, but I behaved long enough to convince her to marry me).

Eric and Bill went out fishing, hoping to catch something we could have for dinner. Hell, they brought back enough to feed the whole town!

Bill reeled in a 400-pound Marlin while the rest of the guys assisted and cheered him on (that’s Latin for “drank beer and yelled”). Apparently the rule on sport fishing is that the person who hooks the fish has to man the reel until the fish is pulled aboard. Who came up with that stupid rule? I know, I know, it’s part of the “essence” of fishing ... the pride of accomplishment. I say tell that to Bill when he couldn’t move for the next two days. To hell with regulations, someone better help me if I’m pulling on more than 15 pounds of fish!

I’m not sure how I got volunteered for the job, but after the mighty Marlin was offloaded, measured and weighed, you typically do one of two things: stuff and mount them, or cut them up, smoke them (I don’t mean like a cigarette, I’m talking about cooking) and eat them. If you choose the latter, the bill (the long pointy thing on the front of the fish, like a gigantic proboscis) is cut off and eventually given as a trophy to the poor bastard that had to spend 90 minutes of hell strapped to a fishing pole because his buddies wouldn’t help him. If it’s me in the chair, keep your Ibuprofen, keep the snout on the fish, and for God’s sake, HELP ME!

Anyway, I got to hold the poor fella’s (the fish, not Bill) nose while it was hack-sawed off. I have to be honest: the “caveman” part of me felt a primitive force (I’m talking about an influence or power, not the 14-time Funny Car champ). Suddenly I felt like one of the crew and had an urge to put zinc oxide on my nose, unbutton the front of my shirt, and pop open a bottle of Corona!

Monday was the day! Eric and I were going to surf the big waves of the North Shore. Okay, truth be told there isn’t anyway you’re getting me out on a 15-foot wave. I’ve done 10, maybe 11 feet, and that was more than enough to get my respect. I just want something in the 4-7 foot range with good shape (that was my criteria for girlfriends, also), and Monday should have been the day! Or not. Two feet and mediocre wasn’t what I had pictured for the North Shore on my first trip there. At least Jason and Jack got to practice their surfing, albeit on the beach.

After we had spent about two hours at Hale Iwa, we loaded up the gals and babies and headed east to see if any of the legendary spots like Sunset, Pipeline, or Waimea Bay looked decent. Though a bad day surfing is still good, driving that distance and renting boards left us feeling a little flat, pardon the pun. Apparently all of the beach-partying had worn out the little guys, as they slept like logs all the way back to the hotel.

I really wanted to see the Arizona Memorial, so we packed up the little guy (I should say we took him with us, as that sounded like we folded him and boxed him up with that shipping “popcorn”) and headed over.

The Missouri, perhaps the most famous battleship of all time, is also on permanent display in the harbor. That tour will have to wait for next trip (see earlier comments about taking a 20-month-old on vacation). I didn’t realize what reverence the employees treat the Arizona sight with, and I was impressed. After all, it is the final resting place for 1,102(!) of our finest, so all the respect given to a cemetery is expected while viewing the ship.

Lest you think we were on hiatus from our Capitol crusade, let me allay your fears. Number 22 is now crossed off our list. At the risk of pissing off the Hawaiians (and that’s tough to do), it wasn’t impressive at all. In fact, when I’m elected governor of the islands, I have a proclamation ready to go. Any building over three stories tall built between 1968 and 1979 will have to be renovated or replaced. Hawaii is so beautiful; unfortunately the majority of tall buildings were built during that timeframe where aesthetics took a backseat.

Just what the heck were architects smoking in that era? (I think I know the answer, it was just a rhetorical question).

I tried to find a flattering angle of the Honolulu Capitol to capture with the camera, and this really is the only one that I could come up with. This is Queen Lili’uokalani staring at the building in a mild state of bewilderment. The queen’s palace next door actually served as the State House from 1959 (Hawaii’s statehood) until they could erect an unimpressive building next door, and boy did they! The palace is very elegant and stately looking, and next trip will include a tour.

Unfortunately we were cutting into Jason’s nap time during this portion of the day, so I had to run around and take pictures while Jenna stayed in the car with “sleeping beauty”. Yep, too young for the vacation thing.

One of the best parts of my “job” is all of you. I really am flattered and appreciative of all the great people that stop by the pits. I apologize if I can’t visit with everyone, but the pace can get pretty hectic at the races. I am continually surprised at how many of you actually read my blog, and I have made several new friends “at the ropes.”

Two of those folks are Jerome and Cassie, and I was able to have lunch with them during the trip. Jerome played tight end at the U of H, and currently works for Hawaiian Airlines and is also a massage therapist. Cassie is an esthetician, which is Latin for, “one who makes women look better” (come to think of it, that’s also what a bartender does).

Jerome’s house is probably a quarter mile from the University, and about the same (I wonder why everything is “about a quarter-mile” to me, and perhaps now I should go by the 1000-foot distance) from Pearl Harbor. We took a photo of the three of us by one of the anchors from the Arizona, which weighs 15,800 pounds, or just over six Funny Cars.

`We did Thanksgiving on Wednesday so we could spend the day Thursday at Waikiki. Bill and Joan did an amazing job with the turkey dinner, especially when you consider that we were basically staying at a hotel.

Thursday we headed out to get some of those predictably fun waves in Waikiki (I think that’s Latin for “tall, ugly buildings”). Problem is, they weren’t. I mean the waves, not the buildings. The buildings were ugly, and the waves sort of were, too.

Jason loved playing with his mother in the water, and he would just make a break for the ocean every time he could. Though he’s carrying some girth around the midsection, he’s no match for even the small shorebreak waves, so we really had to be careful and stay with him. I don’t ever want him to feel traumatized at the beach, like my friend Rich does when I kick his butt on the waves!

So there you go, Hawaii in 1717 words or less!

When we got home we did our second Thanksgiving, this time with my brother Ted and Cindy coming over. Cindy cooked another great turkey, and Jason insisted on helping his grandmother stuff the bird (that sounds odd). He’s braver than I, that’s for sure. Not only will you not see me straining for hours to reel in a huge fish, I absolutely won’t be caught shoving soggy bread up a bird’s butt without a gun to my head!

I began this column bragging about how I don’t vacation, don’t have nice furniture, don’t dress expensively, and don’t hang out in bars, and here I’ve described an honest-to-God vacation. While I’m confessing, let me come clean on the furniture deal: We just ordered a brand new sectional, and it wasn’t exactly cheap. In my defense, I kicked and screamed the entire time, but eventually acquiesced to my lovely wife.

Jenna has been so great a wife and mom, and she told me that’s all she wants for Christmas AND her birthday (December 31st). She deserves more (on the husband end, too), so I green-lighted the new couch. However, when she phoned me last month from Lazy-Boy and told me she found the perfect setup for $3,100, I had to put my foot down. Remember, I chopped down that “money tree” out back, and I haven’t worked in Pomona at the drag race school since March, the last day of operations there. Besides, the couch and loveseat that I bought a mere 16 years ago are holding up fine, and who cares if there are pink accents in the fabric?

Surprisingly she found a much better deal at Jennifer Convertibles, and the new stuff is on order. Oh, well. I will go on the record swearing that before I got married I certainly didn’t have any nice furniture. Plus, I still don’t dress nice (unless you count my DSR uniforms) or hang out in bars or clubs (not even the nudie ones!) I’m still a motorhead, even if I’ll soon be sitting on a nice couch and planning another vacation.

I have a lot more to catch you up with since getting home, but that will have to wait until next blog or this will end up as another novel, and Tolstoy I am not.

Aloha!