Musings from an overworked translator

Aloha! May 29, 2012

As predicted, as soon as I go on vacation it seems like my clients realize they need me. The first day I had several requests and am averaging about one a day. I’ve accepted two small jobs that I was easily able to squeeze in at night (including one 6 a.m. phone call this morning), but for the most part I have been sightseeing and getting burnt to a crisp. I guess the solution to being underworked is to go on vacation. I am recharging my batteries and looking forward to starting a new marketing campaign when I get back. I also received a tempting contract job offer, which I am seriously considering applying for.

In the meantime I have spent my days swimming in coves and beaches, hiking to out-of-the-way places and scenic overlooks, and relaxing. I’ve been burned to a crisp, started peeling, and have now reburned the fresh skin under the peeling skin. The first few days were spent on the island of Molokai, a 38 by 10 mile island that is considered to be Old Hawaii. Life there is slow and very, very basic. The highlights for me were the unspoiled beauty and the live slack key guitar/ukelele music and hula dancing we enjoyed several times. We flew on a tiny 9-seater plane to Kona on the Big Island on Saturday afternoon (they weigh your luggage and then put you and your carry-ons on the scale to calculate load and balance the plane). We spent the entire day yesterday exploring the west and north coasts of the Big Island (including the breathtaking Hapuna Beach) and had a fabulous meal in a little town called Hawi. Tomorrow night we are doing an evening sunset dinner cruise on a glass bottomed boat to see the marine life and maybe do a little dancing. We head to Hilo on Friday, where I plan to hole up in a posh hotel and enjoy some alone time as well as visit the volcano lava flows and fly over it on a helicopter. Hope you all are having a great week too.

Have the Top 100 Language Blog awards run their course? May 20, 2012

I received a reminder the other day that my blog had been nominated, but it just occurred to me that I had completely forgotten all about it – and none of the other language blogs I follow have even mentioned the awards either. Bravo, fellow bloggers, for seeing the awards as a way for a website to get a ton of hits without having any substance behind it and not trolling for votes this year.