THINGS I'VE LEARNED ON VACATION

Greetings from lovely Kona, Hawaii. I'm here until the 30th, enjoying the sun, reading, swimming in the warm comfort of the Pacific.

Here are a few things I've learned since I left Bethesda:

• The Satanic Verses is a beautiful and troubling novel, but you shouldn't start reading it while you're on an airplane. Thus, it joins two other excellent-novels-not-for-airplane-reading: Lost Horizon and Fight Club.


• Kona is not Waikiki


• Kona's charms are less easily accessed than the charms of Waikiki, but they are charms nonetheless. On Christmas I saw two whales frolicking off of the beach at the Old Airport State Park. Beautiful.


• Noel Kent's Hawaii, Islands under the Influence is a good read.

At any rate, I'm having a beautiful time here with Anita and her family. Hope your holidays are going well.