I won! I WON!!!

Aloha.

So, on a recent and wonderful trip to Hawaii generously provided by my employer my wife and I stop by Hilo Hattie's.

Hilo Hattie's is a warehouse type facility that sells cheesy Hawaiianish trinkets, probably made in China. As you can imagine, this line item on our itinerary was not suggested by me. Sue actually bought a hula dancer doll to place on the dashboard of her Jeep. I am not making this up.

Anyway, as we are making our way through Hattie's throwing all kinds of crap in our cart we walk by a jewelry kiosk hosted by Maui Divers (Motto "We dive for credit cards"). A nice young man comes up with a bowl full of matching keys. "Pick a key" he says "and see if you have won!".

Sure, why not.

Sue picks her key and tries to unlock the padlock on the miniature treasure chest (probably made in China). No luck.

You would think that I'd be bright enough to walk away at this point, wouldn't you?

I try my key, and it unlocks the padlock! Hurray! I've won ..... something....

The nice young man, let's call him Pretty Tenacious Barnum, opens the miniature treasure chest and pulls out an attractive little jewelry pouch. In the pouch is a pearl! WOW!! I've won a pearl for my wife and, according to Barnum, it will only cost me seven bucks. Not bad!

And then I start to cry.

I didn't KNOW I was crying until my tears started splashing off of my credit card.

Credit card?!?! Where did THAT come from? I thought it was safely tucked away in my wallet. I guess I was struck by salesman's instinct and just (instinctively) pulled out my credit card.

Barnum drills a hole in the pearl and starts to show Sue some nice settings.

I turn to the guy behind me who was watching this whole story unfold and say "This seven dollar pearl is going to cost me an arm and a leg". He says "Yup", turns around and runs away. I tried to follow him but he kept pushing me away. I wandered back to the jewelry kiosk to review the damage, damp credit card in hand.

Sue has picked out a nice setting and Barnum has expertly glued the pearl in place. Looks nice.

THEN Barnum, sensing a professional sucker, hands me ANOTHER bowl with two oysters in it. He says "Tap one and see if you have won anything else!".

Bite me, Barnum.

However, having already reached the point of no return, I tap the one with the freshest looking rubber band holding it closed. Barnum "pries" opens the oyster and out pop TWO MORE PEARLS!!! Who could have imagined?

Barnum looks surprised and says "Two pearls! TWO PEARLS! That's amazing. Why, you could make ...." and as he pauses for dramatic affect I blurt out "... MATCHING EARRINGS!!!". Barnum looks a little disappointed that I've stolen his thunder, but quickly recovers. He fires up the drill. My guess is that once Barnum has actually drilled a pearl you are under some sort of legal obligation to buy it. He was pretty fast on that drill. Sue picks out the matching studs and glue is once again applied.

In the end my lovely wife brought home from Hawaii a nice pearl pendent with matching pearl ear rings. The whole thing only cost me seven dollars, plus $243 cover charge and floor show.

Good show, Barnum.

Mahalo.