Konabish's photostream  

Retired Fire Captain in California.
love exploring and beachcombing.
I've spent a lot of time in Hawaii (Big Island, Maui
and Kauai).
enjoy meeting new friends
and I'm interested in many things.

I'm very very fortunate that good people have done things for me that positively influenced my life.
I'll never forget this. We all might want to stop and think about that once in awhile.
I've had the very good fortune to have many memorable experiences.

I've flown in a
Pitts S-2A Stunt Plane
Ford Tri-Motor
B-17G Flying Fortress "Nine-O-Nine"
B-24J Liberator 'Witchcraft' aka 'Dragon And His Tail'. She's my girl, only flying B-24J in the world.

I have been incredibly fortunate to have skydived solo, scuba-dived with sharks, and witnessed a volcanic eruption with no other human within 40 miles.

I love cats, including the big cats, especially cheetahs. I hope to see them "live" in Africa. I have great Karma with dogs; I don't have one because it wouldn't be fair to leave it while I'm gone for weeks. Animals are some of my best friends.

My Dad was a Naval Aviator from 1941 to 1955, when he was lost in the crash of his bomber. That history has partly influenced an interest in old military aircraft, especially WWII bombers and fighters, and flying in them is a thrilling experience.

I've always liked videography and photography; digital photography fits me very well. I've always taken numerous shots of each subject, and now I can do it to my heart's delight!

My Flickr name konabish: comes from....
Kona, an awesome place on the Big Island of Hawaii, plus
Bish a nickname my brother firefighters gave me based on my last name of Bishop.

I was a career firefighter, never in the military. I almost surely would have been drafted in 1964 just after turning 18, but my dad had died in the service, making me a sole-surviving son, pretty much assuring no draft.. I have always had mixed feelings, somewhat guilty, along with feeling the loss of having had that experience and camaraderie. BUT it was primetime Viet Nam. My only real exposure was being a US Marine Corps "Devil Pup" at Camp Pendleton in California for 2 weeks. "Back then" (1959 - I was just shy of my 14th birthday), the Devil Pups LIVED AS USMC recruits in Basic Training (It's nowhere the same now): I fired an M-16 rifle (had the purple thumb to show I didn't move fast enough after loading the clip!), and even a 105mm howitzer. I ran into the tripwire of a (dummy) mine, and did push-ups on pea-gravel at O-dark-thirty with my mattress on my back (along with my entire squad, after someone was talking after "lights-out". I did love it. All except sitting in a quonset hut in the stifling heat, watching USMC B&W film of WWII invasions of the Pacific Islands. If you nodded off (I did), you had to stand at attention on a table in the back of the room.

Still it left good feelings. As did the memory of my dad, a US Naval Aviator, and the ships and aircraft i'd see as a part of being his son. But what really endeared me to the Marines was finding the USMC Sgt who was in charge of my dad's crash site in 1955 in Naples, Italy. Talking to him, I felt a strong sense that he treated that assignment in very a respectful and honorable manner. Semper-fi, JJ.

A very timely and worthwhile group that I support is the INJURED MARINE SEMPER-FI FUND http://www.charitynavigator.org/index.cfm?bay=search.summary&orgid=11708