When in Hawaii...

1. Turn off your phone

2. Head straight for Honolulu and book a room at Hilton Beach Resort. Rainbow Tower is rad because it has a lagoon view and is closest to the food. Also, the beach. If you’re coming in around midday on a Friday, you might catch an indigenous meal and smile at the boy drinking POG by the palm tree. Ask your driver if Hawaii likes to party and witness an emphatic string of positives: Yes, yeah, yeaaah, aloha!

3. Curl up under beach towels with fireworks blazing in the sky. Your jet lag will kick in first thing the next morning, but it’s worth it. Rinse, repeat, rinse, repeat. Aloha forever.

4. Try your first shrimp taco (I knowwwww) and add shrimp and garlic to your grocery list pronto. Also, google food trucks on the island. (This one’s the winner for now!)

5. Stake out a spot on Sunset Beach, stay there forever. Do not leave. Sitting in the swaying hammock with warm toes, you’ll feel like you did when you were 19 in Cancun, which is never a bad thing to feel.

6. Learn many things; remember two: (1) everything is sand, (2) except for love.

To my sweet, loving, committed to work kids Preslee and Max – that couldn't come this time, there's always next time, next time.