I was sitting in my recliner marveling at how easy the Internet and computer technology have made it to project ourselves into the universe.

The next thing I knew I was turning on the previously unused camera and microphone built into my laptop computer and recording a video preview of my column in the Opinion section of today’s Advertiser, “Tongue in cheek — Legislature in review.”

It took only a few clicks on the software included with my computer to do some rudimentary editing of the project and upload it to YouTube, leaving an indelible record of my existence in the online universe.

You can view the result by clicking the “play” arrow in the screen below.

The effort proves mainly that I’ll never be a threat to Joe Moore or Andy Rooney; I have a face made for radio and a voice made for print.

If any of the joke writers who pen the bills for the Legislature or the Lingle administration care to film a video retort to my friendly barbs, I’d be delighted to link to their response.

[youtube 4qCXtZyyTJM]

If math and reading scores ever improve in Hawai’i public schools, it’ll probably come from an initiative totally outside the box of ideas we’ve debated in recent years about school funding, management and governance.

One of the most promising proposals is for a significantly greater investment in preschools that prepare children to learn, and the Legislature’s “Keiki First Steps” bill is a welcome start.

Senate Bill 2878, up for a final vote in both houses today, provides $250,000 to establish a state council on early learning to govern an expanded preschool system for Hawai’i — one of the few states that hasn’t already done this.

The money barely makes a dent in the $10.5 million it would cost to actually begin services or the $170 million over 10 years it would cost to run a system for the 20,000 3- and 4-year-olds who could benefit; it’ll take innovative public-private partnerships to raise that kind of money in this economy.

But it’s a commitment to a concept that the Legislature’s Early Learning Educational Task Force, Aloha United Way and the University of Hawai’i have all said could go a long way toward improving student achievement in our public schools.

The thinking seems sound: If more children enter kindergarten better prepared to learn, they’ll learn more and early gains in the lower grades will work through the higher grades as the preschool kids move through the system.

The $250,000 is a modest step, but an important one, and sponsors such as House Education Chairman Roy Takumi deserve credit for getting something started in a tight budget year.

I was heading home to Kailua from Pearlridge Friday and was trying to figure out if it would be more convenient to stop at Home Depot near Pearl Highlands or go to the Iwilei store.

When I got on Kamehameha Highway, I tried to judge the distance to Pearl Highlands by looking for the nearby high-rises, but these twin buildings that usually stick out like corn silos in Iowa were impossible to see in the vog that had drifted to O’ahu from Kilauea Volcano on the Big Island.

Back on the Windward side, I could barely make out the faintest outline of the Koolaus from Castle Junction. After the rain clouds rolled in and combined with the volcanic haze, it looked like an noxious alien atmosphere out of Star Trek.

This is scary stuff. I lived in Hilo for many years and seldom saw sustained vog this thick from my home less than 30 miles from the vent. I can imagine what it was like on the Big Island over the past week as Kona winds kept the haze over populated areas in Hilo, Puna and Ka’u instead of blowing it out to sea.

The scary thing is that much of the sulfur dioxide and ash is coming from a relatively small fissure in Halema’uma’u Crater at Kilauea’s summit; imagine what we could be facing if a much larger fissure opened.

Geologists have little experience with this kind of explosive activity at Kilauea that has seldom occurred in modern times. They really don’t know what could happen.

The volcanic fumes have already caused short-term evacuations of the national park and nearby subdivisions, and the longer it lasts the more potential for the foul air to affect the public health, agriculture and tourism.

There’s nothing we can do to turn off the volcano, but it would be prudent to make contingency plans to deal with the broad impact.

“We haven’t seen the full range of activity for Kilauea, and it may be uncomfortable, and it may be uncomfortable for quite a while,” said Don Thomas of the Center for the Study of Active Volcanoes at the University of Hawai’i-Hilo.

Fellow blogger Larry Geller thought it important that readers of the Jewish-Buddhist poem I posted yesterday know that the word “bupkis” is of Russian/Slavik origin and means “goat droppings.”

“It adds yet another layer to the zen,” he said.

I’ll leave you to digest that while I go look for news that amused and confused in Hawai’i’s week that was:

• Two pilots walked away unharmed after their twin engine aircraft made a belly landing at Honolulu Airport and went up in flames. They were demonstrating the likely conclusion of this year’s Legislature.

• Former UH football coach June Jones got athletic director Herman Frazier fired when he left for SMU, and now he’s using Frazier as his alibi for stiffing UH on $400,000 he owes for skipping out early on his contract. Jones always did get class confused with crass.

• The U.S. Energy Department will fund research in Hawai’i to find more efficient ways to distribute electricity. If they really want to spread the juice, they should send it out with transit contracts.

• The Hawai’i County Council voted to make Big Island beaches smoke-free. I’m curious how they’ll enforce that at the new Puna beaches where smoldering Kilauea lava is still pouring into the sea.

• New photos are providing local scientists with their best look ever at secretive subterranean shrimps. I’m surprised it’s taken so long to get cameras into legislative chambers.

• The union is defending two go! airlines pilots fired for falling asleep on a flight to Hilo and overshooting the airport. What, they couldn’t hear the alarm clock over the engine noise?

• Two families are bickering furiously over which of their boys gets to keep a jersey that soccer star David Beckham gave them after an Aloha Stadium match. Sounds like these parents are training their kids to serve on the City Council.

• The Army has decided not to remove Cold War-era radioactive waste found at Schofield Barracks. That’s one way to make sure the new Stryker Brigade gets glowing reviews.

• Costco and Sam’s Club are limiting rice purchases because of short supplies. Talk about a fuel shortage. What’s next, mashed potato musubi at the snack bars?

• Hawai’i has one of the lowest rates of entrepreneurial activity in the country, a study says. Could that have anything to do with having the highest rate of government jobs?

And the quote of the week …

… from Mike Hamasu of Colliers Monroe Friedlander on O’ahu’s slumping office rentals:

“In the last six quarters, we’ve had five quarters of negative absorption. That’s not a positive sign.”

Can we infer that the one quarter of positive absorption was not a negative sign?

Somebody sent me a small collection of Buddhist-Jewish poems and one of the bits of combined wisdom from two of my favorite faiths really hit home with my mood of the moment:

Zen is not easy.
It takes effort to attain nothingness.
And then what do you have?
Bupkis.

I invite you to meditate on these words that leave me without anything else I can think of to say today — a situation I hope will change before I join Jerry Burris this afternoon for a discussion of local politics and the Legislature on Town Square with Beth-Ann Kozlovich at 5 p.m. on KIPO 89.3FM.