FlaSoxxJim

QUOTE (Rowand44 @ Oct 27, 2010 -> 02:21 AM) I'm struggling real hard this year to come up with a costume because mine the last 2 years have been so damn good. It's actually starting to drive me crazy. What's everyone else going as? For the last several years Halloween has been all about the kids and making sure they have fun. Prior to that, my girlfriend/fiance'/wife and I had a multi-year string of winning the best costume awards at our friends' Halloween parties until we were finally outright banned from entering the competitions. Halloween has always been a very serious matter at Casa de FlaSoxx.

QUOTE (knightni @ Oct 25, 2010 -> 07:02 PM) American Werewolf in London is one of the dumbest horror movies that I've ever seen. You can Go To Hell, You can go Straight To Hell!! Screw You Guys, I'm going home. American Werewolf in London is a classic. It is certainly the best Rick Baker makeup effects of that decade and worth considering for that fact alone. It also has the psychological element with David never sure what he's imagining and what is real, with all of his victims including his best friend showing up to chat with him. The "all moon" classic rock soundtrack is pure genius (i.e., Bad Moon Rising, Moondance, two versions of Blue Moon, etc.). Plus Nurse Alex (Jenny Agutter) was very hot when I saw this film as a young red-blooded teenager. As a bonus, the film stand as the only thing "The Dr. Pepper Guy" ever did besides being "The Dr. Pepper Guy".

QUOTE (knightni @ Oct 26, 2010 -> 11:57 PM) Can't we just say that boobies in general, rock? Do you want me to call you Beavis or Butthead?

QUOTE (SoxFan1 @ Oct 26, 2010 -> 08:56 PM) The starter in my car died today. This sucks. Call the local junk yards and auto salvage places. I had a dead starter on my 2001 Saturn replaced with a salvaged starter for 1/4 the cost of a new unit.

QUOTE (BigSqwert @ Oct 26, 2010 -> 02:41 PM) Did you see any half man, half monkeys? I did not. Is this an obtuse pop culture reference I'm not up on?? QUOTE (BigSqwert @ Oct 26, 2010 -> 02:42 PM) Also, what are your thoughts that the Galapagos is becoming bombarded with too much tourism which it could be, or already is, affecting the islands? The national park service tightly regulates the number of annual visitors, but the truth is it 10x more heavily visited now than 25 years ago. Certainly, there is a concern about the potential impacts of visitors. That said, we touristas are only allowed access to a very small, well marked and well policed portion of the islands. Further, you must be accompanied by a trained naturalist and you have to be off most of the islands by sunset and are not allowed to overnight. The truth is that eco-tourists bring a HUGE amount of money to the islands and to Ecuador as a whole. A lot of that money goes to research, conservation, and education and that is not a revenue stream they want to do without so they will continue to try to do a balancing act.

Blue-Footed Boobies Rock!

Gastric distress is funny when it's someone else.

QUOTE (Milkman delivers @ Oct 26, 2010 -> 09:33 AM) How many clubs did it take to bring that sea lion down? I did have a good sized bull male chase me away from his girlfriends a couple of days into the trip. I was told the big boys shouldn't be messed with during breeding season.

QUOTE (BigEdWalsh @ Oct 26, 2010 -> 09:30 AM) Wow. I really enjoyed the facebook pictures. Thanks for making them available for our viewing! That had to be quite the experience. And the pics that are up are just day 1 of the trip! Stay tuned while I work my through the rest of the trip photos. Yes, it really was a great trip.

OK, here's some quick background on the trip. It was not a scientific research trip in any way, although I did get to play naturalist in Darwin's playground. I had the good fortune to be selected as the scientist-guide for a group of individuals making a Galapagos trip as part of my institute's "Friends" program — basically a booster or alumni type member program with enough adventurous and financially well off members to mount these sorts of trips once a year or so. The group I brought out consisted of 10 people not counting myself, and we joined a group totaling 93 travelers aboard the gorgeous National Geographic Endeavor for an expedition led by Lindblad Expeditions. We flew out of Miami the afternoon of Friday 10/15 and reached Quito Ecuador high up in the Andies in about 4 hours. After a quick layover we continued to the lowland town of Guayaquil Ecuador where we spent the night before heading out to Galapagos on Saturday morning. The Galapagos archipelago is located about 600 miles west of mainland Ecuador. An air flight of about 90 minutes brought us to the island of Baltra located in the middle of the archipelago. We spent very little time on Baltra before being picked up by inflatable Zodiacs to head out to the Endeavor anchored offshore, but the tiny island has an interesting history that includes serving as a US military base duing and after WWII. The island is also interesting in that it is the result of tectonic uplift and it is not an old shield volcano like the larger low islands of the central and eastern archipelago. We made shore trips, Zodiac runs, and snorkeling trips to different locations on and around various islands for the next week, returning every evening to this wonderful vessel.

A couple of SoxTalkers expressed an interest in a recap of my just finished up trip to Galapagos. I'm more than happy to share some thoughts and images of this trip for those who are interested, and I'll do so here in this thread over the next couple of weeks or for as long as anybody cares. It will probably come as a surprise to nobody — but the place was TOTALLY amazing. I could have spent a year there and not seen enough of it. I'll post selected photos here but I'm up against upload space limits so I'll probably limit myself to links to images I post offsite. I'm posting a lot more on FaceBook and the public link is http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2551...mp;l=5cfb942f19. I already posted about 3o images from the first day of the trip — a shore excursion to the small central island of North Seymour. Take a look if you are interested — photos include sea lions, iguanas, boobies (heh heh), frigate birds, and others. I'll put up a very quick introduction to the Galapagos archipelago, its location, geology, age, etc. here in a bit. To whet your appetite, here's a sea lion pup we encountered on the first day. What a cutie!

QUOTE (NIUSox @ Oct 25, 2010 -> 09:46 PM) The marine iguanas that are there snort out excess salt. I just happened to watch a BBC documentary on Galapagos a couple of days ago. It was pretty sweet. Going there would be one of my dreams, to walk in the islands that contributed so much to biology and our understanding of life. I caught some excellent up-close video of the marine iguanas snorting their briny snot. I'll get it up on YouTube over the next couple days/weeks and post a link.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Oct 25, 2010 -> 11:28 AM) How was the turtle soup? Let's just say I couldn't find a bowl big enough to find out.

QUOTE (Milkman delivers @ Oct 25, 2010 -> 12:34 PM) Were there dragons out there, Flaxx? Indeed there were dragons. Both land and sea variety. Here's the land variety from North Seymour in the central islands.

QUOTE (kapkomet @ Oct 24, 2010 -> 05:37 PM) I'd like to hear about your trip if you get some time. I'll be more than happy to oblige you. I think I'll start a trip photo thread in a day or two once I've had a chance to catch my breath.

QUOTE (kapkomet @ Oct 24, 2010 -> 05:37 PM) I'd like to hear about your trip if you get some time. I'll be more than happy to oblige you. I think I'll start a trip photo thread in a day or two once I've had a chance to catch my breath.

Back in the states, heading home from my Galapagos adventures. What an unbelievable place! Glad to see y'all didn't wreck the joint while I was gone.

On a bus heading to Miami airport. Will be in Ecuador in about 12 hours and in Galapagos this time tomorrow. See you guys in 10 days. Don't trash the place while I'm gone!

Boggle and Scrabble you say? I'm glad you didn't say Scrabble and Boggle.

You don't say. . .

QUOTE (Milkman delivers @ Oct 12, 2010 -> 12:40 PM) I watched Spinal Tap for the first time yesterday. I enjoyed it, but it was again one of those movies that I can tell was a whole lot funnier when it first came out. Very few movies stay hilarious between generations. Hilarious when it first came out for sure. And I saw it at the right time at the right age and it's one of my favorite films.

Radical religioso as cereal spokesperson. . . go figure.

"Hot Thick Steak Chili" sounds like rich drunk housewife code for Pablo the Pool Boy.

I think hotspots and triple junctions and Nazca and Cocos Plates. . . it's all Greek to me but I'm looking forward to taking it all in.

Fernandina is the youngest and westernmost island in the Galapagos archipelago and is still volcanically active. I should be there one week from Wednesday.