friday night: got myself some nice free pots and pans from a nice guy named joe on craiglist.
saturday morning: dragged myself out of bed to go do a shift for the national save the sea turtle foundation at their oceanfest booth. while i'm on that subject, you can join the foundation for only $20 and get a $12 visor for free! go join! or sponsor a turtle nest!
when i finished "working", ed met me to check the 'fest out. byron was supposed to meet us but went to the wrong location, etc. so we walked around by ourselves. i got some nice little free scuba magazines, stickers, postcards, and bought some ADORABLE SEA TURTLE EARRINGS (see upper right) and a necklace. then ed bought me a a guy harvey print of sea turtles - thank you, baby!!!
we also met this awesome artist named patrick chevallier, a crazy little frenchman, whose stuff i had admired in world watersports but is way too expensive for me. someday, though, i will get a grouper or a sea turtle or something. admire for free - his website.
patrick chevallier grouper
my new turty print.
now i have to learn which is which!
then we met up with his friend ted from russia by way of new york.
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COOL STORY.
ted used to work with ed when ed lived in nyc. apparently ted wasn't legal at the time. so to be able to pay him, ed's company expensed ted as furniture. TED WAS FURNITURE.
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i had too many drinks with ted and his russian doll of a girlfriend and then went home to lay on the couch and whimper for the rest of the day about my beer- & margarita-induced headache. and had ice cream for dinner.
today we went to shark valley with ernie & cyndi. I OF COURSE LEFT MY CAMERA BATTERY AT WORK. but it was my first time at that part of the everglades and completley awesome.
the trail.
we saw roughtly 768,007 alligators, bunches of turtles, and lots of birds and their goony baby birds. it was a 15-mile bike ride and hella windy on the way back, so we were pretty winded by th etime we got back to the car (ha ha) but it was GREAT.
poor softshell turtles are just so ugly.
the lookout tower was AWESOME. we could see the gators and the birds and huge turtles swimming everywhere.
this is the observation tower.
a highlight was when we saw a baby alligator on one side of the trail. i got off my bike and ooh'd and ahh'd at it for a few minutes, then ed pointed to the other side of the trail, where lay a mama alligator and her ten or so babies. that one i didn't get so close to, but it was absolutely awesome.
baby alligator!
now i'm home and totally pooped.
