May 10, 2008 Ship of Thieves! Stealing the Magic..AGAIN!!! Panama Canal FL to CA!!! Part 2

[nskjerven]

If there is a group working on it then it would be ok. But I figured that our group is up to 300 or more. To save on the price you need to order 500. So with that and the laminated pouch someone would have to put up front about $500+. I have the website where we got ours from for the TA cruise. I think a group of us went in and each paid about $30 and considered it our gift. I think it would be too confusing to try and get every person to send in a small amount. I can give someone the website if they need it.

I like that idea, I'd act as the front person if a few of us can pool $ together that would be great. I just don't have the time for the leg work on what to order these days.

 

[tink1963]

It's not a factory! You go to a roadside hut(shack or what ever you want to call it). You are outside and they show you the plants that they make it from and show you how they make it. It reminds me of how you would make moonshine. No government regulations that I know of. It is definitely worth seeing. You do get samples of 3 or 4 types of tequila.

We did this exact tour when we cruised with Disney in 05. Gydell's description is pretty right on. I would have to disagree with the government regulations. Tequila making is a highly regulated process. Only a couple of states in Mexico are allowed to manufacture tequila. For example, if you were to go to Mazatlan and do their Tequila, Saddles and Sandals tour, the factory you go to can't actually call what they produce tequila.The place in PV is not an actual factory. They have the agave plants all around. More or less they show you how it was processed many years ago. I will dig up some of the pictures from this excursion for you to check out.

 

[gydell]

that is why I was thinking safety in numbers. I am not sure she was lost, I think she thought she was going somewhere with those boys, I really think they had something to do with it.

She was so drunk she didn't know where she was much less where she was going! Her friends said they started drinking around 8am and drank all day and then went to Carlos and Charlies. It will be one of the 1st things you see when you get off the ship. I think the boys know what happen and even the locals we talked to said the boys knew what happened. The judge's son had been in trouble several times before concerning girls.

 

[LisaG520]

me too, I'm the packer in this family. I learned at the feet of the master, my dad. It drives me crazy how Paul just piles stuff on top of stuff making it impossible to get to what you need unless you unpack other stuff.

I too learned the art of packing a vehicle from my dad!! We moved to Canada for a year and we were afraid going up they would make us unpack the truck at the border - my dad had packed it and we knew we could never re-do it to make it all fit again!

 

[lillygator]

it's horribly sad, and I hate any missing persons case especially when there is no ending. I think it's one of John's concerns about venturing off on our own...

 

[woody73]

. . . Aruba is relatively small and not all that much chance of getting lost.

Oh yeah?

How about that girl who was there on Spring Break?

Ouch!

Woody

 

[nskjerven]

Monica, this all sounds sooooo familiar. I have dealt with depression most of my life but nobody ever put a name to it, even the therapists I saw (so many years ago they probably didn't think it was an illness). Any way I had a lot of close deaths to deal with in the last several years and just kept plugging along. Last March I started having Panic Attacks for the first time and knew that it was time to do something.

Now I am seeing a therapist and trying to find the right dosage of meds. Like you, my favorite thing in the world, going to WDW didn't hold a lot of interest for me and we went twice in September.

I am also finding it difficult to do the little things but am getting better too and making myself do them. I find that when I do I end up feeling better.

Glad to know that there are others out there who understand what this is all about. Sometimes you feel kind of alone and foolish for feeling the way you do.

Any way, sorry about the downer but it is nice to be able to talk about it.

Carol

Carol & Monica:

I'm with ya gals. I have had my bouts too, mostly post-partum in timing, but not just the baby blues. A client of mine was killed in a motorcycle accident just one month after I had Molly. This sent me into a very long fog of sadness and panic attacks and migraines. I ended up taking depression meds ~ 3 + years later (after Wilson was born) The meds caused my weight gain and for that I'm mad. I have to say the meds for me just masked my feelings of everything. Made me feel numb. It worked for the short term, but I'm so glad I weaned off them and found other oulets. Funny enough Disney is one of the big outlets for me too. Fortunately, my DH understands and supports the cause. I know exercise would be the ulitmate solution, but I'm stuck in that can't get started place too. Trying to work on the eating, but alas, when I stress over work, I eat. Bad thing I know. Maybe I need to bend to Paul's request to get a treadmill or thing like that for the house. OK, back to reading. Just meant to tell you guys that I'm hearing you and feeling you.

 

[nskjerven]

LOOK EVERYBODY...it's PAUL! Hi Paul! How 'ya doing, Paul?
Nice to hear from you, Paul.

....did you ever notice if you keep typing and reading the name 'Paul' it looks really funny? Like you want to start saying Paw Uhl......OK, I've had a really hard day today...back to catching up...

Really, thanks for stopping in, Paul.

oh Jackie you crack me up!!!

I told him at dinner many people had said hello and he replied in his snide voice, tell them I went away. What a grump.

Wait til I bring him your post Jackie, that will send him way over the edge

 

[tink1963]

Here are some PV pics from our last visit.

Sunrise from the ship

again from the ship. I think we were on the secret deck 7.

The pirate ship

The agave plants on the tequila tour

It is more the a hut. It's someones home I think. There were other houses around too.

Explaining the process

The Pina (peen-ya)

The households pets

Some of the oak barrels

 

[nskjerven]

wow - it was a true story. This girls husband was a rapist, he ended up being sentenced to 99 years.

which was that one V, that sounds creepy in a good way

 

[nskjerven]

Can Tyler and I be stalkers too?

only if you can promise you will act as outrageous as the rest of us trying to keep our silbings from killing each other. I'm sure you'll have no problem joining right in

 

[woody73]

Here are some PV pics from our last visit.

Great pictures!

Woody

 

[lillygator]

which was that one V, that sounds creepy in a good way

Tiffany-Amber Theisan from Saved by the Bell was in it.

 

[nskjerven]

my friend just called me, she is booking a 2 week PC cruise in 2009 sailing from SanDiego to Fort Lauderdale.....airfare 1 way is almost $400 a pc....and an ocean view room for 2 is $4600 - I thought the room was ok but isn't that a high estimate on air?

depends on time of year too. but it does sound high.

 

[LisaG520]

Here are some PV pics from our last visit.

Thanks for the pics! I saw agave harvesting on one of Samantha Brown's shows and it looks really hard to do! But they did make it sound like having the harvesting job is a very honored position.

 

[lillygator]

g,night all!

 

[Jhalkias]

OK, all the non-techies can skip this post . . . Kaylee asked, so I am giving my thoughts on MacWorld and Steve Job's Keynote.

Steve went over four items

#1 Was Leopard (new operating system). The most interesting thing here is an enhancement to Time Machine (backup program) that is a new piece of hardware. For $299 you can buy a combination Airport Extreme router / 500gb Hard drive called Time Capsule, that will automatically do backups of all the Macs in your house wired and through Airport (Wi-Fi).

#2 was iPhone. Since no one here seems to have or talk about iPhones (including me) I'll make it brief. Some new apps, (maps with directions as an example) rolled out for free to current owners, and the same apps now available on the iPod touch for a $20 upgrade charge. Mail is one of them, so now you can get your email on an iPod touch with a Wi-Fi connection. But, no 3g phone, no larger capacity. I am still holding out for an updated touch with more memory - maybe even a built in camera like the iPhone.

#3 was Movie rentals through the iTunes store. You will now be able to buy or rent movies through iTunes - both Mac and PC. All major studios are covered, and thousands of titles will soon be available - 30 days after DVD release. Cost for standard def movies is $3.99, streamed instantly to your computer. $1.00 more for HD. Library titles (old) for $2.99. Once you rent, you have 30 days to start watching, and once you start, you have 24 hours to watch as many times as you want. This part is pretty standard with other digital rentals. The part that is cool is you can watch on your PC, your iPod, your iPhone OR, your Apple TV. You can even start watching on your computer and finish on your iPod. Apple TV is a set top box companion to iTunes. New software was rolled out for Apple TV to permit direct purchase without a computer through the iTunes store, and direct download of free content too like Podcasts. This has me excited as I was an early Apple TV adopter - for now it has just been a great way to play my music collection, or view my photos on a widescreen HD TV. This new software will make it way cooler.

Something very interesting was glossed over. The head of Fox Studios showed a DVD of the new Family Guy Star Wars Spoof that now ALLOWS you to COPY the DVD to your computer (read Rip) so that you can play it on your iPod! About time someone woke up to this!

#4 the big announcement was the MacBook Air. The MacBook Air is the thinest computer on the Planet. It is so thin it fits inside an office envelope. All aluminum, razor thin at the edge (one guy said you could shave with it), full 13" LED display, full-size backlit keyboard, 5 hour battery life, 80gb HD (for $1,000 more you can get a 64gb SSD drive - flash memory), 2gb Memory, multi-touch trackpad, and Intel Core2 Duo at 1.6ghz. Weighs in at 3 pounds and at it's thinest point is .16 of an inch. Super cool - too cool for school. $1,799. No optical drive, but you can buy an external for $99, OR you can "borrow" the optical drive of another Mac or PC through the "air" with software loaded through Wi-Fi.

This was not really the computer most expected - most expected a smaller sub-notebook like the 12" Powerbook. Apple fooled us. Instead of shrinking the package width wise, they shrunk the thickness. My opinion however is that this appeals to only those who want the coolest greatest looking hardware no matter the price, or someone who has to travel very light. I would love one of these, but would never buy it. It is not meant to be a "main" computer, but more of a travel accessory device. The battery is not replaceable by the consumer and neither is the hard drive or ram, and there are limited ports.

Personally, If I were spending that much, I would buy a much more capable MacBook Pro for $200 more, or spend $300 less for a top of the line and again much more capable MacBook.

Good news for everyone who bought MacBooks or iMacs for Christmas. Your hardware isn't obsolete - YET!

That's my summary Kaylee.


Hope I didn't bore anyone. Some guys like Go-Carts, I love gadgets and computers - especially Macs.

 

[Jhalkias]

Natalie was there for hs graduation. We were there a couple of weeks after she vanished.

In the back of my mind I knew I had something wrong. I stand corrected.

it's horribly sad, and I hate any missing persons case especially when there is no ending. I think it's one of John's concerns about venturing off on our own...

Amy too. She gets nervous in unfamiliar places.

Carol & Monica:

I'm with ya gals. I have had my bouts too, mostly post-partum in timing, but not just the baby blues. A client of mine was killed in a motorcycle accident just one month after I had Molly. This sent me into a very long fog of sadness and panic attacks and migraines. I ended up taking depression meds ~ 3 + years later (after Wilson was born) The meds caused my weight gain and for that I'm mad. I have to say the meds for me just masked my feelings of everything. Made me feel numb. It worked for the short term, but I'm so glad I weaned off them and found other oulets. Funny enough Disney is one of the big outlets for me too. Fortunately, my DH understands and supports the cause. I know exercise would be the ulitmate solution, but I'm stuck in that can't get started place too. Trying to work on the eating, but alas, when I stress over work, I eat. Bad thing I know. Maybe I need to bend to Paul's request to get a treadmill or thing like that for the house. OK, back to reading. Just meant to tell you guys that I'm hearing you and feeling you.

I would not say anything if Amy had not spoken up on her own. It seems that more people suffer from this than one would ever imagine, and Amy's started right after Alex's birth. I can tell you there were some very difficult and trying times. I can also tell you it has helped me understand others a lot better because I could never understand this type of illness until it touched my own life. I have seen it a lot with various employees now in my position in HR, and it has made me more empathetic.

My problems Nan relate to weight and stress too. Two years ago I was heading in the right direction, and I am getting back on track now. Mom's passing and the unbelievable stress I had at work when I had to RIF people made me fall off the wagon. The elliptical machine is ready to put together, and I have gone back on my better diet - down about 4 pounds in the last week. Once I get my activity level up again, I will feel better and start losing quicker too. You just have to find your own way and your own will to do it. It is indeed hard.

 

[Jhalkias]

g,night all!

Good thing V left before I started the tech talk.

Wait until she wakes up in the morning to that long post and it puts her back to sleep!

 

[Jhalkias]

Or did I now effectively put everyone who WAS here to sleep now?