Just a bit of humor that I forgot to share.

Most of you know that I live in deep south Texas... I was setting up the event late Friday afternoon... and these things were *everywhere*.

Normally, corner workers stand in the grass... not this time!

What stories of danger do you have?

http://flickr.com/photo_zoom.gne?id=531719339&size=o

Remind me not to move to South TX!

I hate it most when they jump

Wuss!


JK

I usually visit Texas once every year or two. This past year in mid to late March, I was in Harlingen, TX for 5 days. You guys can keep your rattle snakes, spiders, and mosquitoes. Had a great time fishing, but I've never seen mosquitoes so big in my life and it was early in the season! Granted you guys did have a lot of rain early this year, but my Uncle had to spray the yard with poison every day to keep the mosquitoes down. When I was a kid I would go to my great aunts house and see spiders that size in her front yard. I'll take snow and cold weather any day over poisonous spiders.

Edit: "misketoe" doesn't equal mosquito

Damn straight! They creep me out

I've been wracking my brain trying to figure out what a "misketoe" was....

Mosquito?

And the spider thing? God damn it... I am not going to be able to sleep tonight now.

Sorry, can't spell and neither can auto-replace. Will change.

Misketoe is how you say it with a southern drawl.

Think of Scarlet O'hara......... Miissskeeeeetoeee.


As for the spider... yeah. You don't need to tell me about that

there's a mosquito season? must be long... seems like it has been going strong for.. umm.. all my life now...


mosquito bites swell up for about 8 hours... i think that's a small price to pay for doing my part in the food chain

Yeah. Here in Houston it runs from January 1 to December 31. :-)

So where was that event with the tarantulas?

And Harlingen. Nice place to visit, but don't go there without a job. Kind of tough to find something unless you are employed by Retirement or to cut sugarcane.

I run with the local PCA group.. we run about once a month at the Cameron County Airport... it's near SPI - The tarantulas are out typically in our May/June -> September and sometimes October events. http://www.rgvpca.org and http://forums.rgvpca.org

Harlingen/the valley has come a long way in the ~5 years I've been here... only thing to add to your list is medical... I guess that could fall into your 'employed by retirement' category

My wife is a Perfusionist (the person who operates the heart-lung machine during bypass surgery). She did a couple of stints (no pun intended) at Valley Baptist. The second one wasn't so wonderful. When she was there, I would come down on the weekends and we would go running/hiking in the parks/arroyos and sometimes drive to South Padre Island (SPI). It was fun time, and almost like living two lives, but I'm glad she is home. While she was there, we tried to get me an IT position, but it seems all they do down there is Windows.

In all my ventures there, we never saw a tarantula. I got my fill of them in Cayos Cochinos, but I've never seen one in the wild in the states. They are mostly harmless.

And to think Big Al (CMC #5 ) moved here from Northern Cal!


I bet he has had a few nightmares!

You win!

We have some in the San Francisco Bay area where he is from. They are a lot more prevalent in the deserts of Southern California!
Never seen them on track, have seen plenty of pheasant on track at Thunderhill though!

I hope you pulled your handgun and shot that critter. They are a little too fast to use a magnifying glass on

The State bird of New Hampshire should be the mosquito...

I remember going there a few years back, on vacation. There and South Padre Island that is. I had recently married a girl who a few years back was an IE there with Fruit of the Loom, so we went to go visit some of her old friends. Seemed like a pretty decent sized place, but no big industries.

Skeeters, I don't remember seeing any... Or tarantulas. I guess that's a good thing.

LOL, We got the slightly smaller type tarantulas back home (Puerto Rico). They usually kept to them self and rarely wonder in the house. I use to get a cutup liter of Soda, a gas can and go hunting. You pour a bit of gas in their burrows and they'll come right out as the gas fumes suffocate them. That's where the container comes in, in a normal day I would catch 10-12 of these suckers. Then proceeded to soak them in gas and light them up. They make a weird whine sound as they cook and then pop. I bet you really wanted to hear about that! This is what ours look like (these particular ones are not aggressive at all unless messed with, or set on fire )

Our mosquitoes also require a flight permit! No snakes though.

Its all a hoax. There's this huge conspiracy going on where Texans are actively trying to keep the undesireables (like Kalifornians) out with stories like this. Its not true!! There are no mosquitoes, or tarantulas, or snakes in Houston or any other part of Texas. Its not even humid out here!!! Its fantastic and the real estate is practically free!! Thats what they don't want you to know! They'd KILL me if I let out the truth!!!!

Gotta run, someone's at the door...

Just remember Al we could revoke that Alien Visa at any time,

Good to hear from you!

if you make the line properly, it becomes the safest track