Hash #1

So the Hash was amazing!! Much more than I even dreamed of. Nothing to be nervous of, just a whole lot of people out to have fun. What an ingenious idea too, who came up with this? Drinking and then running...never would have thought the two could go together without lots of time vomiting in the bushes, but it can be done. And the people are great...that's what it's really about. I will be going to this pretty much as often as possible. (Wow, my legs really need a tan!)

My first Hash!

So today I will be attending my first ever Hash (#1 on the List). If you don't know what that is, then check out some more information about the Hash House Harriers here. I'm excited and nervous at the same time. It seems to me that I may be the butt of some jokes as the newbie, but that's to be expected, I just hope they go a little easy on me. Luckily one of coworkers is involved in it, so he gave me a little heads up about what to expect.

So far I've been told "bring shoes that are old and can get wet". When I asked why, the response was "in case we run in drainage ditches"...WHAT?

Wish me luck! I'll give you all an update when I get back.

Tampa Escapades - THE LIST!

Here is the list, in no particular order, of things that I hope to accomplish while living in Tampa.

The MASTER List (updates can and will be made)!!

1. Hash house harriers runs
2. Adventure runs
3. Martial arts
4. Yoga
5. Rock climbing
6. Kayaking
7. Sierra club
8. Audobon Society
9. FNPS field trips
10. Camping trip
11. Volunteer at Moffitt Cancer Center or the Red Cross
12. Volunteer at animal rescue/big cat rescue
13. Volunteer at a nature center
14. Take guitar lessons
15. Biking on florida greenways
16. Massage classes at Cortiva or get a message
17. Take some non-credit classes at a local university
18. Tai chi on the water/beach
19. Drum circle
20. Work at a brewery
21. Brew my own beer
22. Volunteer at organic farm
23. Volunteer with a farm at the St. Pete farmer’s market
24. Kayoga
25. Become a kayak guide
26. Organize a fundraising pub crawl/scavenger hunt
27. Do photography at any events/outdoor thingy
28. Go to the drive-in!!
29. Go to a crochet meeting (Sacred Grounds Coffeehouse)
30. Go to pick-your own fruit orchards
31. Take classes at the Hillsborough extension office
32. Hike the barrier islands
33. Join the coast guard auxiliary
34. Cooking/dinner party
35. Cocktail party
36. Book club/used bookstore
37. Volunteer at botanical gardens
38. Work with USF to create searchable database for native plants
39. Go visit the springs in florida
40. Fishing
41. Join a search and rescue team
42. Scuba diving
43. MOSI IMAX
44. Find an independent movie theatre
45. Volunteer usher at Tampa Theatre
46. Go to the Thai Buddhist Temple in Palm View on a Sunday for the Thai Market
47. Get involved in local sports
48. Swimming at free pools
49. Join the Tampa Bay Couch Surfing crowd for an event
50. Dance lessons
51. Surfing
52. Blues jams/jazz lounges
53. Meditation
54. Young professional get togethers
55. Bowling – big lebowski style
56. Wine tastings
57. Be a representative for a alcohol company
58. Be a nude model
59. Go to the comedy club
60. Habitat for humanity!
61. Watch rugby
62. Film festival
63. Woodcrafter’s club of tampa
64. Go to bingo nights or host a bingo night at the house or have a bingo night at the bar for charity
65. Florida Nature Conservancy events – VOLUNTEER
66. Get a boat captain’s license
67. Become a master naturalist
68. Become a master gardener
69. Beerfests – volunteer
70. Music festivals in the area or far away
71. Join the Davis Island Yacht Club sailing team
72. Become a weekend dog walker!
73. Go on a cruise
74. Become a wine-rep/wine tasting person
75. Be a local tour guide in Ybor or St. Pete
76. Go to Tampa indoor shooting range
77. Buy a sewing machine and make clothing
78. Make jewelry
79. Learn web design/html
80. Join Tampa Bay Grotto – go caving!!
81. Go to local wine tastings
82. Attend fishing seminars
83. Volunteer at FWRI
84. Get a fishing rod and start going out!
85. Go to florida sportsman show
86. Take classes at NATA – Natural Areas Training Academy
87. Go to Lebowski Fest
88. Go to the beach theater – st. pete indi movie theater
89. Go to a film series event at the Salvadore Dali museum
90. Tampa Museum of Art – Art After Dark program
91. Artists Unlimited Gallery
92. Florida Museum of Photographic Arts
93. Hyde Park Jazz Festival
94. Do one ESRI self-study module every 2 weeks
95. Go to the everglades
96. Go to Miami
97. Go to Key West
98. Go to New Orleans
99. Bike to work
100. Make a large map of all the preserves and public lands in SWFWMD district
101. Volunteer with Tampa Bay Watch
102. Volunteer at the Ocean Conservancy
103. Check out some local restaurants
104. Go see more local music!

Why this list?

So I've decided to expand this blog a bit. It will no longer be about just playing in the mud and enjoying nature, but it will also be about experiencing life. Having moved from Tampa to Baltimore to be with my mother while she went through cancer treatments (she's doing great now!), I realized that although I had lived in Tampa for almost 2 years, a lot of the things I wanted to do there didn't happen. Why not? Well, you know how life gets when you get into routines or you get stressed out! So now I'm getting a chance to go back to Tampa and I feel like it's my second chance to live in this interesting city and actually do all those cool things I always wanted to. So I made a list!

I will post it shortly...

Tampa Escapades List Description

So, as most of you know, I've been away from Florida for the past year...and let's just say I'm antsy. It's been really great being up in MD with Mom and seeing the family a lot and everyone's support has been amazing! (Mom is doing well, if you haven't heard!) BUT...the time has come for me to get back to all the debauchery that most people in their 20s partake in daily.

Looking back on the 2 years that I spent in Tampa (2006 and 2007) I realized that my weekly routine gets a bit, well...routine! I work consistently during the week, play on the weekends, wake up Monday morning and start it all over again. It's not that I didn't have fun, probably too much fun, but in retrospect, I still haven't done all the things I want to do in Tampa. Can you believe that I lived there for 2 years and I've never been to Miami, Key West or the Panhandle? I've gotten involved lightly in some volunteering activities and local groups, but heading up an initiative I'm passionate about is what I'm really striving for. There should be an efficient way to combine my social life with building myself into the person I want to be. This has been a lot to think about. So, I had to get organized.

I've created a working list of about 100 things I want to do when I get back to Tampa. These are things in all aspects of life. And most of them are pretty fun! I'd love to have my friends (you all) involved with whatever strikes your fancy. Who wants to start on my list of Tampa Escapades?

If you think you want to help me accomplish some of my goals or just come along for the ride, then please leave a comment and let me know!

Port Canaveral Field Day

I recently had the opportunity to go down to Port Canaveral for some field work and boy was it fun to be out of the cubicle!! I felt like a fugitive who had just escaped a horrible prison, as if I had to keep looking over my shoulder to make sure my bosses weren't running after me with unfinished reports and expenses.

The pictures from the day turned out ok, but don't really capture the full feeling of it. It was overcast, but in my mind, any day in the field is just beautiful.

Part of the project was to field verify some seagrass mapping. This is a thick area of Shoal Grass (Halodule wrightii). Also present in significant amounts but in slightly deeper areas was Star Grass (Halophila engelmannii). Here's a great website for seagrass ID.

This area, known as the Banana River, has lots of bird rookeries and we saw everything from pelicans, osprey, terns, and more.These pelicans felt the need to guard the property. They just wanted us to know we were on their turf, fair enough.

And this dolphin has obviously been fed by fisherman over the years. He actually came up alongside the boat and begged for food by doing tricks and then look up at us!

We were threatened by thunderstorms all afternoon, but never saw any lightning, so we just kept plugging along with work and got a good long day of field work in.

Fawn Grove Old Tyme Days

How do you know summer is halfway over? The way I gauge it is by the Fawn Grove Old Tyme Days festival. There's a tiny little town just over the border in PA called Fawn Grove where every year, just after the 4th of July, they have a country festival that celebrates farming, agriculture and the community bonds of the old days. The big attraction is the tractor pull which draws a large crowd and many a proud farmer trying to demonstrate his or her agricultural prowess! When I was a bit younger I used to be in the parade that accompanies the event, but now I just attend and it's still awesome...

The tractors you see there come in all forms, makes, models, and rust level.

This is Dan Vaughan, a friend, neighbor, and infamous farmer of the area.

Notice the little sign in the corner?

The event is attended by all people, young and old. This guy has a new high powered version of the "senior wheelchair"!

And when they say "Old Days" they don't mean to imply that women can't partake in the manly events too! The girls were rocking this event.

Fish Sampling in the Bush River

So I realize I've been slacking quite a bit with the blog lately, but things have been picking up at home and work is going insane, so bare with me!

Anyway, a really great thing I've been getting into lately is this fish sampling survey with the Otter Point Creek Estuary Center. They are a really fantastic group of people that are dedicated to making the Chesapeake Bay watershed a cleaner environment for humans and the inhabitants of the bay. They have a ton of really awesome volunteer opportunities all the time, and I don't mean just your typical trail maintenance type volunteering opportunities. One that I'm involved in right now is the fish sampling survey in the Bush River that is specifically targeting variations in Yellow Perch spawning habits in the tributaries of the Bush River. What exactly does that mean? It means that I get to go along with this group of really dedicated and fun loving people every two weeks to do a fish survey. How do we do it? Well...we hope on a couple boats, do some seines and trolling and catch some pretty cool stuff like:

White Sucker

Here's a picture of my big brother, Erik, doing some of the seine netting. The net gets pretty heavy and this was a deep sight, so he was up to shoulder height dragging this net!

White Perch

If you live in the area this is a great way to get involved, play in the water, learn about some fish right in our own bay, and have a whole lot of fun!

Textures of the forest

This is a continuation of the springtime adventure hike I took with my big brother on our property in Maryland. Even though buds are just now peeking out and the countryside hasn't turned green yet, there's still lots to be seen and adored in the forest. Here are some textures of the woods that I think are truly magnificent and make you want to reach out and touch them:

Ouch...very pokey small tree.


Wood from inside a splintered pine tree that must have snapped off during a storm.

Bark of a very large, extremely old white oak that has recently fallen. Very sad.

The inside of that same white oak.

Moss on the bottom of a tree trunk. Just makes you want to pet it, doesn't it?

Snakey wakey

This black snake was laying on our porch in the morning. It wasn't a particularly warm or sunny morning, but being on the wood was probably warmer than being under the porch. He was all kinked up and funny looking. So what's a girl to do? Well...I poked him, of course! And oddly enough, as soon as he woke up, he un-kinked. So strange!

And then he decided to leave. I didn't poke him to be mean, but he took it as a threat.

And now he's back under the cold porch. Sorry Mr. Snake!