Mission

This thread just keeps getting better and better!

My fellow sea surgeon, however the heck you say your name, here's a nip of the best medicine to you! "The French don't care what they do, actually, as long as they pronounce it properly." -Professor Henry Higgins

You should read Barlow’s Journal of his Life at Sea in King’s Ships, East and West Indiamen & Other Merchantman From 1659 to 1703. 500+ pages of the real period seaman complaining about 42 years of life at sea.

I agree with you good sir. See my Crows Nest thread about a new rant forum. I'm a visionary, ha! Actually I am pretty well opposed to rants unless they a ) are really stupid - and thus humorous or b ) propose solutions to whatever it is you're ranting about. So I would personally avoid a whole forum of such almost as readily as I avoid the Way to a Pyrate's Heart forum.

Nekkid pictures of Walt's brain?! Good God, man!

Yes, you broke it. Now you must send money to all the members. Send James his money first. He deserves it for that post alone. And no starting absurd flame wars over PCness in the Beyond forum. Go do it somewhere where they can really lambaste you for being unnecessarily Quixotic.

It's a sign from God...or Walt. Go forth and whinge no more.

Red Jessi had this at PiP this year. It was very good. To quote the Surgeon's Journal, "Red Jessi had a flask of something that was a little better [than another type of rum]- tasting vaguely of butterscotch and other things which I only got a sip of." Later on in the Journal, after having another go at it, "Jessi brought this magnificent rum that is apparently so limited in production that it is numbered and signed by the distillery owner and I enjoyed a bit of that. It's probably the best sipping rum I have ever tasted." My flask (on the rare occasions I have it with me) contains The McCallans or Glen Ord if they are available. If not, any reasonably-aged single malt scotch is usually worth trying. Good stuff.

Post pics!

True. Although plants are also spread 'naturally' across islands and continents, the common culprit usually being identified as bird poop. (This is if you consider humans spreading them unnatural. I would enjoy arguing this point about over several shots of single malt scotch as I think the distinction is mostly arbitrary. Folks swimming in Kudzu in the southeast might argue with me, but boundaries are just arbitrary constructs we mentally invent. Evolution is as evolution does, no matter who helps it along.)

Arf arf! How much is a little cannon? Where do you get one? Why am I asking this here? Can we put a bale mark on it?

Also from Wood (which I find very interesting): “[1670, Port of St. Julian] Before our departure from hence, we sowed several sorts of English Seed, such as Turnips, Carrots, Colworts, Reddishes, Beans, Pease and Onions. Some of each of which, that the Patagonians had left, we found upon our return. The Turnips were very good, but for the Reddishes, Beans and Pease, they were gone to Seeds; Neither could we perceive that the Indians had used any of them, but only pulled them up by the Roots, and then left them to wither.” (Wood, p. 73)

Speaking of Longitude...the description below also contains a chart of observations and explanations of the numbers that went into Wood's calculations which I did not copy - if only because I cannot reproduce many of the symbols. I will be happy to scan in if someone would like to see it (once I get to a scanner). If not, I'll probably forget. This is from John Wood's Captain Wood’s Voyage Through the Streights of Magellan, &c., from William Hacke’s A collection of original voyages (1699): “[1670] The Night of the same Day or our Arrival here [Port Desire], I observed the beginning and ending of the Ecclipse of the Moon. Whereby I found the difference of Longitude between London and this Place to be 70 d. which in Time is four Hours, and 52 Minutes. __ __ It appears therefore that this Ecclipse began at London, 17 m. 52 seconds past One a Clock on Monday Morning, September the 19th: But in this Place I observed the beginning of the Altitude or Scorpion to be on Sunday Night, September the 18th, at 5 m. 48 seconds past Nine: Therefore the difference of Time betwixt this Place and London is 4 Hours 52 Minutes, which converted into Degrees, gives 73 d. for the difference of the Meridian; Betwixt London and this Place is 66 degrees from the Lizzard. The middle of this Ecclipse I could not see for the Clouds, but off the Land are to be observed 12 hours and 30 m. by the Altitude and Mars, which makes the total duration to be 52 seconds more here than in London.” (Wood, p. 71, 73)

I thought this was funny. He seems to be describing the armadillo and the skunk to me. It's from John Wood's Captain Wood’s Voyage Through the Streights of Magellan, &c., from William Hacke’s A collection of original voyages (1699): “[1670, Port of St. Julian] Ostridges are also very numerous there, and run so wondrous swift, that they are not to be taken without Dogs: Besides which, we found many such Hares here, as have already been mentioned to have been at Port Desire, some of them weighing twenty Pounds. The Foxes are numerous in this Country, but less than those in England. Here is moreover a little Animal that is somewhat less than a Land-Turtle, having a jointed Shell on his back, and which we found to be excellent Food, the Spaniards call it A Hog in Armour. But above all, I cannot pass over without mentioning a little Creature with a Bushy Tail, which we called a Huffer, because when he sets sight on you, he’ll stand vapouring and patting with his Fore-feet upon the Grounnd, and yet hath no manner of defence for himself but with his Breech; for upon your approaching near him, he turns about his Back-side, and squirts at you, accompanied with the most abominable Stink in the World.” (Wood, p. 69)

That's just so cool. (And it doesn't sound arrogant to me.) My hystry-sense tends to agree with William's later statements that pirates would not have a bail mark. This should in no way stop you from making one. It gives us something else to explain during the edutainment. Something we really need is an actual, physical flag. We had to borrow one at PiP. Oh, and we could also use a cannon. We could point it at the Archangels' camp.

I decided to change my laptop background. Now it looks like this:

Wow...I was trying to sign up for one of those fare notifier things (Travelocity) when I discovered that the flight cost from Detroit direct into Key West airport on AA, leaving Tuesday, Dec. 1st (2009) and returning the following Tuesday with one stopover in Miami is $276 ($325 once you apply the airport fees and such.) I have never seen that flight that cheap in the 17 years I've been flying there. The cheapest I can recall is about $300 terminating in Miasma International Airport - not Key West. And that was more than 10 years ago. Plus the seating is wide open. Sign me up! (I suggest everyone check their favorite on-line flight searcher! Particularly Patrick!!)

Happy Birthday, brave farm girl who walks Duvall barefoot!

I still like Up the Creek which I saw when I was young, but that doesn't make it a great movie. Here are my thoughts on The Crimson Pirate.

opps ...Rusty Wild Rice ...I meshed my redheads. lol I was sort of wondering where he was this year myself. He's an interesting guy to talk to.

Pirates of the Dark Rose are planning to be there with at least Crudbeard and Bloodthirsty and Oreo (does he count?) Would like to have more of me crew there as well, we'll see As ta where ta camp, well, I well knows that tha fun be had on the beach, but havin' me tent inside tha fort is waaaay too convenient fer tha cannon work, so we will probably still stay there. Oreo counts! http://www.markck.com/images/Piracy/PiP08/...dbeard_Oreo.htm

This finally came up on my Netflix list. It was ok, I guess. I found the script to be wildly uneven. Some of the characterizations (not to mention characters) were painfully sacrificed in attempts at comedy. Plus there were several characters that they took great pains to get onto the ship and then failed to use much - like the doctor. Cheech and Chong were also sort of lost in the shuffle, which is unfortunate. (And what's with the lisp?) The Pythons came off the best, with Cleese leading the way, as noted. Cleese wisely decided to die before they left England - things in the plot sort of unwound after that point IMO. I actually thought that Idle's effete "Head of Her Majesty's Secret Service ( )" was the funniest character until he left land. Then it was sort of touch and go. Graham Chapman was pretty good when he was playing a berserk pirate, but it clashed with his more sedate character so much that I found him slightly annoying. And how did he come back to life after being stabbed? (Yeah, yeah, pirates are the most dangerous when they're dead or something. But that's a piss-poor explanation.) There were several funny lines. "That wasn't strictly true, was it sir?" "No, Mansell, it was what we in the British Navy call... a lie." (Ok, it may not sound that funny here, but the way Idle said it, I thought it was a hoot.) Three stars of five on Netflix - mostly for the beginning. There are worse ways to waste your time. (Like The Crimson Pirate. *shudder*)

See what I mean? BTW, for everyone's info, the text of the web page and the journal at the beginning of this thread are essentially the same. I have cleaned up the text for the web page (grammar, spelling and whatnot). I have edited some material for length, added some material to match the pics and re-arranged parts so that the subjects are better grouped to match the pictures. Some bits have even been moved from the main text to the Easter Egg or extra pages. I also added a new introduction that may or may not improve the journal. However, I'd guess 90 - 95% of the material is the same on the web page as it is here. So you don't have to re-read the long, poorly edited and picture-less posts in this thread unless you want to see how I type when I'm drunk and/or tired; you can just read it on the web page. Some people claim it helps them to remember the event. To be quite honest, the true goal of the web page is so that you can share it with friends that you want to go to PiP. That way they can see one (allegedly) humorous account of what happened there, which should bring some of the fun home to them. (Well, that's the goal.) Plus I just like having created things, even though I do not always like creating them. (OTOH, it may just come off as if you were being forced to look through someone's vacation snap shots. ) Oh, and thanks to everyone for your comments. Very few of the pics are mine, I just arranged them, re-sized and cropped them to fit the pages and (in some cases) edited them a little.

Even the actor says he's modeled in large part on Tuco. It's hard not to like Tuco - he's such a grubby, Id-based character. If you like the Tuco elements of Jayne and you ever get the chance, see the movie A Fistful of Dynamite aka Duck You Sucker. I don't think the movie is that great - it's too political for me and some of the elements of Coburn's character seem dated - but the role Rod Steiger plays is fun. It is clearly designed for Eli Wallach playing as Tuco. (The extras explain that Leone designed the role for him, but the studio in their infinite wisdom blocked that choice.) Steiger does a great job with it, but I'd have loved to see Wallach mugging in that role.

Shut up and let it ride for a while, I still haven't gotten around to reading - rereading and reliving all of it just yet - so leave it alone. Did you happen to notice the topic died when you re-pinned it? Fine, fine, fine. I have one additional extra page to add now that I am not stressed about finishing this thing for Brig and Cpt. Sophia. So I will start a new topic for people not to respond to since you seem to be saying you can't find topics unless they're trapped here in no man's land.