21 Mar, Wed

Wed, 21 Mar ... today is the tomorrow i was waiting for ... and i still don't feel that great. when i got outside, i looked in the trees and saw the monkey ... but this one looked smaller ... and ... it has a tail ... there must be 2 of them .... well, now i feel better, that there isn't just one monkey all by himself. ...i got a few pictures of him ... later in the day, Michelle told me there are actually 3 of them; ...and yes, one does not have a tail. she said they can be very destructive and torn the screens and gotten into the cabins and made a horrible mess :( ...they have lots of cats, dogs, and birds here; so i'm thinking they are 'animal people' ... so i hope they can learn to live together :( went to the RMP, and .... my orange juice was there ... i don't know how they do it, but it is the best sweetest OJ i've ever had ... the minute you open the top, you can smell the oranges ... that made me feel a little better. Todd and i finished putting the fish net on the rest of the bins; and then called it a day. Christie asked me if i wanted to join her tomorrow. she was going to a school .... first thing i asked was, 'do i have to talk to the kids?' :) ...she said no ... so i said ok. she does a presentation on the reef, fishes, corals, etc. on one day with the kids in school, then a day or so later, they all get to go on the Glass Bottom Boat to see what they learned about. tomorrow we do both, but with 2 different groups of kids. ...sounds like fun ... i've never been in a Glass Bottom Boat and have always wondered if it was any good ... now i'll find out .... i forgot to mention, when i met with Christie on Monday, i also met her Mother. they were both born in Honduras, but her Mom spent time in the U.S. .... where? ... Ohio ... really? i'm from Ohio .. she said she lived in Tiffin !!!!!!! ....that's where i was born!!!!!!!!!! ... she said Mercy Hospital? yes, i think so, .....(Mom.... is that where i was born?) ...she said that is where one of her son's was born too !!! .... so we hugged on the street ... Christie turned around to see us ... and said ... 'you two bonded already?' ..... small small world !!!!!! i got a Baleada ... which is a nice warm fresh tortilla, with refried beans; ... and i ordered chicken and avocado ... it was good and i needed food. ...went home, and still didn't feel much like doing anything .. but i thought maybe if i went for a snorkel, i'd feel better. so i just went out to Half Moon Bay in the center of the village. i crossed to the other side of the bay and saw this TrumpetFish .... notice his placement of his dorsal and anal fins and their coloration ... you can see why they call it a TrumpetFish because the shape of his head and lips looks like the mouthpiece of a trumpet .... and he was right in front of this Flamingo Tongue ... i took this photo with my macro lens, i usually use the 'underwater' auto setting on my camera; because it is supposed to adjust the color; but it doesn't have a macro feature; so i thought i 'd try not using the 'underwater' feature ... on this Flamingo Tongue ...and i think i like it ... and am going to try it more often ... then went outside of the entrance a little way .... i saw this Midnight ParrotFish .... they are very large, and very dark blue .... i couldn't get a good picture of him unfortunately ... also saw this HogFish with his pretty subtle colors ... you know a HogFish by his spiny dorsal fins (the ones on the top) .... then crossed back to the other side and snorkeled outside the entrance along the other shoreline and saw this Blue Indigo Hamlet and this TigerTail Sea Cucumber ... which i saw last year for the first time ... and i still think it's very strange .... their skin is kinda saggy and looks squishy .... maybe it's old :( a pretty Blue Tang and this very decorative Reef Sea Urchin ... much more interesting than the Long Spiny Urchins which are just black .... and i swear this NeedleFish was trying to show me his teeth ... they've always looked very benign to me ... but he looked menacing ! ... this is a Sergeant Major, which is usually yellow and white striped; ... but the male turns this pretty blue color when it is defending it's eggs .... which you can see as a purple mass behind him ... he darts out at everything and will even nip at you if you get too close ... but he is only about BlueGill size ... you can see he legs of a hemit crab beneath this conch shell... well barely ... this is why they ask that you not take shells from the seas ... even if they are dead ... they can still become homes for other creatures ... i sure see a lot of Lobsters lately ... since it is their mating season .... it is illegal to hunt them between 1 Mar and 30 June here in Honduras .... they must know this :) i'd been snorkeling for 1.5 hours and i was cold, i wear gloves because my fingers get cold, but the tips were numb ... time to go in .... back in my room i was happy to have a hot shower ... but i still couldn't get warm. .... i put on my sweats, undershirt, and sweatshirt and climbed into bed; i was still shivering ! ... after awhile, i decided i must have a little bit of temperature. i took a motrin, and stayed in bed ... again ... for the second night in a row ... hopefully tomorrow WILL be better !!!!