Who here hails from the Pacific Northwest?

[82_28]

Just to get a gauge on it and send out a feeler or two, as I was contemplating a RigInt PNW meetup just now. How many of us are there around here? It's hard to keep up. Perhaps in a week or two we can all meet for maybe a day of paintball combat. Or beers.

[Peregrine]

I do. But I'm north of the border.

[82_28]

Yeah, I'd love to roll up north of the border, but my passport is expired and I didn't spring for that "enhanced" drivers license when I renewed it last year. Plus I motherfucking hate fucking US customs. But there's one. Keep em coming! If we can come up with something down the road here, Peregrine, I would hope to see you. So, we shall see if this gets any traction!

[freemason9]

i hear that you don't have fireflies up there

[Peregrine]

I saw a firefly here once when I was 4. That's a travesty, as I love them. I did see some when I was in the Dominican Republic, though. And I'd be up for another RI meetup down the road!

[82_28]

Well, excusing the randomness, I actually have always wondered why too. Why we don't have fireflies out here.

Fireflies love humid, warm environments. In the U.S., almost no species of fireflies are found west of Kansas—although there are also warm and humid areas to the west. Nobody is sure why this is. There are many species of fireflies throughout the world, and the most diversity in species is found in tropical Asia as well as Central and South America.

http://www.firefly.org/firefly-habitat.html

When I was growing up in Colorado we would take a yearly roadtrip out to PA along I-70. One of the most exciting aspects of the arduous, quarrel ridden drive was when we would see our first firefly. Now of course, kids just watch DVDs on their personal screens.

[norton ash]

They live in Northern Ontario, you'll see them for a few weeks every summer. More of a dry, cool climate here. They're lovely, and cats and dogs enjoy chasing them.

[Project Willow]

We don't have crickets either, nor cicadas. I was so amused to hear to cicadas in the heart of Manhattan a few weeks ago, their songs rising with the heat of the day. I heard crickets and frogs in Connecticut, but I saw no fireflies.

There's always next year, and my travels will take me into the heart of firefly country. When I lived in the deep south, the early evenings were spectacular, tall southern pines groaning in a gentle wind over a carpet of their own needles, their bases girdled by a layer between 4 and 10 feet off the ground of sparkling bug lights. It was truly magical.

[mentalgongfu2]

We don't have crickets either, nor cicadas. I was so amused to hear to cicadas in the heart of Manhattan a few weeks ago, their songs rising with the heat of the day. I heard crickets and frogs in Connecticut, but I saw no fireflies.

Really? Learn something new everyday. Around here, we have more crickets than we'd like, an infinite number of cicadas, and fireflies in the late summer/early fall that line the road ditches and create an amazing spectacle at dusk as the sun goes down. I didn't see as many lightning bugs this year as the last few, but I think (hope) that has more to do with my schedule than with the health of the insect population, although I've heard of an absence of fireflies in other habitats normally hospitable to the creatures.

[operator kos]

I'm in the SF Bay Area, which I like to consider as the southern tip of the Cascadia region.

[Elvis]

I'm in the general vicinity... gimme a holler if there's a kaffee klatch or sumpn!

[beeline]

.

I thought you lived in Memphis!

[Elvis]

.

I thought you lived in Memphis!

Too damn many fireflies there!

[§ê¢rꆧ]

I'd be up for some PDX meetups. Or possibly Seattle again. It's a bit of trip with my old car, but she can make it.

[82_28]

We should all meet at The Great Wolf Lodge!

http://www.greatwolf.com/grandmound/waterpark

I keed. (But going down a waterslide for the first time in 20 years sure sounds fun)