Seven Seas Mariner Panama Canal Cruise, 5/6/07-5/7/07

Part Four, 5/4/07-5/5/07, is here.

May 6 (Sunday, Day 10, Acapulco, Mexico) –

Phil’s sunburn got him up before the sun, and he went forward to the Observation Lounge.  More dolphins.  Yawn.  (Just kidding, it’s always a thrill to see dolphins.  It’s even more of a thrill to take a decent picture of them, because they’re so $#%@#$ elusive!)

This was supposed to be another snorkeling day, but we turned in the tickets in time to get the shipboard credit back.  As it turns out, Acapulco isn’t a very good place to snorkel anyway, and they cancelled the snorkeling excursion due to lack of interest.  Now we have even more shipboard credit to spend…

Janet laid claim to the title “Queen of Finding Dead Animals” by locating a dead sparrow along her path during her short stroll around the Acapulco harbor area.

We went to the animated movie “Happy Feet” and decided that it was okay, but about 30 minutes too long.

Dad is the only one on board with a scooter.  There are 4 or 5 wheelchairs, at least 2 walkers and lots of canes.  The wheelchair people should definitely have scooters since then they would have their independence.  Getting over the doorsills that are all over the ship (for the watertight doors) is impossible on your own in a wheelchair.  But the scooter does just fine.  The dining room wait staff love to drive his scooter to its “parking spot” before and after dinner since he sits in a normal dining room chair while eating.  It seems to be the highlight of their day!!

May 7 (Monday, Day 11, At sea) –

Today is another sunny day, but the temperature seems cooler than it’s been.  Phil and Dad did the tour of the bridge.  A code blue was announced around 11 AM and at 12:10 PM, the captain came on and said that we were diverting to Puerto Vallarta but that our scheduled port tomorrow of Cabo San Lucas shouldn’t be disrupted at all.  Mom encountered one of those code blue situations–a woman was running towards her saying that her husband was having chest pains.  So, we guess it’s a man with a heart attack.  Phil’s comment was something like “Traveling with old people is fun” since you just never know what will happen next.  We can only imagine the number of itinerary changes on our 65-day cruise in 2008!!!

Janet had done some online research towards the beginning of the cruise on our next cruise and Phil finally got around to doing his research and said “yes” to a Royal Caribbean 13 night transatlantic eastbound cruise on the 3,114 passenger Voyager of the Seas in April, 2008.  (We disembark in Barcelona, Spain and then will visit Stuttgart, Germany if Janet’s sister and brother-in-law will have us.)  I’m sure it will be quite different from the luxury of the 700 passenger Mariner that we are enjoying now!

Another code blue sounded during our Indian and Thai curry buffet lunch by the pool (there is a themed buffet lunch outside by the pool on all sea days), but we found out it was just a bloody nose!

We saw a steady stream of stingrays this afternoon.  They seemed to be about one or two feet under the water.  When we first saw them we thought they were turtles, but then we quickly realized they were rays since they were diamond-shaped.  None of them jumped out of the water, though.  They just floated alongside the ship in groups of two to four or so.

Rays under the surface

We stopped near Puerto Vallarta and a little boat came out with an EMS guy and a stretcher and the man that had the heart condition code blue was transferred from our ship to the little boat (and then probably to a Puerto Vallarta hospital).  His wife and a nurse from the ship went on the little boat, too.  While the stretcher transfer process was going on (it took about 30 minutes in total), a wooden “pirate” booze cruise party boat was leaving from Puerto Vallarta.  They had their loudspeakers on and were saying crazy things to our ship.  They even fired three cannon balls “at” us (that is, fired off three fireworks into the sky—away from our ship).  Anyway, it was kind of bizarre.  Since they had no idea what was going on, you couldn’t blame them for having fun.  But it was very, very surreal.

Rescue boat meets pirate ship

We had dinner at Signatures, the Le Cordon Bleu restaurant, tonight.  Mom ordered two appetizers – caviar and frog legs.  Phil ordered two, too – scallops and escargot. Janet confesses that she ordered (and ate) three desserts – vanilla bean crème brûlée, a warm gooey chocolate tart with chocolate ice cream and a lime “muffin” with a blob of chocolate ganache on top of it.  The lime muffin was good and the chocolate ganache was good, but not together!  The presentation of all the food is really the outstanding part (as well as the taste).

Phil likes scallops
Soupe Cremeuse aux Moules Infusee au Safran
Sorbet au Vin Rouge avek epice
Tournedos Rossini, bouquetiere de legumes glaces, sauce Perigueux
Baba au vieux Rhum, Crème Pistache et Fruits Rouges
Crème Brulee a la vanille de Tahiti, aux Fraises marinees et son coulis, Tarte tiede au chocolat et aux framboises, and Financier aux Amandes—Citron Verte, Ganache au chocolat Molleux

After Janet ate her appetizer the waitress put a silver tray in front of her with something on it.  She opened it and found the one bracelet that she had been looking at buying.  Mom and Dad bought it for her as a thank you for planning the trip!  It was funny since that morning Janet had told Mom about the bracelet and Mom started talking about it, too.  Of all the bracelets in the little store, we managed to like the exact same one!  When Janet went to the little store before dinner to buy it, it was gone and Janet was very disappointed.  She didn’t realize that Mom was the buyer.  It is made up of tiger eyes, clear green and blue “gems” and opaque bright green stones and matches a lot of Janet’s cruise outfits perfectly.

The story continues in Part Six, 5/8/07-5/9/07.

Seven Seas Mariner Panama Canal Cruise, 5/4/07-5/5/07

Part Three, 5/4/07-5/5/07, is here.

May 4 (Friday, Day 8, At sea)

Phil got sunburned, sitting in the shade.  We sat out for about four hours in the afternoon on our suite’s balcony deck.  It was on the shady side of the ship, but still there was enough reflected sunlight to turn Phil into Lobster-Man.  We saw our first dolphins and sea turtles, and witnessed numerous rays leaping out of the sea and re-entering with a great splash.  A professional travel photographer cruising on the ship said that they did that to dislodge parasites from their backs.

At Sea
Veranda listening shack
Lobsterman!

There was a code blue announced during our dinner that night (it wasn’t Phil’s sunburn) and while we were leaving the dining room we saw the woman lying on her side on the stretcher being put in the glass elevator.  We later found out that she broke her hip and there was some discussion of skipping Huatulco to get her to a bigger Mexican port, but we ultimately did keep on course for Huatulco.

May 5 (Saturday, Day 9, Huatulco, Mexico)

We were supposed to go snorkeling.  Phil’s sunburn kept him on the ship, so Janet went by herself.  But it was an excellent dolphin- and sea-turtle-spotting day, as numerous dolphin pods and a steady stream of migrating sea turtles swam by our ship as it cruised into Huatulco.  Phil even got a couple of useable pictures!

Dolphin leap
Two dolphins!
Huatulco harbor

Janet had a good snorkel and the highlight was seeing a school of millions of sardines.  (The guide said millions, and since Janet can’t count that many fish, she believed him since they were all over the place!  It was the largest school of fish she’s ever seen while snorkeling.)

In the evening, we had our made-to-order Indian meal originally scheduled for May 3rd but mistakenly scheduled by the dining room manager.  Prior to it being served, we were treated to a dolphin ballet out the window.  And, since the restaurant is on deck 5 (the lowest deck for passengers) we were pretty close to them.  Mom said it was her first time to ever see dolphins while on a cruise.  Our Indian dinner was good as always and included three appetizers (fried curried cauliflower, onion balls and samosas) and four curries (lamb, shrimp, vegetable, chicken), rice, raita sauce and two breads (naan and papadam).  We had to order our desserts from the normal menu.

Indian appetizers
Curries
Spice cake

The executive chef visited our table to make sure we enjoyed everything (which we did).  We learned that there was an Indian chef on board who worked overtime in the afternoon to make our dinner!  He had his regular duties to do and the executive chef said that he was paid overtime to make our dinner.  We thought that was pretty interesting.  The Indian chef made extras, too, for himself and his friends so everyone ended up winning.

The story continues in Part Five, 5/6/07-5/7/07.

Seven Seas Mariner Panama Canal Cruise, 5/1/07-5/3/07

Part Two, 4/30/07, is here.

May 1 (Tuesday, Day 5, Transiting the Panama Canal)

Phil was up at 5 AM to see our entry into the Panama Canal via the Gatun locks. While we were anchored in Gatun Lake we went on an “eco-cruise” excursion.  On the way to the eco-cruise, we saw a three-toed sloth in a tree.  Our guide said that it takes 14-23 days for a three-toed sloth to climb up and down a tree – that’s how slow they are!  We also saw a big iguana on the ground and a cat-like coatimundi with a very long ringed tail.  During the cruise in our “rustic boats”, we saw a cayman (like an alligator), several snail kites (birds), another sloth and survived a 5 minute tropical rainstorm.  (We didn’t see any monkeys and we were hoping to.)  May is the start of rainy season and the “May trees” were in full bloom (big trees with orange/yellow flowers on the top that bloom at the start of rainy season).

Gatun locks
May trees

An interesting fact about the Panama Canal is that it takes 52 million gallons of Gatun Lake water for each ship to transit the Canal and this water is only replaced by natural rainfall.  Panama gets 200 inches of rain a year.  The construction that is being done on a new set of locks to allow larger boats to transit the canal is supposed to be done by 2014 and will be paid by the fares of the ships passing through the canal between now and then.  Yeah, right.

Gatun Lake
Approaching the locks on the Pacific end of the canal

Phil and I ordered in tonight from the menu for the main restaurant and Mom and Dad went to La Veranda for dinner where they had lamb shanks.  La Veranda is the Italian-themed restaurant that has an antipasta/salad buffet and then you order off a menu for your entrée and dessert.  We left the second set of locks around 9:20 PM and the third (and final) set of locks around 10:30 PM.

May 2 (Wednesday, Day 6, At sea)

After waking up at 10 AM (after going to sleep around 9:30 PM – our clocks got set back an hour last night), Phil looked outside and saw a dolphin.  That’s our first ocean wildlife sighting so far. Naturally, dolphins and other sea life are uncommonly camera-shy—at least, shy of Phil’s camera—so pictures were hard to come by.  As you’ll see, it took a while for them to settle down and give Phil some good shots of them.  We went to lunch at noon for the Tex-Mex buffet out by the pool.  I put on capri pants and a ¾ sleeve blouse since it was overcast.  Phil sweated some, but since the sun wasn’t out, it really wasn’t that hot.  Humid, yes, but not too hot.

After lunch we looked at the boutiques since we have around $150 left to spend.  So, Janet might be getting two Regent polo shirts and Phil might get a bottle of premium port.  Otherwise, there is really NOTHING to buy.  But, in case you feel sorry for Janet and Phil–Mom and Dad have about $550 left to spend!  (Phil and Janet spent our shipboard credit on shore excursions but they didn’t which is why they have so much left.)

We went to the 3:00 movie “Pursuit of Happyness.”  It was okay, but the popcorn was stale and burnt.

Tonight we went to Latitudes, the Indochine restaurant that requires reservations.  We’ll only go to it once this cruise since we’re never very impressed with it, but it’s a change of pace so what the heck.
There’s nothing really wrong with it, it’s just that nothing we’ve been served there has ever really grabbed us.  We’re not sure why it rates a separate restaurant which only changes its menu every 8 days.  Latitudes just isn’t our cup of tea.

May 3 (Thursday, Day 7, Puntarenas, Costa Rica)

Today was forest sky walk day.  Janet and Phil went on the excursion, which featured a walking trail through the rain forest, with several steel suspension bridges.  We didn’t see much until at the last bridge, Janet spotted a coatimundi in the gully underneath the bridge.  (Couatimundis are, possibly, more camera-shy than dolphins, it seems.)  Most of us caught at least a glimpse of the creature, but all of us heard him (or her!) pawing through the leaf litter looking for lunch.  Another highlight of the sky walk was seeing a couple of beetles doing the Beetle Nasty on a leaf.  Actually, we saw more wildlife at the small resort we stopped at after the forest tour than we did during the tour, including an iguana munching on a papaya tree, another couple lounging on the sidewalks, and a yellow social flycatcher bird.  Janet found a desiccated frog belly-up on the sidewalk, and later a large moth with a wingspan about as big as your hand lying beside another sidewalk.

Mariner at Puntarenas
Costa Rica
Iguana

 The story continues in Part Four, 5/4/07-5/5/07.

Seven Seas Mariner Panama Canal Cruise, 4/30/07

Part One, 4/27/07-4/29/07, is here.

April 30 (Monday, Day 4, At sea)

We settled quickly into the Mariner routine.  Wake up around 9 AM ship’s time, take a quick shower, then to La Veranda restaurant for breakfast.  Wander around the ship until the room is made up, then drop stuff off/pick stuff up, and go to lunch.  Wander around the ship some more, then go back to the room and dress for dinner.

Phil’s typical breakfast

Today we were eating lunch by the pool, where it was windier than usual.  We were at a table with an umbrella in it (just like a patio table).  Phil was eyeing the umbrella suspiciously, and sure enough, it took to the air.  Phil caught the expensive, high-quality umbrella and guided it down to the deck before it could hit anyone else.  The pool bar staff then scurried over to secure the umbrella.  Such excitement on a cruise ship!

Since we missed out on Cartagena, Colombia due to the medical evacuation, we had to stop at the Colombian island of San Andres, off the coast of Nicaragua in the Caribbean Sea.  The reason had something to do with the Jones Act.  This 1920 U.S. law, so we were told, requires non-American ships that are leaving one part of the US to stop at an international port before stopping in another US port.  (We’re puzzled as to how this applies between the United States and the Panama Canal Zone, since we gave that back to the Panamanians in the 70s.)  The bottom line is that since we didn’t make our scheduled stop at Cartagena, Colombia, we had to make a “technical” stop at San Andres.  A tender did leave the boat with some people on it, but we guess they just had paperwork.  From what we could see, though, San Andres looked absolutely beautiful and had at least five shades of blue and green water surrounding it.  Phil looked on the internet and it is world famous for its snorkeling and diving so maybe we’ll have to come back on our own.  The water looked magnificent.

San Andres

Tonight we had dinner at Signatures. Regent claims this to be the only restaurant outside of France to be sanctioned by Le Cordon Bleu.  Bill (his real name), who was a guest on our last Regent cruise, joined us for dinner and the five of us had a fun time while eating French food.  (Bill emailed us about 3 weeks prior to the cruise telling us that he had decided to take this cruise, in part, since we were taking it.)  Mom and Dad went to the female singer’s show, while Phil, Janet and Bill went to the casino and we watched Bill play 3 card poker for a while.  Phil and Janet then sat down at the blackjack table and won $30.  The table was a $10 minimum which we didn’t realize until the first hand was being dealt.  We only played two hands before beating a hasty retreat with our winnings.

Signatures
Marinade de noix de petoncles a l’huile d’herbes, pommes de terre de deux facons
Cassolette d’escargots Signatures
Bisque de crustaces avec garniture d’avocat, miettes de crabe et tomate fraiche
Sorbet aux pommes et au thym
Saute de chambas epices aux asperorn vertes, a la crème de champangons

When we returned to our suite, we had a note saying that we were being given $50 per person of shipboard credit due to the skipping of Cartagena.  We have no idea what we will spend it on since the boutiques have the same merchandise as our last trip.  Did we mention that alcohol is free on-board, so even spending the money on booze is out of the question!

The story continues in Part Three, 5/1/07-5/3/07.

Seven Seas Mariner Panama Canal Cruise, 4/27/07-4/29/07

April 27 (Friday, Day 1, Leaving Ft. Lauderdale)

We awoke at 4:30 AM, showered, dressed, and headed out to pick up Janet’s parents at their house. From there, the trip to the airport was uneventful, as was check-in at Southwest.  We were told that the plane was pretty full, so we settled in the back of the plane and began to get comfortable for our 7:20 AM departure. And then, we met . . . Joe-Bob (not his real name).

Joe-Bob was your classic good-old-boy, traveling with his wife to do some fishing in Florida.  He was situated on the aisle seat in the last row, across from Janet and behind Phil’s mom-in-law (whom we’ll call “Mom” for short).  Joe-Bob was boisterously cheerful, which should have been our first warning sign.  We determined that it was probably Joe-Bob’s first flight and he was trying to hide his trepidation.  For the moment, he was succeeding with the aid of a stiff drink or two.  Joe-Bob’s parents and cousins were on another Southwest flight from KCI to Ft. Lauderdale. They were on separate flights since he and his wife booked later and ours was the cheaper flight.  Joe-Bob’s wife chatted via cell-phone with his family in the next plane over, which departed just before our flight pushed back.  We watched maintenance people come on the plane, go into the flight deck, and then go back outside.  This is rarely a good sign.  Eventually, the passengers on our plane were all boarded and settled, but maintenance people continued to frequent the flight deck.  After a brief delay, the pilot said that our plane wasn’t going anywhere, but that we would board the plane that had just arrived from Dallas and had parked at the gate beside us.  (The gate vacated by Joe-Bob’s relatives a bit earlier.)

Shamu at KCI, not our plane (or Joe-Bob’s relative’s plane) but the one on the other side of us.

Joe-Bob wasn’t amused with this development, but his wife calmed him down and we all went back into the terminal.  After maybe fifteen minutes, we were boarded onto the new plane.  Plane #2 pushed back, then didn’t go anywhere.

Oh-oh.

The maintenance guys came out and opened the cowling of the right engine.  After about 20 minutes they fixed the problem, and the pilot made an announcement that they’d have to go back to the gate to “fill out the paperwork.”  Joe-Bob was now officially ON EDGE.  Quietly at first, but with steadily increasing volume, he launched into a tirade featuring the F-bomb every third or fourth word.  “I want off this f’ing plane.  I want off right now.  F*** it.  I need a f’n cigarette.  Get me off of this f’n plane.”  Meanwhile, Southwest finally figured out that maybe it would be easier to bring the paperwork out to the plane versus pull the plane back into the gate, and we finally took off about 1.75 hours after our scheduled departure time.

Our Southwest flight was scheduled to stop in Tampa before terminating in Ft. Lauderdale.  After we got through delay #1, plane change, and delay #2, the flight from KC to Tampa went smoothly.  The flight attendants didn’t publicize that they were giving free drinks, but if you ordered a drink, it came and they weren’t asking for payment.  Given Joe-Bob’s state of mind, I suppose the flight attendants weren’t sure whether or not to give him more whiskey, but they did—five of them in all.  Janet’s dad, on the other hand, partook of a single scotch on the rocks before 10 AM—not his usual routine.

When we started the descent to Tampa, Joe-Bob’s insecurities (and his affection for F-bombs) arose again. “I want off this f’n plane.  F***.  I need a f’n cigarette.  F*** it.  Are we in FL yet?  F***.”   Joe-Bob’s volume was again increasing as he became more and more agitated.  But this time, he varied his routine by repeatedly getting up out of his seat (the fasten-seat-belt signs are, of course, on).  Phil leaned over to Janet and asked “I wonder if Joe-Bob will be leaving us in Tampa?”

When we landed in Tampa and parked at the gate, the galley truck moved up and they opened the rear galley door to resupply. Joe-Bob might have made it to Ft. Lauderdale if he had just settled down (and sat down) at that point.  The woman traveling with him kept telling him that he had one more flight to go but Joe-Bob insisted on getting off.  With the plane’s rear galley door now open, Joe-Bob saw an opening (literally) and tried to go out the galley door.  They frown on that sort of thing as a rule.  The flight attendant said he would have to go out the front. Joe-Bob insisted that he needed to get off the plane.  The flight attendant, who had been amazingly patient with Joe-Bob to this point, agreed to let him off the plane, and said “Follow me.” She led him up the aisle and out the front door where the friendly Tampa police officers were waiting to have a chat with him.  A few moments later, one of Tampa’s Finest came back to get a statement from the flight attendant.  This was probably only the start of Joe-Bob’s very, very bad day.

Sans Joe-Bob and his partner, we departed Tampa and landed without further incident in Ft. Lauderdale.  We arrived at the ship around 2:30.  As we boarded the Seven Seas Mariner, Phil and Janet were delighted to be welcomed back by name by Lynn, the Regent “Future Cruise Consultant” with whom we’d booked this cruise, and by one of the waiters who was handing out the champagne glasses.  He said he remembered serving us in the dining room on the last cruise.  We were amazed that people remembered us!  As we walked around the ship later on, more and more crew would come up to us, shake our hands and welcome us back.  And, yes, we remembered most of them, too!

Our suite

When we arrived at our respective suites we were greeted with a beautiful tropical floral arrangement, a bottle of Veuve Clicquot champagne, a coupon for a free 8 x 10 photograph and a beautiful red silk covered jewelry box (with a drawer in it) of 30 pieces of Leonidas Belgium chocolates (which retails for $48).  Each of the suites had $700 in shipboard credit, too, due to using AmEx Platinum and due to Regent just giving us $400 because of our prior problems in December, 2005. We met our stewardess, Eugenia, from Cali, Colombia.  The situation in our “suite” being well in hand, we headed down to Mom & Dad’s room.

Goodies

The scooter that we ordered for Dad was waiting in their handicap suite (829) and we were down the hall in 877.  Their suite is very close to the laundry room so that will be nice.  The ship left Ft. Lauderdale at 4 PM and Mom promptly wanted their bottle of champagne opened so Phil obliged her!

There was a block party at 6 PM where you were supposed to step in the hall and meet your neighbors.  This hadn’t been done on either of our prior Regent cruises and we thought it was a great idea.  Stewardesses came by with bottles of wine, and it got everyone talking to everyone else.  The couple next door to us is from Ventura, CA and the husband is a WWII army POW.  He had on his bolo tie with the POW holder and that’s what I saw.  I hooked him up with Dad and they traded war stories.

April 28 (Saturday, Day 2, At sea)

I’ve been fighting a cold for the past five days and still have it so am kind of lethargic.  However, after breakfast outside on the back of the ship Phil and I decided to look for Mom and Dad.  We looked everywhere (except for the hospital) and finally just gave up.  As it happens, they were in the naturalist’s lecture on sea life.  During our search we went in the theatre, but somehow missed Dad on his scooter in the aisle and Mom in the seat next to him.  Anyway, everyone was having fun and that’s all that mattered.

We received an invitation to join the Food and Beverage Manager Dominique Nicolle (male, French) for dinner that night.  Mom got all dressed up in formal attire but 20 minutes before dinner, she felt seasick so she stayed in her room.  The rest of us had a good time, though.  We found that Dominique started out as a chef and is now in charge of a staff of 211, including the executive chef and the executive housekeeper.

April 29 (Sunday, Day 3, At sea)

After breakfast Phil was watching his favorite shipboard channel–the navigation channel that shows a map of where we are and said, “We’re not heading south to Colombia anymore but now we’re going northwest to Jamaica.  We must be having another medical evacuation.”  We went to the front desk and asked.  Sure enough, the front desk had just been informed by the bridge that we were heading towards Jamaica.  So, we’re on our 2nd Regent cruise with a medical evacuation!  Around noon the helicopter from the Jamaica Defence Force hovered over the ship and picked up the man with the bladder blockage, his wife, and a ship’s nurse and took them to Jamaica.  Our port stop in Cartagena, Colombia was canceled but we were told we would make the Panama Canal as scheduled.  Phil and I were thrilled with another day at sea but Mom wasn’t since she was thinking of more seasickness.  (Dramamine proved to work for her, though, so she has been fine after that first bout.)

Air evacuation at sea

Since we used an American Express Platinum card to pay for the cruises, we were invited to a “Back of the House” ship’s tour with Human Resources Manager Vanesa Serafini.  We briefly toured the galley, the officers’ mess (which was small and made me realize that there aren’t many officers on board), the crew’s mess (which was pretty large), the crew bar (very smoky and not too big), and the laundry.  The laundry was hot and humid, crowded and busy.  This was the last stop on the tour, so the nine guests were treated by Regent to a full bar set-up.  (Alcohol is free at all times so it wasn’t that big of deal but did look very out of place in the industrial laundry!)

Food in the galley
Dad, Mom, and Janet in the galley
Ship’s Laundry

The story continues in Part Two, 4/30/07.

Seven Seas Mariner Panama Canal Cruise, 4/27/07-5/12/07

On the heels of our fabulous experience on the Regent Seven Seas Mariner on our Hawaii-Tahiti cruise last year, we eagerly anticipated our next voyage on the Mariner.  That tale is told here, in several parts, as we did for our previous cruise.

Knock on the door to begin your cruise, or do it the old-fashioned text hyperlink way.

Part One, 4/27/07-4/29/07

Part Two, 4/30/07

Part Three, 5/1/07-5/3/07

Part Four, 5/4/07-5/5/07

Part Five, 5/6/07-5/7/07

Part Six, 5/8/07-5/9/07

Part Seven, 5/10/07-5/12/07

Orange cauliflower. Mmmmmmm.

Understanding orange cauliflower may lead to more nutritious crops[*1] :

While orange cauliflower may seem unappealing to some, it has distinct nutritional advantages. Now, Cornell researchers have identified the genetic mutation behind the unusual hue. The finding may lead to more nutritious staple crops, including maize, potato, rice, sorghum and wheat.

Right Said Fred

Fred’s too sexy for his show[*1] , too sexy for his show, too sexy . . .

WASHINGTON – Republican Fred Thompson took the first formal step toward a widely expected bid for the presidency, establishing a preliminary campaign committee on Friday.

The “testing the waters” committee allows Thompson — a former Tennessee senator and actor best known for his film and television roles, including as a prosecutor on NBC’s “Law & Order” — to raise money, hire staff and gauge support without officially committing to a White House bid and without having to publicly disclose donations or expenditures.

Too sexy[*2] .

(See, ’cause he’s “on the right” and his name is Fred.  IT’S FUNNY!!![*3] )

[*1] http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070601/ap_on_el_pr/fred_thompson_1
[*2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I%27m_Too_Sexy
[*3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Eye_Creatures