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One of the greatest accomplishments a teacher can achieve is to be able to postively influence and mold their students into being someone successful and happy. The second greatest benefit is to be able to travel and experience the world outside the classroom! The Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation made that possible for me and 56 other teachers this summer. I enjoy traveling and experiencing new things and to combine that with my love of teaching just made this trip much more exciting.I have been teaching science is a rural school district in lower Delaware for the past three years. I am the District's science chairperson and was just nominated the Y2K teacher of the year. My school will soon be torn down and a new school put in its place. I assisted in the design of the new science rooms to make sure plenty of lab space and other resources are abailable to enhance inquiry-based and hands-on science instruction. In addition to my duties mentioned above, I am also a member of the school improvement process program (the first in the state) and work at the the state Department of Education level on designing performance indicators to assist in teaching in accordance with state and national science standards. I have also been in the US Air Force Reserve since 1992 and am the Officer-In-Charge of the Reserve Intelligence Office at Dover Air Force Base, Delaware. I currently live just 100 meters from where I teach; in the little town of Delmar, DE, just 40 minutes from the Atlantic Ocean. I spent my first 18 years of my life growing up on farms in the mountains of western Maryland. The other "missing" years were spent all over the states. I have traveled to most of the countries in Europe and travelled to several countries in the Middle East, Central and South America. My most recent endeavor as been the submission of my astronaut application with the aspiration of one day being able to teach students from space.
Now back to my expedition to Costa Rica. I submitted my application to WWNFF and teamed up April McCrae, a friend and science teacher from Dover, DE. We were accepted and immediately planned for the trip. The trip was funded by the National Science Foundation. With shots and passport in hand, we left for "pura vida" which means to the locals in Costa Rica, the "pure life".
The locations we spent most of our time, Palo Verde, La Selva and Las Cruces, were all under the guise of the Organization for Tropical Studies (OTS). OTS does an excellent job of mainitaining the areas and facilities at these locations. Should you require any additional information about the WWNFF, NSF, OTS or of the three sites, just click on the names above. If you have any questions for me, just e-mail me by clicking here.
The following is my personal journal of my trip to the three locations. I highly recommend this program for all science teachers who wish to expand their knowledge base on rain forest and global environmental issues as well as inquiry based learning. With "Mucho Gusto" I give this to you!
MY JOURNAL OF "PURA VIDA"
BY BILL MILLS

INTRODUCTION: This journal primarily focuses on my personal reflections of my experiences to the “pure life” country and in some areas concentrates on the benefits and disadvantages of human factors which influence the forested areas of Costa Rica. This will hopefully give insights to future visitors to the three stations.
THE TRIP TO PALO VERDE
Just cruising’ down the Pan
American highway!!

What an experience to view the beautiful landscape and contrast it with the drive out to Paulo Verdi from San Jose. Just before we left, we got to go to Volcan Poas (pictured above), an active volcano. On the way, we observed at least three accidents in the few hours we spent driving on the paved roads. Everything from small cars to 18-wheelers filled with flammable liquids seemed to be trying to position themselves for the Indy 500. The frequent stops made included fruit stands, modern gas stations and a small town to pick up “supplies.” The last portion of the trip was on several miles of dirt roads through rice fields and wooded areas. During the entire journey observations were made of incredible vistas, delicious fruits, and an astonishing amount of flora and fauna normally only seen in literature.
PALO VERDE

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My First Look: Sometimes it’s nice to be the first inhabitants of a new building. With electricity just pumped in a few weeks ago, the new “hotel WWNFF” was in business: six mosquito-netted beds to each of the 5 rooms; a lab area; a classroom; and, four toilet/shower rooms located adjacent to the facility. Food is served family-style and is the best “fixin’s” Costa Rica has to offer. It’s absolutely fabulous! But the mosquitoes……whew!!!!!!!!!The facility lies at the base of a mountain and in front of a flat basin, which leads to the Rio Tampeika. Iguanas are crawling all over the place and the resident staff, as expected, are very friendly. The area that we stayed was in a second-growth forest which used to be a cattle ranch. The amazing speed at which some of the plants grow would lead one to believe this was still the original forest. Clearing the land and letting it re-grow leads to the introduction of non-native species, which was observed in several areas. Also, the presence of shade-intolerant plant species will eventually give rise the larger tree species and the shade tolerant plants in the near future.

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Our first outing was along a dirt road towards the Rio Tampeika. Within five minutes of the walk, we saw several species of exotic birds, trees, bugs and spiders. Perhaps the most interesting observation was the symbiotic relationship between a species of ant (with a bad sting) and the acacia tree. The ants attack almost all creatures coming in contact with the tree and clear the ground under the tree of any other plant. The tree provides the ants food, which is secreted through their leaves and the ants live in the thorns of the tree. The only other living organisms in the tree are birds, such as the oriole, who have tricked the ants in believing they are part of the tree. One interesting observation was the presence of large, beautiful dragonflies, which followed our group and stopped when we stopped. I believe the dragonflies were waiting for us to kick-up insects or attract mosquitoes for their dinner. It was sort of like a short-term symbiotic relationship. I guess one amazing fact that amazed me as much as the forest is the plethora of knowledge possessed by our faculty on this trip. It seemed they knew almost everything there was to know about the forest and kept our group informed by providing explanations but also asking thought provoking, inquiry based questions to help us also to better understand the area around us.
That evening, we went on a night hike to hopefully observe frogs native to the area. Unfortunately, only two were spotted; one on the road which leaped into forest before it could be studied and another, rather large tree frog who could not be coaxed out of the tree no matter what was attempted. The most intriguing observation noted was the “diamond” shine a spider’s eyes gave when a light is shined upon them.Day Two: Today, we had the pleasure of spending the morning with Aocanio Gonzales, the naturalist here at Palo Verde. I found it hard to believe that this area has a six month dry season; dry as in no rain, little humidity and lots of wind. He stated that Costa Rica has less than one percent of it’s dry forest area remaining and we were in the largest area. The primary reason, obviously, was human interdiction in the forms of deforestation, development, cattle grazing areas. A natural occurrence, fire, was marginally responsible for the decrease. This concern is unique to the concerns we have in Delaware regarding the depletion of the wetlands, but not on the scale for the concern here. The wetlands have their own unique important traits just as the dry forest has. The main part of the forest is from secondary growth and is about 20 years old and used to be a pasture. The dry forest contains several types of wood, such as rosewood, mahogany, and teak, which is/was heavily exploited for human use. As we trekked our way through the forest to the top of a limestone cliff, Gonzales stopped on several occasions to educate us on important features in the forest. The issue regarding the large area of rice fields surrounding the part was addressed. This significantly decreased the nesting area of birds and commented that the proprietors of the fields use loud “cannons” to scare off any birds who wish to consume the rice. Gonzales said that there are [only] 700 species of plants in the dry forest; which I though was a high amount. However, compared to the number of species in the rain forest, well over 2,000, it seemed rather small. The most important types of plants are the legumes, which have a variety of natural and artificial uses, and thrive in the deep, rich, alkaline soil of the dry forest. We had an opportunity to observe an africanized bee hive; where native honeybees mated with the African “killer” bees and produced nasty, aggressive honey-makers. Next, we studied a pochute [strong] tree; a tree lined with large spines and used for making door and window frames. Gonzales speculated about the significance of the spines, which may have been used long ago to prevent large ground sloths from climbing the tree. We then saw a naked indian or “tourist” tree, which has peeling red bark and chlorophyll laden bark underneath. Supposedly, if you take the bark and set it in water overnight and drinking it, it will relieve some kidney problems. Next, we looked at a sudo bumbar, or sabo tree that has green patches of photosynthetic bark on its exterior. This tree bulges out at the bottom from storing water for dry seasons. One of the two most important trees, I thought, were the next discussed. Gonzales discussed the cow tree and how it’s milky sap and berries can be consumed by people, its leaves can be eaten be livestock and its wood can be used to make almost anything. I wonder why this tree isn’t used for mass production such as pines and orchid tress since it’s usefulness is so great! The second most intriguing tress species was the “tree of life”. Found only in dry forests, as well as the cow tree, it has a specific gravity of 1.3 and sometime greater, which causes it to sink in water. It is considered one of the hardest, if not the hardest, wood in the world. It can be used to make ball bearings and hammer heads. It also produces a chemical that cures the sexually transmitted disease syphilis. As we continued our journey, we observed the chicklet tree; the tree where the sap used to produce a very common gum and is only found in the dry forest areas. We finally reached the summit of the limestone cliffs and were rewarded with a spectacular view of the Rio Tempesque river valley. The cliffs were actually coral reef formations from long ago and were uplifted by the Earth’s dynamic forces. Interestingly, during the dry season, all of the water flowing down the river is used up for agriculture. This causes heavy tidal currents, some as high as several feet, to come up the river. After our little siesta, we headed back down and got a tour of the OTS facility; which was nice because the library, open 24 hours a day, has air conditioning!
That afternoon, we took several minutes to go out and come up with 50 questions and anything that came to mind. This was very fun; just sitting out in the forest contemplating life and watching a thunderstorm move in on us. When completed, we all sat in a group and formulated questions around our questions and approached each question from an adaptive significance question and an experimental hypothesis to determine how to best answer the original question. I applauded this technique because I felt it helped to answer questions related to the nature of science, an important national science standard our students must learn. Three areas during our discussion of questioning were evolutionary adaptations, accurate hypothesis/null hypothesis, and testable issues. Afterwards, we completed an inventory of the material boxes. The items in the boxes are to be used to conduct our field studies.
We then discussed a management issue involving group dynamics. Came to a general consensus on a full value contract. The contract issues related to democratic decision making, flexibility to individual needs, effort, collaboration, respect of others and equipment, cooperative attitudes, clear communications, support, positive attitudes, planned and agreed upon endings, commitment, compassion, complaints with alternatives, support the “golden rule”, and “only one microphone”.Sunday evening we started conceptualizing our projects and what our responsibilities will be. Basically, we compromised on three basic areas of research: habitat structure vs. species composition; plant/herbivore interactions; and, a dry forest management issue, which involved the controlled use of cattle to control an African species of grass. Later in the evening, with libations in hand, we were enchanted with lovely songs and guitar playing by Jim “Jimbo” Cole and Ted Styles.
Lets’s Start the Projects!!! Today is the day we finally get down and dirty with our research. We divided up into three teams, just a little difference than last night (the habitat structure was changed to wetland management). I had a difficult time deciding which group to choose. My team partner, April, thought it would be a good idea if we work on two different problems and get double the benefit. So, she decided to work on the plant/herbivore project and I decided to work on the dry forest management issue. I know that April will have a great time, she came up and told me soon afterward that she gets to run up to the limestone cliffs six or seven times. I think she’s going to be very sore! Anyhow, my group consisted of four great, enthusiastic folks: Diana from Texas; Jim from Louisiana; Melanie (who I met out in Colorado last year) from North Carolina; and, Barbara from Hawaii. We kicked off our first meeting and it went off like a fuse. We brainstormed issues and came up with an excellent game plan, which impressed our wonderful staff member, Phillip Hansen, who will lead us into the deep, cattle trotted areas of the dry forest. I knew that our group would do very well. We decided on four different areas to discuss and then break those areas down into priorities we can achieve in the short time we had to complete the project. They involved issues surrounding the density of organisms, the diversity of organisms, the interactions between organisms and the aboitic influences of the areas we will be investigating. We decided we will approach three different sites and collect data on the number/type of trees and the percentage of grass coverage. If there were time, we would also collect insect samples using a sweep net. We will be conducting research at three sites: one site which has controlled burning; one that has controlled burning and cattle foraging; and, one that has only been foraged by cattle (no fire). We managed to squeeze some time in before lunch to conduct research in the OTS library (the a/c felt good!). I found some interesting articles from past OTS experiences and I particularly liked perusing the back issues of past OTS class “yearbooks” and reading about their very interesting experiences. With a belly full of rice and beans and our game plan and materials in hand, we ventured out with Phillip, our fearless leader, to try to find our research sites. After a lot of hiking and riding we found two sites to complete our investigation but time was running out and we had to return back. Unfortunately we didn’t make it back in time for our afternoon meeting; I guess some concerns were vented regarding decision making and scheduling concerns.
Monday evening, we were given a lecture from the director of the park, Mr. Geraldo Barbosa, who said some kind words about us being here and then led into a discussion about the area around us. He concentrated his lecture on the very same issue our little team was conducting research about: the use of cattle to control the invasive grass species. He used slides to show several beautiful images of the park and provided data in the form of graphs to show the success he has had with the inclusion of cattle in the dry forest. He also mentioned that the four months of the wet season is when the cattle are present in the dry forest. The remaining time they are transported into the wetlands to consume the invasive cattails. Also present at the lecture was Mr. Manual Guernos, whose cattle are used for this program. Both gentlemen gave valuable insight into this important management issue involving the successful interaction between the socio-economic and environmental concerns of a developing country. I applaud these individuals for successfully making a difference in this increasingly difficult endeavor.
With our minds filled and our bodies tired, we headed out to the front porch for relaxation and more tunes on the guitar.
Data Day: OK. Here we go. We collect our tools and head on out. We bid another group a fond adeau (their heading off on a boat trip to see some crocs) and literally packed seven people in a six-person jeep. Phillip decided to choose optional sites to conduct our fieldwork so we don’t travel as far today. We marked off our first site and headed off to the other site. Once found, Phillip and the driver left us to fend for ourselves. We all did well. A few minor disagreements and a lot of sweat were all we lost. We were lucky because of all the killer bees and wasps in the area, no one got stung. The work was hard but enjoyable. Well, I’ll save all the details for our lab report. Disappointed that I didn’t see any snakes.
We returned and found everyone hard at work on their projects; I kind of felt giulty but then realized that their collection requirements were quite different from ours. We worked well getting the report started. Since I am pretty good with PowerPoint, I went ahead and put the site maps I drew on the computer; they turned out nice. We then had a group meeting with “Jimbo” preciding and I found out that there were actually four study groups instead of three; they went ahead and had a herbaceous plant study. Well, tomorrow I’m going on the “croc” trip and Thursday we’re going to swim at a waterfall!!!! Can’t wait.Boy, the mosquitoes are bad tonight! After dinner, Ted gave us a slide presentation on protective coloration and mimicry. Incredible pictures. Thought I’d play with the PhotoDeluxe software and was able to acquire my digital pictures as well as the camera brought here by the faculty. Lots of folks liked what they were seeing and asked if I could save them pictures on their personal disk. I can see that I’m going to be busy the next couple of weeks! Well, my group is going take it easy tonight and we’ll hit out project hard after our boat trip.
Wow! Here it is; Wednesday already. Can’t believe I’ve been gone for a week. Well we got up o’darkearly to venture out on our “African Queen” voyage. Hopefully, we’ll see more crocks than the last group. We have to leave so early because if you want to see the big ones, you have to get on to the river at low tide. Well, nine of us hop in the boat and within a few yards down river we spot our first crock. It was a successful trip. Altogether, we must have seen at least 15 of them. We also saw several species of birds, incredible large iguanas, four types of mangrove trees and lots of fish jumping out of the water. We headed back about two hours later to start getting our presentations and research papers completed. It was a semi-difficult task but we got it done. At lunch, 5 had the chance to visit with some high school students lodged at the OTS site. They arrived last night. I made mention to Phillip that I thought it would be a good idea to invite the students over to watch our presentations. He thought it was a great idea so they said OK. The rest of the afternoon was used to put the final touches on our projects.
The Presentations. We were fortunate to be the first group to go. We did great. The students, who we found represent the top one percent of their class, asked a lot if intelligent, thought provoking questions. I enjoyed the time spent with the students but some teachers were a bit apprehensive. Anyhow, all of the other presentation went well also. Afterwards, we threw a party for Ted, who was leaving the next day. We had cake, ice cream, soda, beer and tequila. The local help joined in the festivities and it was a great time.
Thursday. Unfortunately, we had an accident by one of my teammates sometime after the party last night. She was climbing down a later and fell and broke two ribs. She was sent to a hospital two hours away for x-rays and observation. Hopefully she will still be able to stay with us. This cancelled our trip to Santa Rosa and a local town but hopefully we can still make it to the waterfalls this afternoon.
Later that day: Well, the hospital decided to keep Diana over night for observation so we didn’t get to go to the waterfalls. I did manage to get a hike in and we got to review our 20-hour commitment and TORCH program stuff. Afterwards, we got all packed up and ready for our long trip out to La Selva.
ADIOS PALO VERDE
OLA LA SELVA

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So bittersweet. I loved Palo Verde but now we must move on. We presented our wonderful cooks/cleaners with a card and monetary donations from the group. They were wonderful cooks and great people. Surprisingly to us, we actually left the park 15 minutes early! The U.S. to send Costa Rica some type of “road aid” because the shape of some of these roads leave quizenarts blushing. We stopped at tourist town outside of the Arenal volcano and I of course had to try a Cuban cigar. You should have seen the look on some of our folk’s faces when I stepped onto the bus with it. “You’re not going to smoke that on the bus are you? Yea, right. Anyhow, we saw some spectacular views of the active volcano and none as great as from the hot springs we siestaed at. After paying a negotiated fee, we all headed into the springs; it felt absolutely wonderful, particularly since we had no hot water at Palo Verde. He had a great lunch and watched steaming lava rocks tumble down the volcano. Awesome! The only bad thing is that I cut my big toe and had to get it patched up; still fully functional, though. Well, all good things must come to an end so we were back on the road again to our next destination. We saw spectacular rivers, three toed sloth, more monkeys and the drastic change in biomes.

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We pulled in through the [armed] guard gate (how interesting) at about 6pm. Wow, what a difference. We got our stuff in our rooms and went to the cafeteria for dinner. First, we noticed that there were several other groups/researchers here and that the food was, well, not nearly as good as it was in Palo Verde. But they have hot showers here! After dinner, we got an indoc from the staff here and then went on a night hike. We observed frogs (all kinds, even a poison dart frog), big spiders and big bugs. Then we called it a night and went to bed. I can’t believe I actually got cold!Day One at La Selva: I finally got a chance to call home. Always nice to talk to the family when you’re so far away. This morning was blocked for a several-hour hike through the area. I went with a group headed by Jaime Albarado. I never realized how common those poison dart frogs until I saw about two dozen this morning (they make a sound like a cricket). We saw: leaf cutter ants (and their 20 yr old hill), large momosa trees (they make up about 22% of the trees here), wild almond trees (macaws eat the nuts), a tarantula hawk (a big, bright emerald-green wasp), and emerging tree over 600 yrs old (now endangered), protien tree (2nd most common, flammable even alive and smells like paint thinner), monkey’s ladder (a vine), a poroma leaf (also called a sand leaf because it can be used like sand paper), a monkey’s brush ( a seed pod that looks like a round brush head), a sandbox tree (a large tree used to make dugout canoes and its sap is poisonous), spider monkeys, a coutamonde, a agoutae (a rodent-like animal), rubber and cocao trees, black river turtles and last but not least, a mimic hog-nosed viper (finally got to see a snake!). It was a great hike, I just hope the digital pictures turn out. I started relating this experience to the excitement and anticipation expressed in the movie “Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory”!
That afternoon, a bunch of the folks finally got to wash clothes in a real washing machine! That, along with the hot shower, is a real treat we definitely take for granted back in the states. Anyhow, after our siesta we went to the “bug lab” and got briefed on how OTS collect, categorize and preserve insects they catch here. I was very impressed with the high-tech methods they employ to catalog insects (arthropods) utilizing a program called ALAS. Then we went on a tour of the library and lab area where we will be working. We had a chance to talk with a researcher who climbs into the trees studying epiphytes. She is in the process of placing hundreds of unique sensors she developed to monitor various abiotic factors in the trees. Afterwards, Bill gave us a great class on how to build our web site. I didn’t know it was so easy. With our brains leaking with all this new data, we top it off once again with an ant briefing by “Ant Jim”. His lecture led the group into several research topics, two of which, of course, were ant studies. Other groups consisted of frog studies (my group), bat studies and plant (vermelead) studies, each dealing with a specific sub-topic. Most of us were tired after a hard day and crashed to the sound of rain and thunder.
The next morning we woke up to a downpour, when occurred on and off the entire day. My group of me, Diana, Evelyn (from New York), Stacy (from Texas) and Barbara met with Maura Maple, a researcher here on frog breeding preferences. We decided to assist her with her research and write up our report reflecting how we interacted our research with hers. She was great to work with and she really appreciated our help. So, we started cleaning plants, measured water volumes in some of the plants (in areas called axils), pouring wax into the axils for volumetric measurements and actually taking the measurements. We completed that until lunch, when I borrowed Mora’s bike and traveled down the 4.5 mile bike trail through the forest. It was wonderful but really tired me out. After the trip, we continued work in the lab. That evening, some of us went to watch the bat folks catch bats in special nets. That was pretty neat but I had to leave because our group had to go check some plants along the bike trail for Ctenids (spiders), suspected predators of the frog tadpole we were studying. It was interesting but we got caught in one of the many unanticipated downpours they get here. Saw and collected some interesting spiders and a neat looking bug which we still have yet to identify.
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Monday, Jul 26. I had to put the date in the journal because here you occasionally forget what day it is. What a great thing to do once in a while. So today, we continued to work with Maura and consolidating some of the data. Later we went out to a research area and collected more data and got caught in a major (unexpected) downpour and had to cut the collection short. I dragged my tired, wet body into a Global Information System (GIS) used here. It was pretty cool because the program maps out practically every square meter of La Selva. It also has various spectral images and other data, such as soils, vegetation and slope/elevation data. Then we got another class from Bill on how to incorporate photo into a web page, which was followed by a group discussion on an article about environmental unknowns.After dinner we received a briefing on La Selva and OTS from the curator here. Afterwards, my team got together and started writing up our project.
Our Last Day Here: Well, it’s raining again. Surprise, surprise!! Well, all of us our trying to put the finishing touches on our projects and presentations and finishing up our web pages. Should be an in-house day.We worked with Maura with some last minute touch-ups and our team was ready for our presentation. We had an interesting lecture on a long-term project relating to the uptake and discharge of carbon in the environment and its global implications. Afterwards, we completed our presentations (all went well) and headed back to the cabins for a small celebration with libations and a Cuban cigar.ON THE ROAD AGAIN…………
Well, here we go again; another several-hour journey practically from one side of the country to the other. We head out (in the pouring rain) a little after 7am on Jul 29th. Along the way, we stopped at a facility that takes folks on a tram (cable car) ride to the rain forest canopy. It was very interesting and I spotted a tree viper in one of the trees. Gotta love those snakes. Afterwards, we hit the road and traveled cross-country for a nice respite, courtesy of WWNFF, called the Playa De Arco.

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We pulled into an environmentally sound villa just in time to see the sunset over the pacific; a first for me. The place was incredible; made of wood from where it was built, solar and hydroelectric powered, and great, locally grown and caught food. It also had rain forest trails and a nice walkway to the beach. On the beach, there were waterfalls, caves and plenty of waves. We spent the morning (the next day) surfing in the ocean. I got to see another kind of poisonous dart frog; this one was bright green and black. It was a wonderful time for all of us. By 1:30pm, we were headed to Las Cruces, a four hour drive down pot-holed roads.

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LAS CRUCES
A MID-EVEVATION RAIN FORESTWe arrive at our last research site late in the evening of the 30th. Got settled in and basically repeated the same routine. This place is located in a mountainous area in southern Costa Rica. Part of Las Cruces is a botanical garden, complete with exotic and native plants. Lots of nice trails take you through rough terrain and to beautiful waterfalls. My new team decided to do water quality tests at a local river. It was wonderfully pristine in the forest but as you approached a local town it became increasingly polluted by industries and agricultural runoff. Unfortunately, our journals had to be handed in during this leg of the journey so I couldn't give a complete account of this site. It is just as wonderful as La Selva but it's located in an area almost always within the clouds. It's like a constant mist, like a fog, surrounding you. Just another incredible site but unfortunately it's our last site where we have to bid a fond and sad adios to my teammates.

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Well, as I close this journal, I can't help to look back and reflect on the new experiences, visions and friends I now possess. There's only one other thing that compares: you gotta do it yourself!!Warm regards to all,
Bill Mills
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