Hey everybody,

 I enjoyed the comment on my vampire piece by fellow blogger Calliope.  Enjoy.

[Regarding vampires' teeth, see below ] That is a very likely solution to this quandary. However, you should also consider the possibility that blood is a very base fluid that would not counter act the acidity of saliva, (which I think vampires would produce because as humans they would have produced it, though I doubt that the need any help digesting)and therefore the acid in the saliva would rot their teeth, so any teeth that we would see would be dentures, and of course those can come in any shape and length.

More later,

I woke up the other day wondering why vampires in movies sometimes have longer teeth, sometimes shorter.    Consider, the Cullen clan from the Twilight saga have fangs that are barely longer than normal human teeth,  whereas the blood-suckers from the Underworld movies have really long canines.  Other movies continue the trend. The original Dracula?  Long fangs.  Dark Shadows?  Medium fangs. There seems to be no standard length for vampires.  Even within the movies there is variation.  In Underworld,  the lead character's rival has significantly longer teeth than she does.  There must be some explanation.  Now all these vampires share the same diet, and, considering the whiteness of the teeth, all attend to oral hygiene.  So what is the difference?  Genetics doesn't seem to offer much of a lead;  how do vampire genes even get passed along?  By bites?  Then I thought maybe there was some sort of baby-teeth/ adult-teeth thing going on,  but we never see them trying to wriggle out a loose tooth, hoping the tooth fairy will visit their coffin.  The answer did not occur to me until I saw a friend's pet gerbil.  These pets, along with many other mammals, constantly gnaw to keep their continuously-growing teeth from getting too long.  This must be the explanation for vampires.  Those canines of theirs must be constantly getting longer, and different movies catch them in various stages of growth.  Having an all-liquid diet, the vampires must be chewing on wood when humans aren't around.  This explains why so many vampires live in the forest.  It also makes sense that humans are always killing vampires with wooden stakes: there must be dozens of sharpened sticks lying about.  And perhaps that's why vampires leaves their coffins; they've chewed a hole right through it and need to find a new one.

Day 4

The continuing, and now ending, account of the Ruta de Maya race.

I lost a bet on the above sentence.  After we got back from the Ruta de Maya, I was sitting at my desk arguing about it with my teammate, Lucia.    "Jonathan," she said,  "You acted as if you had a lot more canoeing experience than you did before the start of the race, and I just think you should admit that. "
This was an accurate charge,  but I decided a counter-allegation would be better than admitting the truth.
"Well, Miss Lucia,"  I shot back,  "someone had to steer the canoe while you were busy rolling up your sleeves."  Lucia had incurred my wrath during the trip by stopping paddling to ensure that her arms tanned evenly.  "Someone had to make sure we finished the Ruta la Maya,"  I continued.
This small slip in my novice Spanish was not missed by Lucia:  "Its not Ruta la Maya, Jonathan,"  she said,  "Its Ruta de Maya."
Here I should have just admitted my mistake to her; she knows more Spanish than I do.  But sometimes I just have to be right, even when I'm wrong.
"No," I said, "Its Ruta la Maya."  The argument immediately started going back and forth, because if Lucia and I agree on one thing,  its that we like to disagree.  The debate culminated in a bet that whoever was wrong had to buy the other yogurt, which is a real treat for a volunteer on a stipend.  A quick Google search revealed my error.  "There, you see?" Lucia said, pointing at the screen,  "Now you owe me yogurt."  Although there is no arguing with Google, I continued my grousing.  But defeat was inevitable, as my opponent did not fail to point out.
It was several weeks before I had any money to make good.  Again we were sitting at our desks, and I grouchingly drew the money from my wallet and tossed it to her.  "What's this for?" she said.  "For the yogurt," I grumbled.
"No, you can't just give me money, you have to go buy it yourself and give it to me."
"Lucia, just take the money!"
This was something new to argue about.

day 3

The continuing account of the Ruta Maya race:  day three.

Day three was unquestionably the hardest day for me.  After 20+ hours in a canoe together,  little things that normally don't annoy you suddenly take on a level of aggravation normally associated with clouds of black flies or colic-afflicted infants.  Its like being that infamous fourth day that guests are still at your house.  The novelty is starting to wear off, and you've noticed that they take the last cup of coffee without making more.  Anyway, the same thing happens in a canoe, but a lot sooner because you share a physical space approximately the size of an oven.  Of course, the biggest offense in such a situation is any action that prevents you from paddling.  Snack breaks,  refilling a water bottle, or quickly adjusting one's seat is tolerated, but viewed with distaste.  Anything else is grounds for being thrown overboard. Luckily for me, I was sitting in the back of the boat, so no one noticed when I took my hat off to tan my head evenly (who wants a huge tan line across their forehead?) or when I snuck an extra snack.  Fortunately,  Christian charity prevailed and we made to the end of the paddling day without ever repurposing our paddles as clubs.   But that was where the trip got tough.  Previously,  the crews had been camping on open fields, where we had plenty of room.  Now, we were ensconced on about two and half acres between the river and the access road to a nearby village.  The scene was a zoo.  Total strangers pitched their tents, and their laundry, right on top of each other.  We had to clear several people off the truck so we could get our equipment inside.  The smell of marijuana drifted across the whole campsite, but no one, certainly not the detail of law enforcement on hand, seemed to take notice.  As I may have mentioned,  the Ruta Maya is not only a river challenge, but a four day national party.  So the music was blasted, along with a few of the people.  In all this, we had to try make a camp and get dried out before turning in.   The Rutat Maya was three-quarters done, but it was far from over.

the crews

Here are some shots of us at the end of the race!

day 2

There was something extra special about rounding a bend and seeing the finish line of a day's leg of the race.  Even though it was not the end of the whole thing,  there was something rewarding about finishing for the day.  That was why we were so excited when we say a huge rope with  banners stretched across the entire river after eight hours of paddling on day two.  The crowd on the side of river were cheering and waving, the sky was blue, the sun was warm upon the water, and life seemed pretty good.  I turned the canoe from the middle of the river toward the shore.  But something was funny,  there was only one other canoe resting on the bank.  We had rowed hard, but there were over 50 boats, by virtue of athletic crew or better design,  that had simply outpaced us that day.  Then I noticed that the crowd didn't seem... big enough.  My turn had brought us closer to the shore, and now we could here the "fans" more distinctly.  They were shouting for us to keep going.  Cries of "keep is up!" and "you're almost there" drifted across the water.  Turns out that the people of this particular Creole village had simply strung their own line across the water.  Who knows why?  Decoration for their party?  A big practical joke?  A cruel tease?  I'm sorry, but after hours of paddling,  "You're almost there!"  almost always sounds like,  "You have a ways to go!"  which is not encouraging by any means.  We didn't want to almost be there, we wanted to be there.  Until I was there, I didn't want to hear how much farther I had to go. As for the banner-bedecked  rope on the water, that bordered on paddler abuse.
That leads me to another factor about the fans on the side of the river.  While most were generally encouraging, a few were not above lying to your face.  They would tell you how the finish line was close,  even tell you how bends in the river lay between you and your destination.  These bits of information were always wrong.  The raced finished not "four bends" away, but sixteen,  but who's counting?  It was true that it was only "half an hour and your done,"  but only if you counted that half hour ten miles after you spoke to the person.  I admit I may have called these people some names after their advice proved false.
At any rate,  day 2 did finally end, and not terribly long after we mistakenly thought it would.  Ironically, the actual finish line was less gaudy then the faux one, with no flags or banners.   It goes to show that things are not always what they appear.  As for our appearance, it was beginning to deteriorate.  But more one that next time.

day 1

the river was exploding in shouting and a literal stampede of canoes.  The first team to reach the "low bridge" would win a thousand dollars, so every team was sprinting for the that first quarter mile.  I never thought canoes could make the water so rough.  So here we were, three volunteer teachers with four hours's experience of rowing together, and it looked as if we were going to flip and then get run over.  Some canoes did flip, which required some last-second digs into the water to avoid hitting them.  Lucia earned her Indian name "Beautiful Hawkeyes" here, guiding me around tipped boats. I suppose that the low bridge had people we knew among the crowd, but my world had contracted to the 200 feet of water directly in front of my canoe and the thirty feet on either side.  We managed to steer under the bridge, an accomplishment as some canoes actually ended up sideways against the pilings, pinned by the current.  Then we were racing again, trying to maintain position in the pack.  The early morning sun reflected off the water and nearly blinded me, so I had to have Lucia shout "More to the left" or "Right! Right! Right!" from the front.
Day 1 was 49 miles, so I was very anxious if we would even be able to finish.  I simply did not know what our team was capable of.   What should have worried me more, and certainly was Betsy's greatest concern, were the dozens of rapids along our route.  The key to rapids is to keep on paddling. Pulling your oars out of the water robs the boat both of its balance and momentum.  The concept is the same as riding a bicycle: stop peddling, and it becomes a lot harder to stay upright.  But rapids are freaky, and its hard to think about paddling when six inches of water splash over the sides of the boat.  Nonetheless, we did well enough and kept our overall position.  However, after 90 minutes a fork in the river proved too much.  I did not pick a side to follow soon enough and we slammed into the small island in the middle of the river.  I had carefully instructed Betsy and Lucia to "never ever let go of your paddle if we tip."  They held on perfectly.  I promptly let go of my paddle when we tipped, proving that those who teach, can't do.  Four or five boats passed us while we were bailing the boat and getting back in.
Two hours later, this loss of position proved helpful,  we were just catching up to two boats when we came up on a much more dangerous set of rapids.  On the right was a huge dead tree, on the left currents swirled dangerously.  We watched as the two teams attempted the rapids.  The first team took the left and flipped in the current.  The second team took to the right and ended up running their canoe up onto the dead tree, where in promptly broke in half.  We breezed through the middle,  looking up just long enough to see three paddlers clinging to the tree. 
After seven hours of paddling we rounded a bend and were shocked to see the finish line of the first day.  We we were relieved.  I had a headache from steering through rapids, and we were all sore from the long day.  But we were done, and had arrived on our own steam.  It was a good day.