Pacific NW Fish ID Class

[John Rawlings]

We had a GREAT time, even though it wound up being only three of the 7 who said they'd come! :(

A humongous thanks to Brian at Tacoma Scuba for getting this set up and letting us use his classroom. AND ordering pizza!

Bad news - on the way home to the Portland area, stopping for gas at Fort Lewis, I realized my purse was missing. As we started searching the van for it, we discovered I was missing WAY more than just the purse with the cash, (your $$ got stolen, Calvin!) credit cards, Drivers license etc. Laptop, digital camera, Palm pilot, portable DVD player and speakers, etc. About $2000 worth of stuff in all. And the joy of worrying about identity theft now too.

- Janna :(

Folks.....I gotta tell you.....In my opinion Janna got slapped TWICE here - once (mildly) by her own no-show students and then (big-time) by a rotten, no-good #@%^&* thief!

7 people confirmed they were coming and only 3 showed???? Wow! I think that a few folks owe her an apology. She is an outstanding professional who delivers a great product and she deserves far better than that. The members that missed it missed something really unique and special. Hopefully, Brian didn't order pizza for 7 also. I know that sometimes unavoidable things occur, but SURELY not to that many of the folks that were signed up.

I pray that the Police can somehow work a miracle and that Janna will have her things returned to her, but I also wonder how likely she will be to give presentations through NWDC in the future.

Everey now and then I get accused of saying what I'm really thinking.....I know that it will probably piss some people off, but it's just my .02 worth.

- John

[Tangfish]

I got your message Janna, I am soooooo sorry that happened.

I can't believe it. Was there any sign of forced entry into your car? When did it happen, when we were eating? (I'm thinking that you had your camera with you in the water, unless it was another camera). I hope that you have some option such as insurance to help minimize the damage. Of course, there are irretrievable data on your laptop, I can only hope you had a backup somewhere.

This makes me so sad, what a horrible end to an otherwise awesome experience learning from you. I remember being pretty paranoid that we'd get something stolen, especially when we (dave and I) left our stuff on the bench to go swap tanks, I kept thinking someone was going to take off with our lights or regs when the train was going by.

Please let us know if there is anything we can do to help, like contacting the Police (if you haven't already done so) or providing witness/testimony to the insurance company or call the pub across the street from where we parked to see if they saw anything. I know these don't sound like good ideas and they won't help get your stuff back, but I just wish I could help somehow.

Also, I just want to point out that I'm not sure who the other 4 are who didn't make it to the class (I only counted one from this thread, BJ), were the others part of the club or friends of friends? In any event, if Janna is ever willing to teach us (the club) again, Dave and I thought it'd be a good idea if we collected a deposit at the dive shop or something ahead of time.

I'm really sorry Janna, and I hope that making 3 enthusiastic Surveyors out of us makes you feel better, even if it's just a teeny tiny bit.


Calvin

[Tangfish]

Just in case any of you are interested in knowing more about REEF fish surveys and how to get involved. Here's a link to some commonly asked questions (and the answers).