The Republic of Finland

[Robotbeat]

You guys forgot Iceland and Greenland (arguable since it's part of Denmark or something) and Thailand and Disneyland--I mean, uhhh...

[James S]

OH NO! How could we POSSIBLY forget THOSE?

[Cameron]

And don't forget Mexicoland, featuring the world famous ride, montazumas revenge*



*

Seriosly though, allmost all that you saw in the movie was NZ with a few exceptions. They have such a diverse ecosystem there. A little known fact, all four legged animals have been brought to the country by humans. Also, there's no snakes in NZ, though in the "Glow Worm Caves" (never go caving in NZ, they have next to no laws, and if you don't have you wits about you you're screwed) there are eels (our guide told us this just before throwing us into the 32 degree water, the a-hole).

[refractor]

[sandmann]

My dad is a knight in Finland. Seriously. He is Sir Ralf Boer. He got it because he's the CEO of Foley and Lardner, a pretty big law firm, and he is Fiskars' (makes every pair of scissors you've ever used) main representative corporate lawyer.

[PDAFantast]

[Warren]

[PDAFantast]

[sponge]

[Warren]

Well, green is Vermont (taken from French, means green mountain), and yeah, it is green. Massachusetts is mostly dense forest with some scattered farms. There's one large farm down the street from me (when I say large in Massachusetts, that's like a little field you can play frisbee on), it's not operational, and the grass is chest high. It has a line of missing trees in it because of a gasoline pipe line that was installed in the early 90s. Cape Cod is picturesque, but when you live here, you get pretty sick of pictures of lighthouses... We have the Appalachian Mountains, but they aren't the Rockies, Mt. Washington in Vermont is the big one, people go skiing on it. Maine is the green mushy (whatever mushy means) state, not many people live there, the people are actually KIND (New Englanders, must be rude, and you must tell people you are going to meet them somewhere or do something for them and never do it. My sister was to meet a group of friends at the movies today, none of them showed up, why? "Because it's easier to do nothing than something"). Maine people are different, they're slow (Massachusetts people, Connecticut, and Rhode Island, are like, HURRY! FASTER! NOW!), Maine people, they're like "I want to go to sleep". In southern New England, if you go to someone's door and ask for shelter, there's a much better chance that they'll stab you and call the cops. In Maine, they'll take you in as family and stuff. The capital of Maine is Augusta, I've been there several times, what's there? A McDonalds, 2 roundabouts, and a Chinese buffet. THAT'S IT. Portland is bigger, but it's just more lighthouses. There's a lot of uninhabited land in Maine, I went camping there, and there's no one there. Once in a while, you'll see a logging truck doing 100+ mph. Maine is the laid back life, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, and New Hampshire are the rude hurrying people, and Vermont is in the middle. Vermont people are like Swiss people, they go skiing a lot, hiking, and rock climbing. There's actually quite a few Swiss flags in Vermont. Rhode Island, well, I know mostly Woonsocket (sees RICoder laughing), which is a slummish dump rural city, but there's a kickass Chinese Buffet (RICoder, it's on Clinton Street, you should go sometime for dinner, the crab legs are awesome!). The south of Rhode Island is more lighthouses. Connecticut is like Massachusetts, only probably a little more economical, the grass is greener somehow, the cities are smaller, and the state is just more quaint. Massachusetts has 2 big cities (Boston and Worchester). It's mostly suburban with larger rural areas, but those rural areas can be drug infested (like Milford next to me, the drug capital of New England), but other rural areas like Framingham are like, highway cities, they have 1 big highway going through the middle, and is lined with malls, Walmarts, and restaurants. There's also rural areas like Jamacia Plain, where there's a murder more than once a week (yesterday in Jamacia Plain, this 6 year old girl was gunned down while she was sitting on her stoop for no reason). I'm sure the other states have similar areas, like Connecticut's East Hartford. New York is not part of New England as many people think it is. So, Maine is nice, but if you think Massachusetts is frickin' freezing, Maine is REALLY frickin' freezing, they're usually 10F lower than we are, and they have snow ALL the time, while I basically ALWAYS have the mix slush poop. Today was freezing rain/horizontal rain/slush/snow/and ending with rain. New England has some of the world's most unpredictable weather. Really, they can't even tell us what's happening RIGHT now. They never know, and they're always wrong. The jetstream is always through us, so we get crazy unpredictable storms. Moisture from the Great Lakes, cold Canadian air, and warm southern air makes New England weather comical. You ask anyone about New England weather and they'll just go off laughing. So I'd say Vermont is the best, they're overall slower, easier, adventurous, and the state is the most scenic with green mountains, but it's cold up there too (if you can't remember, Vermont is the state to the left, New Hampshire is to the right, yes, even I get them mixed up a lot). Oh, and the absolute most important thing about everything is, Vermont is the only state in the country that allows same-sex marriages. Yup, you absolutely needed to know that.

[edit]He's from Sweden Sponge, I think he knows about shoveling.

[FLiPsTa_G]

Boston represent!...hehe

P.S. Jamaica Plain is PART of Boston...it's not a suburb or anything.

[Warren]

I said Jamaica Plain was rural didn't I? I don't know, I don't have a desire to visit there. Doesn't Lynn have a murder every day too? I remember a while ago, a baby being shot in a random driveby shooting there. Oh, Northampton is awesome, lesbian capital of America! *sees Paul drooling*.

Boston is nice, a trillion Italian restaurants, a million Chinese restaurants. The Big Dig (which is digging big into our pockets! What, like $14+ BILLION dollars, when it was said to be like $500 million!) is quite big. It *starts chuckling* should be finished by 2004.

[sponge]

[Warren]

Pfft, those are nothing compared to the hurricanes, do you remember hurricane Bob? I WAS CAMPING IN A TENT DURING HURRICANE BOB! I remember, trailers tipping over, tents being thrown over trees, stupid people trying to block the wind with umbrellas... I was in a friend's trailer playing Clue the whole time, it was great. On the way home, the radio said there was a tornado on the highway we were on (495), and it was only a few miles behind us. But you know, we haven't had a REAL good blizzard in a long time. I mean, I can't remember the last snow storm that we got like 4+ feet in a day. I remember in elementary school, having snow like mad, feet and feet of it. But now...not even a foot. But I don't like snow, but if we're gonna get it, I'd prefer enough to cancel school (which NEVER happens, I mean, I could on and on about this, but I won't. I'll just say that the school across the street from my school is closed every time, but mine? NEVER).

Oh, and as an example of New England rudeness, my mom's friend said she was going to call about help on a test today, and said exactly what time she was going to call. So my mom made sure that she's be here when she called, rushing and stuff to get here. Did she call? Of course not. But this wouldn't happen in Maine, Maine is like ol' colonial type.

Where do you live Sponge? I live in Mendon, a small town next to Bellingham and Milford, in Blackstone Valley (that's why we're always WAY colder than Boston, we're a valley, but at a high elevation, so we have Worchester temperature with high winds all the time [if the winds are low, they aren't bad because the trees block it]), about 40 minutes from Boston. I just put Boston as where I live because no one obviously knows where any of those places I meantioned are. If you take the upper right corner of Rhode Island, and go straight up til a little before you hit I-495, that's where I live, southeastern corner of Worchester/Middlesex county.

[Warren]

About the Big Dig, the state government has just completed a virtual drive-through of the new tunnels. Here are the links-





The I90-East is the best, there's other cars in it. The graphics though, are HORRIBLE, extremely blocky, no shadowing, textures are monotonous and don't fit (especially on the buildings on I90-East, HORRIBLE!). I mean, I can do a MUCH better job, I know I can, I have! Massachusetts spent $750,000.00 on this! Yup, a wonderful waste of money! And this is on the same day that they cut Boston school funding by 10%, that's $65m from the already tiny budget. $750,000!!!!! ON THIS CRAP!! AHHHH!!!!