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Custheyder

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Everything posted by Custheyder

  1. Perhaps the cache owner could be pursuaded to add a GeoChecker (http://www.geochecker.com/) link so that some of us hundreds of miles away can check our co-ordinates before we jump on a plane and come to claim the FTF! Cust.
  2. I'm a happy chap most of the time. Even more so as "those which cannot be mentioned" have been found and I've recieved some extremely positive feedback and encouragement from the finders by email and in the logs. As to Americanism's that would be the topic of another thread durrnit! I always feel sorry for the folks that come from the place the Scunners Footie Club hail from. Mentioning their City name can get you thrown out and banned from some chat rooms. (Justified in my book! ) No doubt a decision will be made on the topic of the thread eventually. Cust.
  3. I have never said the closure notice was rude, or implied anything derogatory about any moderator. There are threads all over the forum in general announcing caches and there are even threads in here that announce them or are trying to generate interest before they are published. The difference being they didn't place a link and have not been closed. Just because something doesn't happen very often does not make it obvious that it is not allowed. It does happen though, obfuscating the illegality even more. What you lot do with goats in your spare time is your own business, but I'm pretty sure it's illegal!!! Again the purpose of this thread is to suggest the posting of local rules as a pinned topic and to suggest a slightly different approach to escalating infringements before a thread closure. De-railing a thread away from it's original topic is documented as as "Don't" in the general rules. Cust.
  4. I'm still here and posting, so no real harm done, but then I have a thick skin. "Specifically aimed at publicising" ... now that's where I take issue over my locked thread as it that was not the case at all. It was me getting over excited about publishing my first caches and looking for a sense check from a wider audience of the listing. Not many are going to jump on a boat or plane to come and do mine here in the Isle of Man, so publicising them is pointless to me. The locals spot them quick enough on their own! No option was given to "edit it away". It was locked, end of. That I do any way, which is why I didn't start a thread about general guidelines for listing. This is the point of the thread I've started here. Discussing what happened to my last thread was not the intention. The problem is the "local rules" which the regulars know but the new posters have no way of knowing. It is those I feel should be right at the very top of the pinned list and the reason for starting the thread. If people ignore them, then it's their own fault if they run foul of the rules. If the rules are no where to be found then it's not the posters fault if any of the unwritten local rules are infringed. My thread didn't contravene any of the Groundspeak forum rules, which are published and I have read. Something for the moderators and powers that be to discuss between themselves. I'm only bringing it to your attention as a possible sparking point for trouble in the future. Cust.
  5. There are many threads of that type already ... you only need to use the search facility. I read most of them before setting my first caches. I asked for a look-see to reassure myself that I had included everything that these posts suggested. What I intended to do with this thread is expose the unwritten rule land mines that can catch a poster out and see if they can't become written. I could take offense at being sanctioned over a rule that is not an official rule. I'm not though because in general it is a sensible "guideline" not to promote your own caches. The forum would quickly fill with people advertising their latest and greatest. It is unfortunate that such a guideline does not help a new cache placer looking to pick the brains of the collected wisdom here about the quality of their listing. Most of us are capable of spotting the difference between a genuine post and a blatant advert with a poor excuse. Take each post on merit. If it's of no interest, leave it to fall off the bottom of the page would be another suggestion. Cust.
  6. I honestly don't want to go into the specifics that prompted me to post this request. It's not about that. Granted it's taken a shine off my enthusiasm, but my toys are still within my pram It's about saving other new posters from making the same mistake, and suggesting a slight modification to the policing methods of the forum. I own a forum of my own and I am involved with a very large forum on power kiting. Flame proof boxers come as standard. A simple set of Do's and Don'ts goes a long way in my experience. If the topic is pinned then moderators can always point at it and say "Sorry, but it is written in the rules posted at the top, please correct the infringement or we'll have to lock the thread or even delete it." This I have found to be far easier to accept by posters than an "unwritten rule" which requires a crystal ball. Thanks for posting the FAQ's and General Rules, they don't mention the infringement that prompted this thread, that I can see. However I admit I have not read every word. For those that were inadvertently offended by my other thread... sorry. Cust.
  7. Not to start anything controversial, just a simple request. Could the unwritten rules of posting to this forum please be written down and pinned at the top so that new posters don't get the legs blown off their threads when they accidentally step on one in their enthusiasm to post some news or a landmark in their geocaching life. May I also suggest that thread locking is a last resort and that a pm from a moderator about a rule breach would give the poster a chance to rectify their error by editing their thread with minimum confrontation. I feel that a psychic ability to "know" the rules of posting should not be a pre-requisit. In my opinion, if it's unwritten then it's not a rule. Some thoughts for everyone to consider and a request for clarity. Cust.
  8. I've used magnets on one of the hides listed. I have another setup with magnets which is really evil. Saved from Ruin I couldn't place a reasonable size on site, but found a good spot just off site so used the multi cache option. The Vicar was keen for a larger one on site and suggested hiding it under a loose tomb cover! ....I said thanks, but no thanks, there will be kids involved and I really wouldn't want to give them the idea they can go tomb robbing! (Didn't fancy sticking my own hand in there either ) I'm forming ideas for hiding the the barrel, plain sight is a little easy if I state it's a Large cache. I've a couple of possible sites to scout, with any luck one will have what I'm looking for! Bets are now on for how long before my first caches are found! (By tomorrow morning probably) Cust.
  9. Hmmm links seem to be a little odd. I can get to them via a search though. Should appear in the top 5 for a search on postcode IM4 4AD (not my postcode, but close enough to my caches) I'm currently looking a 60 liter barrel (with a locking water tight lid) wondering how the heck I'll manage to camo and hide it.... it may be sometime before that one goes live. Yup... hiding is defiantly getting addictive.
  10. In the past I've managed to gnaw back the odd pencil as well. However I came accross a cache that had a pencil but used waterproof paper which wouldn't accept the pencil! I had to get out my trusty pen for that one. A couple of times I've sent the kids back to the car for a pen because "they had it last" and left it there. If a cache is missing a writting implement and there is room I have been known to leave a pen or pencil. What annoyed me most was finding a nano and the log had had a piece torn out of it seriously weakening the tightly rolled log. TTFN Cust.
  11. If you remove the cache, for whatever reason, then you remove the container with it. I can't see you ripping up a tree to remove he cache. The tree is not the container and is not camo and so it not part of the cache, therefore has nothing to do with the size of the cache. The tree is the place where it is hidden. If I was to place an ammo can in a fake rock the size of a small car (exagerated ... just a touch!) in an abandoned quarry (better than a small fake rock in a pile of rocks in a quarry!) then it'd still be a regular as far as my listing was concerned. I'm one for listing the container size, not the size of the surrounding camo or the place I've hidden it. That's my opinion anyhoo. Cust.
  12. Recently resurrected my Palm III from the bottom of a draw and installed cachemate. Seems to work fine. I can even get a cable to connect my Etrex to it! ....naaa, stuff that, I'll get a better PDA that can handle TomTom or the like first....maybe with GPS built in. I'm tempted by the Mio P550, I have to say, but the Palm are much more stable IMO. Cust.
  13. Whoo hooo ... can I do that again? I am a little over excited as I've had my first hides published today. Now I'm going to be itching to go and sit in a tree and spy on the site waiting for the FTF hounds to come searching! I have other containers ready to go and far more devious than the two I've just put out. Now I have to find a suitable location. I have a sneaking suspicion that hiding Geocaches is going to be as addictive as finding them. Shameless plugging of first hides: Saved From Ruin Take a Seat Despite having other containers ready to go I'm looking for quality, not quantity. With that in mind, please feel free to cast an eye over these two listings and let me know if there is anything blindingly obvious I've missed, or could improve upon in the listings. Cheers Chaps/Chapesses Cust.
  14. It's just as well. PDAs aren't rugged enough to use as a primary GPSr, in my opinion. I quite agree. The intention is not for it to be my primary, but to use as a Sat Nav in the car to get me close and to pop up any caches along a route if I'm off somewhere I haven't checked in advance. Then to take with me to double check the cache details and recent logs to make sure it isn;t a puzzle that needed some working out before hand or a huge multi I won;t have time for. The display on my Palm III is pretty hopeless in bright sunlight, but better than nothing. Tungsten will be better, but I'm considering the Mio P550. Cust.
  15. "I'm looking for the kids .... so we can can give them a proper funeral."
  16. Think very very small! A 35mm film canister is a micro so a size down to a pet ID tag or one of those evil tiny magnetic caches is a nano. Here's an example ... Linky Thingy Nano's are fine as long as they are appropriate for the area. A nano in the woods is not appropriate unless it's been incorporated into something larger, like a pine cone or a stick that looks slightly out of place so a Geocacher would spot it, but no one else. Cust.
  17. It's great when that happens isn't it. I just resurrected an old Palm III from the bottom of a draw and now have that loaded up with Cachemate. Father in law is about to decommission a Palm Tungsten E2, I might just have to steal it! I keep looking at PDA's with built in GPS's but at the moment the budget won't stretch. Bring out the old kit! Cust.
  18. I have to say this thread has made me extremely nervous! So much so I've ordered a pack of O'Tom in both sizes. It's not just this thread that has made me nervous though. Just last week I was chatting with a sheep farmer friend of mine and he was complaining that ticks on the Island were at near record levels! As I spend quite a bit of time in the countryside and up on the mountain in the heather and bracken I felt it better to have a removal device handy than not have one. I think I'll be trading in my small daypack for a quad bike and trailer soon .... to deal with all the geocaching "essentials"!!! Cust. Edit: Just rembered a fishig friend of mine that suffered with an embeded tick ... although how it got inside his boxers it's probably best not to ask ...... baaaaaaaaaaaaaa!!!!! *cough cough*
  19. Neodynium magnets are great fun! I got a couple of batches off eBay and they work a treat. Mind you I haven't put them out in the wild yet... IOM lot have now been warned! (I'm not saying how I'm using them ) I have some that are about 6mm, countersunk and you can hang a hammer off them. (3kg'ish) Great for screwing into the shed struts to hang up garden implements. I also have 50 x 3mm (10p each) magnets which are plenty powerful enough to stick a film canister to anything ferrous. Word of caution about these magnets.... The big ones snap together very fast from several cm's apart and can pinch the skin. If they do slam together they can also shatter sending magnetic shards flying. So take care folks! Cust.
  20. I was lecturing at a night class on Visual Basic .NET and in the break, while their brains cooled down, one chap in the class told me about it and the fun he'd been having with his kids running all over the countryside. It appealed to my techie-hippie (gadgets in the great out doors) and so signed on hee, picked up a GPS from eBay (Etrex) and haven;t looked back. Now I've introduced a couple of others to the game as well. Last weekend I was sweating like a warthog and puffing like a train climbing up the side of South Barrule and a chap came down the other way with two young kids. He was just out for a walk, but after we chatted for a while and I told him what I was upto, I gave him one of my printed cache pages and off he went to look into it. Possible new convert. (He already had a GPS for his mountain biking) Now to place a chache or two of my own. Cust.
  21. It's the repeated freeze/thaw that destroys things not just the length of time below freezing actually, with plastics, I think it's the UV exposure that is far more significant. It makes them go all brittle. Which is why painting them can actually help prolong their life in the field. It is recommended by the manufacturers of expanding building foam that it is painted if it is exposed to the elements. I like micros that have been cunningly camo'd, are in appropriate places and/or used as a stage of a multi. Don't get me started on "nano's in the woods" ....love'em even more (cause I'm weird ) Cust.
  22. Is this correct? Should it really only be showing the latest topics instead of the latest posts in the topics under the main topic named in the RSS list? That sounded really confusing Let me try with an example: "Geocaching in the United Kingdom" shows me the first post in the most recently created topics which is not necessarily the most recent post in the "United Kingdom" part of the forum so the active topics are not coming back in the RSS feed. What I'd like to see are the most recent posts regardless of topic in the "Geocaching in the United Kingdom" section. Did that make more sense? How about an RSS feed for the "Latest Posts" in the same way as "My Assistant" does? Clear as mud, me thinks. Cust.
  23. On a recent hunt on a bridleway which had a deep ditch one side and a mass of brambles and nettles the other side I spotted a chap coming the other way. It was lunch hour and I was in my suit. The conversation went a little like this: "Are you from the Department of Transport?" He asked. "No, I'm not", smiling sweetly. "Are you sure your not from Transport, because it's about time they cleared these drains they keep flooding" I was informed. "So what are you doing?" ... ahhh right, here we go, tell or don't tell. Quick as a flash, "I'm looking for a small digital camera that my kids dropped in the brambles while blackberry picking, no luck I'm affraid" "Oh right, no problem, show me the spot and I'll get my sythe and strimmer and clear away all the nettles for you... here's my number, give me a ring tomorrow and I'll let you know how I got on. I cleared all of this last year, I'm not doing it again, that's the Department of Transports job." I gave the chap a ring the next day and surprisingly he hadn't found the camera! So after I thanked him profusely for his efforts I said I'd pop back at lunchtime and have a look again myself to see if it was elsewhere. Found the cache no problem at lunchtime, no nettle rash or scratches up my arms. Earlier on the cache hunt I parked up and watched a couple wandering around the beach poking around a large boulder which is submerged at high tide. The cache I just found had partial co-ordinates for the start of another cache. I put them into the GPS and accidentally swapped two of the digits, because I didn't read the cache page properly. The wrong co-ordinates were about spot on for where the couple were searching.... had a chuckle about that one, but only later when I realised my mistake and the couple were gone. I wonder what excuse they would of given me! Other excuses: "Loitering with intent to do something you really don't want to witness" "I saw a pixie run in here... have you seen the pixie come out?" "I'm sure I set my bear trap in here somewhere, careful where you step!" "I'm looking for a suitable tree to hug" "Wife says I have to bring the kids home for a proper funeral" Or: Tell the truth... but that's not as much fun. Cust.
  24. The Who ... Cache Cache Yes it is a song... look it up for the lyrics.
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