Gorak

I'm not old, I just feel that way. Compared to some of you, I'm still a newby. Boblog & Mitsuko were temporarily entertaining but I do miss Jomarac5 taking on TPTB on a regular basis and, of course, the ongoing battles between J5 and the tag team of Canadazuuk & Mr. Gigabyte. And who from that era can forget The Sandbox!

I'm using glass beads but I'd have to go look at the bag to see the specifics. I bought the sandblasting cabinet at an employee auction and it came with a bag of glass beads. They don't seem to cut as aggressively as I'd like but they do the trick. I'll check the specs on the bag when I get home and get back to you.

I used to have a series of caches on Annacis but there is only one still active. There are some great little trails on Annacis, especially on the SW corner of the island. Very surprising given that the majority of the island is an industrial wasteland.

I've painted a lot of Lock & Locks over the years and had a lot of success and a few failures. Initially, I used Krylon Fusion flat camo colours. The paint peeled within a few weeks. Then I tried the same paint over a Krylon primer. The paint still peeled after a few weeks. Pre-sanding seemed to do the trick and, for a while, I sanded, primed and then painted. The resulting paint jobs have lasted for years although the paint can be scratched off with your fingernail if you work at it. However sanding properly, especially in the nooks and crannies where the paint generally fails first, is time consuming and fiddly. The solution I use now is to mask off the blue seal with painters tape and lightly sandblast the container and lid in a small sandblasting cabinet. Then, without removing the masking tape, I spray the container and lid separately. I do not paint the inside although I do spray the underside of the lid tabs. I spray a grey primer followed by a coat or two of flat olive drab. For the final coat I hold a small cedar bough or fern leaf over the workpiece and lightly spray flat black. I do this for the top of the lid and the sides & bottom of the container. I have containers like this that have been in service and held up well for 5 years.

+1

I only complain about micros that take me to uninteresting locations and/or have all the thoughtfulness of a litterbug tossing trash out of thier car window. Sadly that is a large percentage of micros. But not all of them. I've been to quite a few "regular" caches that took me to uninteresting locations and/or have all the thoughtfulness of a litterbug tossing trash out of their car window. The size of the cache often has very little to do with the quality of the hide. I think Mushtang really hit the nail on the head, though...

No, the problem isn't micros. There is nothing in any of the guidelines that declares that cache containers should be able to accommodate travelers or swag. As I stated previously, the only problem is expecting other cachers to only hide the types of caches you want to find. Perhaps you should take your own advice about learning to read what was actually written. You DID say that, "Nanos, micros and even small containers have taken a big chunk out of the fun we used to have caching". Nowhere did I write or claim that you did not enjoy caching anymore, merely that the offending containers were "spoiling" your fun. Likewise, it was you that stated that "the reason some of the fun is gone now is due to the fact that you can't put a TB in most caches hidden now" so TB's and coins are obviously an important part of the game for you and a big part of why caching is less fun for you. Call it what you like. Complaining = whining = same difference.

Terrible idea. I hope it is never implemented. It will do nothing to improve cache quality since most "poor quality" caches meet the guidelines anyway. All it will do is create an impediment for people to hide caches and create a lot more work for reviewers. The result will be a dramatic decrease in the number of new caches. On the upside, a lot of people will be forced to improve their Photoshop skills.

You know, you can always filter out caches with containers designated as "micro" or "small". Nobody forces anyone to hunt for caches they don't like. Stop blaming other cache hiders for spoiling your fun because they aren't hiding the types of caches you want to find. The real problem isn't micros. The real problem is people letting their obsession with numbers, TB's, coins, etc. take priority and then whining about how much they hate looking for micros or whatever other kind of cache they don't like. Deal with your obsessions first (i.e. - forget about the micros/nanos/small containers) and then you'll find caching fun again.

You're making the presumption that there are very few geocachers who like nanos/micros and/or that everyone should strive to hide the largest possible cache that an area can handle. Both, in my opinion, are erroneous presumptions. In fact, a lot of people actually like nanos/micros. Hard to believe, I know, but it's true. Some people appreciate a clever hide or good camo over size. This topic brings to mind a few popular cliches: Good things come in small packages. Size isn't everything. It's not how big it is but how you use it. (Or hide it, as the case may be)

When I got PO'd with the local geocaching politics I just stopped logging online and participating in the local geocaching scene for almost 4 years. I didn't stop caching entirely but I probably skipped logging a couple hundred caches. I did, however, continue to maintain my favorite caches and archived the others when I didn't feel like maintaining them any longer.

You mean like this?

If the cache meets all the guidelines and the coordinates are reasonably accurate, then who cares what is written on the cache page or how it is written? Geocaching is about finding caches, not fill-in-the-form webpage creation. However, I do like the idea about long, rambling, encoded clues that don't really offer much of a clue...

Even if one is not concerned about or believe that there are privacy concerns surrounding PMO caches or any of their other data that is stored and displayed on this site, privacy IS a big concern these days. Those who express concern about their privacy or the lack of control over who has visibility to various data on their profiles have every right to be concerned. I don't believe anyone should be criticized for those concern even if you believe them to be trivial. In all of the various forum threads dealing with privacy issues and/or access to personal data, it amazes me how many people are actually opposed to users having some control over access. Everyday we are bombarded in the media about online privacy issues and we are all being constantly warned and reminded about how even seemingly trivial information about yourself can be dangerous in the wrong hands. It's only natural for people to be concerned even in situations where it may not be a problem. "Better safe than sorry" is an approach that more and more people are taking. I suspect that it is only a matter of time before stronger privacy laws are enacted that require sites like this to provide users with more extensive control over their personal data, whether it is warranted or not. On a more practical note, if you truly are concerned about your visit to a PMO cache page being logged and visible to the cache owner then there is a really simple solution. I view all of my cache pages offline in GSAK. I almost never access an actual Groundspeak cache page. Viewing cache pages offline in whatever program you use to manage your PQ's will never result in a log entry on the PMO cache page. Given the number of people who do paperless caching and use GSAK or smartphone apps, I wonder about the usefulness of the logs collected on PMO caches.

That's not exactly true. It is true for the GPX files that I create in GSAK and download to my GPS. However, GSAK has a feature that will allow you to download all of the image files for the caches in your GSAK database so that they can be viewed offline or used when generating HTML files that you can download to your PDA/Smartphone and view offline while in the field. When I go out caching I have my GPS loaded with whatever GPX file I generated just prior to leaving. I also have the HTML files generated and loaded onto my Smartphone in case I'm in the field and need to refer to images or read more logs than are downloaded into the GPS.

No, I'm saying that members should have some control over what information, specific to them, is displayed to other members. A very simple concept. Frankly, it amazes me that so many people are opposed to that.

Because many feel that, since they don't have any concerns or don't see a personal need for the option, that nobody else should, either. Kind of the way Facebook users used to feel...

Very interesting... I would cross post my Martian and Venusian caches but your Terran coordinate system is not compatible with the galactic standards that are used throughout this, and neighbouring, galaxies. See my profile for more details... There is no dark side of the moon. It's all dark...

Bingo! The issue is about choice. The choice to be able to choose what information about ourselves and our activities that we wish to display to the public. Different people will have different reasons for wanting or not wanting to display different types of information. Whether you agree with their reasons or not is not the point. Yes, as suggested, one could just stop logging their cache finds online, which I did for two years. However, that also deprives the cache owners of receiving find logs on their caches which, from reading other threads, is a really big deal for many CO's. I guess another way to look at it is, why are we given the option to block public access to our Stats and Bookmarks but not any of the other auto-generated data such as finds, souvenirs and trackables? Resistance is futile....

Groundspeak, in their wisdom, chose to allow members to choose whether or not their statistics are viewable by others on their profile. I think, in the interests of privacy, that members should also have the option as to whether or not others can view their find history and souvenirs. I don't cache for the numbers and I resent having my find count and history available to all who care to look. For several years I did not log finds online for that very reason and, although I once again log my finds, I am considering reverting back to stealth mode because of my inability to choose who gets access to what information in my profile. Am I the only one who cares more about my privacy than smilies and souvenirs?

In 1958, when I was still a toddler, my mother made the wise decision to leave Indiana and move back to Canada (she was born in Canada) so that I would not have to grow up and be sent off to fight someone else's war in some third world country. I've served her wishes by staying in Canada (as a dual citizen) pursuing peaceful activities. In retrospect, my mother was very wise.

I have several ideas for urban Virtuals! These are just a few... All local waste treatment plants Local landfills A series of all of the local group homes and half-way houses Some of the well-used illegal dumping sites along the river A couple of the former salmon creeks that are now poisoned from industrial effluent The soup kitchens on the downtown east side (poorest postal code in Canada) The City of Vancouver's "unofficial" raw sewage outfall into English Bay The spot at Vancouver Airport where Robert Dziekanski was publicly "executed" by the RCMP (while being filmed!) Can't wait!

The moon. It has no satellites at all, but at the same time it is a satellite, but is absolutely useless for providing any info for geocaching down on earth. The only cache up there, left by Neil Armstrong, is an American flag which would be completely unsuitable to use as a logsheet anyway. That is where you are wrong. There are lots of caches on Earth's moon and I've found a few of them. However, they're not listed on this site or, for that matter, any other site on the Earth Internet. Check my profile for instructions on how to access those listings. You'll need some special equipment to access them, though.

I once found one of the stages of a multicache by accident. The cache was hidden in the exposed roots of a tree. I noticed it when my dog lifted his leg and soiled the cache container - the sound of the "stream" hitting the plastic container caught my attention.

Wow. The naive sense of entitlement is just amazing How is expecting to get something you paid for a "naive sense of entitlement"? If I pay for something I AM entitled to it. It is neither naive nor unreasonable to expect to receive a product or service that you have paid up front for. I have and if I didn't deliver to my customers what they paid for I wouldn't have been in business for very long.