Team Noltex

Yes, you would be exactly correct, it's not politically correct to make fun of folks who practice an alternative lifestyle. And I have not one, but a series of seven phobia caches, each making light of a different phobia that challenges people to face their "fears". Thanks for the plug. I hear all the arguments - freedom of speech, PC, I'm offended, I'm not offended, someone else may be offended, whatever. For me it gets down to this: Why are so many so quick to defend sinking to the lowest common denominator? What's wrong with striving for the highest common denominator? Like I said before, I'm sure this was pretty funny as they sat around talking about it, but GC.com isn't the place for it. Trust me, it's not like my cheeks got red and I got all embarassed reading it. I just expect GC.com to uphold higher standards and was surprised it had been allowed to remain.

Doesn't matter if it's the best cache ever put out in the history of caching. That's not the point. The title is offensive. Just because something else is worse (the grafitti example) doesn't make the title acceptable. How about we uphold some reasonable standard of decency? I'm sure the title is some sort of witty play on words that a group of guys thought was really funny as they sat around joking. As long as it was among themselves it probably was. Publishing it for everyone to see isn't. There's a time and a place and GC.com isn't it. It seems too like the group name and their "goal" of finding Ape Caches is just an excuse to use something off-color. How is that Ape Cache quest going anyway? Oh yeah, found one since last December. Impressive. I guess what suprises me most is that a reviewer published this as is. I think we can do better.

While I've never personally met CCCooperAgency, there are a whole lot of people on these forums that will vouch for her. One person, reportedly all legit and apparently pretty amazing. Edit: to say that my math makes it 8 caches a day for 5 years!

For all those that take the attitude towards finds like these of "who cares", "it doesn't affect me" or "just ignore it if you don't like it", you can make the comparison to hookers, pimps and drug dealers standing on the street corners or that crappy run down area of town you tend to avoid. "It's not my thing so who cares". I disagree. It's cheap and tawdry and not the way the game was meant to be played. When I hear pocket caches I get a vision of some shady looking guy with greased back hair in a seedy bar sliding up to me asking if I want a good deal on a wristwatch. Thanks, no. It's an integrity thing. Your find count does affect me in that the number is a relative comparison of finds. It assumes that we did roughly the same activities to reach the numbers we have. Most cachers have a few virtuals, a few locationless, a few events, etc, but the vast majority of the numbers usually involves pulling a hidden container out of somewhere that you had to travel to and look for. Whatever your total, our numbers are probably reasonably proportionally the same, so we can compare apples to apples. That's the purpose of numbers. To compare to other numbers. Otherwise they would have no meaning. So when I start to hear about what basically amounts to fake finds it doesn't make me happy. It just cheapens the game. And I know the response, "Quit griping and [insert smiley face] get out and find some caches!" However, if something isn't right, it ought to get pointed out and corrected. I applaud Criminal for doing so. There is a social aspect to geocaching, it isn't just limited to finding caches. So by ignoring "finds" like these, it eventually does change the very nature of The Game. "Wow, you have a thousand finds you say? How many of them did you actually go out and find something? Me? Most of mine I just come to events like this and sign logs all day. Sure gets those ol' numbers up" As someone very astutely pointed out previously in response to virtuals, locationless, events and webcams not being actual finds, these are all sanctioned as legitimate by gc.com and have valid purposes. Pocket caches don't. So who cares? I do. It's an integrity thing.

We came through Bend two summers ago on a caching trip through central OR and loved it! We thought Bend was a beautiful city and have talked about going back again this summer to do some rafting. There is a public art series of caches there that inspired us to put out an art series of our own. Can't remember the name of the park in the middle of the city, but it was awesome.

I think that mailing TB's for initial placement is fine, but mailing existing TB's seems like it goes against the spirit of the TB game. TB's do go overseas on their own. Not only have we personally had TB's end up in other countries, we have taken them there ourselves, brought others back and seen people arrange for someone they know is traveling overseas to take some with them. TB's are meant to move somewhat randomly, that's part of the fun. Having a TB meet a goal is kind of like winning against nearly insurmountable odds. I'm not saying you shouldn't mail TB's, it just seems like if you did you'd be missing out on the chance for a great feeling of accomplishment.

We were definately hoping for dinner on Friday night. Doesn't need to be anything organized, just name a spot. We'll also be staying at the Ramada.

Looks like we're in. Back to the land of my birth, beautiful downtown Astoria. Well, kinda close anyway. Looking forward to the usual fun with GeoDiver, GeoGrammy, Ruck and Bunygrl.

Eagle's Lair is accessible by boat and is located on Eagle Island, just north of Anderson Island in Balch Passage between Anderson Island and McNeil Island.

Having been following this thread from the beginning, I think that I have a better understanding now of why I reacted previously to the OP and the tone of many of the responses. I for one get sick and tired of the attitude, as Criminal once wrote, of those "who feel they must sanitize the world for all of us they consider less intelligent than themselves". I can't stand it when people feel the need to try to take everyone else by the hand as if they were small children and too stupid to look out for themselves. Criminal (OK he's kind of my forum "tell it like it is" hero) summed it all up for me on a thread about someone wanting to leave his signature arrow heads in caches and the cautionary responses that followed. While I appreciate the intent of the OP to have an easily accessible source for safety information, I reject the notion that we're all to stupid to take care of ourselves. My point is proved by the responses of disbelief that we would dare to so foolisly reject the wisdom and guidance offered. We all agree that safety is an important consideration. But as I said before, if you're not concerned about it, no amount of warnings or attempts at education will make any difference. You'll just have to suffer the consequences. I once heard a comedian remark, "It's too bad that stupidity isn't painful. There'd be a lot fewer stupid people."

We're considering doing the Anderson Island Cache Machine and Party Excuse again this year if there is interest. Don't think there will be any significant number of new caches, what with the 25 caches already on the island, but those that did them last year could certainly come and hang out, eat, joke, tell lies and sit on the deck. Pretty much what we did last year too! We haven't discussed a date but late July or early August seems likely.

If people are concerned about their safety, they will do the research, gain the skills and obtain the equipment necessary to keep themselves safe on their own initiative. If they aren't concerned, there is very little that anyone can do to make them concerned, regardless of how many warnings or safety cautions that anyone might publish. Read the Darwin Awards if you need examples of this.

Maybe this is stating the obvious, but perhaps moving it back a bit from the edge would give you a little more peace of mind.

Just curious how it is exactly that you're able to make that claim?

No need to be embarrassed at all about what you did. The cause might not have been what you thought, but bad driving is bad driving, whatever the reason. You did the right thing.

Its a little ways out of town, but Summit Lake Community Center is one of our favorites. It's a reasonably short multi with a really cool final. Elephant's Graveyard is another that is a good cache because it's something out of the ordinary, not to mention morbidly cool, but a little ways out of town. I'm sure that the Olympia area people will chime in (you out there Oh Joy!?) with cache suggestions for closer in town, but these were a couple that stuck out in my mind.

Actually, the water cannon referred to in the story IS the equivalent of "blowing it up", a term which is actually a misnomer. Rarely do they actually detonate a device. They just blow it apart with a blast of water. Actually.

I don't mean to toot my own horn but one of my caches, Tacoma Travel Bug Mania Vault, will be two years old next week and has 517 logs as of today. It has also had 485 Travel Bugs pass through it, been gently muggled twice and one cache pirate (who amazingly later returned all the TB's). I think that works out to a log every 1.4 days. It never ceases to amaze us how often it gets visited.

02/02/2006 08:30 AM CRIMINAL DIVISION 1 CD1 PRE-TRIAL CONFERENCE HELD 02/16/2006 08:30 AM CRIMINAL DIVISION 1 CD1 OMNIBUS HEARING 02/16/2006 09:00 AM CRIMINAL DIVISION 1 CD1 PLEA DATE 03/06/2006 08:30 AM CRIMINAL DIVISION- PRESIDING JUDGE CDPJ JURY TRIAL Ronnie has a Plea date set for Feb 16, which indicates that he will plead guilty at that time instead of going to trial. A trial date is still set for after that, in case he changes his mind. Looks like this may be resolved soon.

Apparently, GC.com and I both think you are completely wrong. If you look at the top of a TB page it clearly states OWNER: insert cachers name. It is not owned by whomever currently has it in their hands and they DO NOT have the right to do whatever they please with it. A TB is meant to move from cache to cache either following the specified goal of the owner or move randomly with no specific goal. The general INTENT is for it to travel, not for anyone who finds it to do whatever they want with it. Under your argument, the mailman can do whatever he wants with my letter after I've mailed it, simply because it's out of my possession and control. Should he throw away mail addressed to groups he finds reprehensible? I OWN the travel bug. I've asked other cachers to kindly move it to caches for me for my amusement. I could understand it a lot better if the TB itself had offensive writing or pictures. Throwing out a TB that simply represents an organization or an ideology you disagree with is the heigth of intolerance and arrogance. You're arguing my point. The cache page and the TB page may indeed be the property of the owner. The cache itself (which GC.com has usually never even seen) and the TB itself are not. Even so, GC.com can remove either page at it's convenience, so ownership is only conditional. If the OP wants to exert ownership rights over this 'supposedly' stolen TB, he can sue. If not, what good is the claim to ownership? Saying the TB was stolen doesn't MAKE it stolen. I find these accusations ridiculous and petty. BTW, condemning someone who hasn't been represented is the height of ignorance and arrogance. I'm definately NOT arguing your point. Take another look at a TB page. It lists the OWNER of the TB as the person who purchased it and put it out. We're not talking about caches here or pages on GC.com. We're talking about the physical TB. You keep wanting to argue semantics about the words ownership and stolen, as if these things are only real because someone says they are. Lets stop diverting the issue of bad behaviour by arguing what the meaning of "is" is. Whether or not the OP chooses to do something about his missing TB does not change the fact that someone did something to his property that was outside of his intent for it. His intent was that the TB move from one cache to another. Someone has purposefully and knowingly interfered with that intent by keeping it against his wishes. Sounds stolen to me. Having an ideological disagreement, such as with a group that sponsors a TB, does not bestow upon you some higher moral right to impose your own will. That's the same "end justifies the means" rationalization that is used to justify all sorts of bad behaviour. "My purpose is so morally correct that it's OK if I do something a teensy bit wrong to get there." Nope. Wrong is still wrong. I and my family have had numerous TB's go missing, which I wouldn't catagorize as theft, but is still disappointing. However, no one has ever posted a log for one of our TB's telling us, as happened to the OP, that they were intentionally keeping it. It seems just about everyone else here thinks that pretty much justifies being upset. As far as condemning someone who "hasn't been represented", GeoMaine has yet to post on this particular forum thread but he surely represented himself by his TB logs and his emails to the OP. He made his views abundantly clear by his words and actions.

Apparently, GC.com and I both think you are completely wrong. If you look at the top of a TB page it clearly states OWNER: insert cachers name. It is not owned by whomever currently has it in their hands and they DO NOT have the right to do whatever they please with it. A TB is meant to move from cache to cache either following the specified goal of the owner or move randomly with no specific goal. The general INTENT is for it to travel, not for anyone who finds it to do whatever they want with it. Under your argument, the mailman can do whatever he wants with my letter after I've mailed it, simply because it's out of my possession and control. Should he throw away mail addressed to groups he finds reprehensible? I OWN the travel bug. I've asked other cachers to kindly move it to caches for me for my amusement. I could understand it a lot better if the TB itself had offensive writing or pictures. Throwing out a TB that simply represents an organization or an ideology you disagree with is the heigth of intolerance and arrogance.

Here's a link to a wireless FM transmitter that runs on 3 volts - http://www.electronickits.com/kit/complete/surv/ck200.htm It reportedly has about a 200 foot range. Radioshack has a digital voice recorder kit that you could add to it. Instead of a speaker on the voice recorder, take the two wires that would go to the speaker, and wire them in place of where the mic would be on the transmitter. On the transmitter will be a momentary switch (only on while pressed). Anything that temporarily completes the circuit can be used in place of this switch - a pressure switch, light activated switch, or a motion detector. Criminal's right, depending on how it's set up, a motion sensor could keep triggering the circuit repeatedly as long as someone's there. Some have a delay built in that would prevent it, just depends on what you can find. However you end up wiring this, try to stay with components that are powered by 3 to 6 volts. Lots easier to power it remotely and cheaper to maintain.

Most of what you want can be bought either off the shelf or as an easy to build kit. Do a search for "electronic kit". Then it's just a matter of combining them together. The motion detector is essentially a switch that is used to activate the recorder. The speaker output on the recorder can be wired into the mic input for the transmitter. It's not REAL difficult, but if you are not at all technical it might be a bit ambitious.

Pretty sure I wasn't talking about you, sbell111.

I'm definately not one to ever bash or flame in the forums, but I guess what I'm having the hardest time swallowing in about the last half of this thread is being lectured on proper geocaching and TB etiquette by someone who's been a member for all of a week and a half now. (You'll notice, no mention of cache finds here-it's not about the numbers) Everyone is welcome to their own opinion and absolutely has the right to express it. But it you are new to a group, might I suggest you at least take a little time to figure out its culture and values first before you start loudly expressing strong opinions. It's more than just respect, it keeps you from inextricably embedding your foot deep in your mouth. A little less passion, a little more patience, please.