CrippledBlindSquirrel
-
Posts
92 -
Joined
-
Last visited
Posts posted by CrippledBlindSquirrel
-
-
When I'm caching with others I love to hear them say "Oh I bet I know what it is" as we head to ground zero...I always tell them that when they make up their mind before they see the search area they are half way to a DNF. I am guilty of it myself...it is a hard habit to break...If you go looking for something and it's not there then your mind gets locked to the other possibilities...it often makes 1.5/1.5's very difficult!
-
I only trade for cars...the matchbox style...
I don't know what got me started on cars...I just noticed that I had about thirty of them in a large Tupperware box on the workbench one day and realized that they had all wound up there because I took them out of the caching bag at the end of the day and put them there...I'm working on a cache idea that will put some of them back into circulation...
-
But it made me wonder how many of us think even stop to consider all the things beyond our control that happen to burial plots other than just sitting there being "sacred space" --People working, worms and moles tunneling through, birds sitting on the headstones, tree limbs being blown onto the stones, weathering and erosion erasing the lettering etc.
Not to mention graves that are dug up for parking lots, road and building construction. Or sometimes just paved over.
After some research my father found out where my great grandfather was buried. My dad was speaking with the caretaker trying to find out exactly where the grave was so we could visit. After checking records, the caretaker informed us that the headstone had been taken down and buried on top of the grave. He said it's done to old graves to make mowing easier.
He informed us that the headstone could be dug up and replaced if we wanted them to do it - for $500.
Ouch, sorry about your great-grandfather.
There is a convenience store in the next town that is built over an old graveyard. There are still five or six stones in the corner of the parking lot, but county records list at least 100 burials there. In Indiana, it's easier to pave over a graveyard than to get the permits to remove and relocate the burials.
Both of these circumstances are just plain wrong. Here in Georgia we have cemeteries and burial plots on old plantation land that go back to the founding of the State. Here in my city I know of at least three burial sites that have found themselves in the way of development. In each case the developers were required to seperate them from the development by fencing and to maintain access to the sites for any potential visitors. In most cases people just start taking care of the site with acts of kindness like planting flowers and cleaning up around the headstone and monuments. These kind of sites hold great potential for history buffs and the Waymarking side of this sport. A nice little cache co-located is gravy. I love to think about the old family plots that are waiting out there in those woods to be re-discovered and preserved as what we call progress catches up to them. Anyone who deliberately desecrates a burial site in Georgia goes to jail.
-
...i am sitting on a rock, approaching the time of late afternoon prayer and i come to a geocache where someone has presumed to inform me that if only i would come to Jesus, all my sorrows would be taken away. was i to have drawn the conclusion that that my faith was somehow insufficient? incomplete? that i had failed somehow to love God enough, or in the right way?
what kind of message of peace or love was this for a stranger to deliver on me through a geocache?...
What kind of conclusion is it to think that the person who wrote that log as they felt called to do did it out of anything other than love for their fellow man? What kind of presumption does it take to see it as an indictment against all who believe exactly as they should?
There is no rational reason to draw a conclusion about what the person who left the message/tract intended other than the contents of the writing and even then there is no reason to believe that even the most vile message was directed at you personally because you found it. This kind of flawed thinking combined with the power to directly restrict or punish the writer leads to despotism and dictatorship. This thread has never really been about the subject of the writing but rather whether anyone should be allowed to censor the free speech activity of another.
-
just because you recognize the words doesn't mean you've understood them, apparently.
<shrugs>
-
i may ask you to support my candidate or even criticize your candidate, but there's very little campaign promotion that threatens you with hell.
.....
i guess i draw the line between "you can reach us here if you want" and "you should join us if you know what's good for you".
I see your point, but I would still place both types of propaganda in the non-threatening category.
A tract reader is unlikely to feel threatened by promises of eternal damnation if he either (1) already has confidence in his own beliefs regarding religion, salvation and hell, or (2) does not believe in the existence of hell in the first place.
If the tract reader is insecure enough about his beliefs that he does feel threatened, then I say that is the fault of the tract reader, not the fault of the writer or placer of the tract.
"A man's ethical behavior should be based effectually on sympathy, education, and social ties; no religious basis is necessary. Man would indeed be in a poor way if he had to be restrained by fear of punishment and hope of reward after death."
- Albert Einstein
I tend to recoil from the attitude that people need to be protected from mere ideas. I don’t care for policies designed to control how (or whether) people think. I prefer to encourage people to consider all available information, and then decide for themselves what they think and believe. Anything short of that kind of open-mindedness tends to produce invalid beliefs, don't you think?
Exactly...The power resides completely with the reader. Any curiosity, agreement, disagreement, revulsion, or conviction is internal to the reader. All anyone has to do to avoid any effect – one way or the other – from written materials is to not pick them up and read them. No person should have the right or responsibility to protect anyone from a third person’s opinion.
-
You sure are going to be working hard...checking up on your cache everytime some posts a "find it" just so you can identify the Cretin that put that "God Loves You" pamphlet in there and delete their smilie.
Yeah, but if it IS stated in the cache, I have the "Groundspeak given right" to do so don't I? Look, I am not against religion by any means, I just don't think it has its place in Caching, so I am asking it be left out. I don't think its a whole lot to ask. Play the game nothing more.
COOL! - Let us all know how that works out for you!
-
My views on this are as follows: This is a GEOCACHING forum, and a sport. Do I care that there are religious materials in someone else's Cache, no. Do I think that it is out of place, yes, as much as I think that corporate sponsorship is out of place in the sport of Geocaching. I will make it clear when I hide a cache that any material promoting religion will be out of place, and be removed from my cache, and the person who placed it will have their find deleted. Why? It disenfranchises anyone who finds it offensive to find such items in a cache. I WANT everyone to come to my cache regardless of race, creed, or religion (including worshippers of the dreaded spaghetti monster). Note that I have kept my religious beliefs out of this post. Not the place or time for conversion or religious arguments really.
You sure are going to be working hard...checking up on your cache everytime some posts a "find it" just so you can identify the Cretin that put that "God Loves You" pamphlet in there and delete their smilie.
-
A newbie question or two
Would Ground Speak accept caches coming from other sites?
Why couldn't he just post them on both sites - assuming that they fit the requirements on both sites.
I know that there's answers to both of these questions somewhere on the site I haven't found them by rambling around
-
Sometimes they come in pairs too.
Just curious, is there any limitations on the size of the cache pairs before they are reclassified as enhanced pairs?
-
I would email the owner about it. If they say the cache is supposed to have those in it then submit a needs archived log. From the guidelines
Solicitations are off-limits. For example, caches perceived to be posted for religious, political, charitable or social agendas are not permitted. Geocaching is supposed to be a light, fun activity, not a platform for an agenda.You would attempt to punish the cache owner for the papers you find in his cache - even if they were placed there by someone else? You have already been to the cache, got your smiley and presumably would not be returning. This is a perfect example of the intolerance that everyone has been talking about in this post...What possible harm has occured to you to cause you to file the "needs archived"?
If you carefully read what they wrote it says "I would email the owner about it. IF THEY SAY THE CACHE IS SUPPOSED TO HAVE THOSE IN IT, THEN SUMBIT A NEEDS ARCHIVED LOG. " (for the record....not yelling, just put it in all caps to make it stand out). The purpose of that woudl be to find out if the cache is supposed to be pushing an agenda. THere are several around here that have been stuffed with tracts by cachers without the cache owners knowledge, and in that case, yes the cache owner should not have their cache archived. The point was probably to archive those caches which are intentionally set to push an agenda, which against the rules. There are a few around here which DO have tons of religious tracts in them and then when you look....surprise...they're set on church grounds. The church doesn't mention that its hidden at a church on the log page, they dont' mention religion at all so they could get around the reviewer and the rules, but then they keep their cache stuffed with tracts. It is clear that those caches were put with the purpose to prostalitize. If someone emails the cache owner and tells them that the cache was stuffed with tracts, and the cache owner SAYS THEY'RE SUPPOSED TO BE IN THERE, then it is obviously a cache that breaks the rules.
At the risk of "what if"ing this to death let me make sure where proper reporting of an inappropriate cache ends and where an attempt to enforce one's own will on what is contained in a cache begins.
Does a cache on church property - whether it contains religious material or not constitue a violation of the rules?
Does this same cache containing some religious material along with other non-religious material constitute a violation of the rules?
If you find a cache with religious materials in it and you contact the owner and he says he didn't put it there but doesn't care or mind if its there and will not make a trip to remove it then will the "needs archived" need to be posted to expunge this non-complying cache?
I think you can see that this is a slippery slope - how much power will you give to those of us who are intolerant of any level of religious speech? My point all along in this thread is that a piece of paper with words written on it is harmless - it has no power that the reader doesn't give it. If is is all wet and mushy and ruining the cache then remove it because of that - otherwise just ignore it.
I hope that we won't endorse forcing cache owners to respond to "needs archiving" posts just because we don't personally believe the words we find written on a piece paper we happen to find in the ammo can. I guess that if I went to a cache that I found to be something or somewhere I didn't expect or agree with I would make the decision to either leave without opening it or just pick through the paper until I find the log and get my smiley. I am certainly not going to presume to appoint myself a cache policeman over a piece of paper.
-
I would email the owner about it. If they say the cache is supposed to have those in it then submit a needs archived log. From the guidelines
Solicitations are off-limits. For example, caches perceived to be posted for religious, political, charitable or social agendas are not permitted. Geocaching is supposed to be a light, fun activity, not a platform for an agenda.You would attempt to punish the cache owner for the papers you find in his cache - even if they were placed there by someone else? You have already been to the cache, got your smiley and presumably would not be returning. This is a perfect example of the intolerance that everyone has been talking about in this post...What possible harm has occured to you to cause you to file the "needs archived"?
-
Then why do we have advertising?
Do you buy everything you see advertised? Don't you buy the the things that you have developed a need or desire for and ignore the things that you don't have an interest in. If you want to call of tract about religion or recycling or skydiving advertising I'll agree with you. Its an attempt to persuade...NOT FORCE...you to "buy" the product/service/belief system. Its just a piece of paper...it has no power that you as the reader don't give it.
There are some who buy everthing and bankrupt themselves. That is a recognized mental disorder - I guess if you want to extend the compulsion to buy to religion then I guess that at least they won't "buy" themselves into bankruptcy.
Edited to add that I don't think there are very many cachers that suffer from the compulsion to spend themselves into bankruptcy based on the stuff I see in the ammo boxes.
-
But what if someone is simply hungry when they get to the cache?
A menu in the cache from Vincenzo's Pizza Palace might entice them to patronize that establishment instead of the usual burger joint chain they normally stop at.
So couldn't it follow that a spiritually hungry person could be influenced by a religious tract found in the cache too?
Exactly....The motivation is internal...If your guy had just eaten, then all of the pizza menus in the world wouldn't influence him to run out the woods and go for pizza. If that spitiually hungry guy was satisifed in himself with his beliefs then the religious tract wouldn't/shouldn't faze him. Either way - the menu or the tract causes absolutely no harm to anyone and may, in fact help some people.
-
I think post 74 was an appropriate usage of the Godwin early alert system.
Relating a belt buckle worn by Nazis and the behavior of those who chose to wear that object to the simple tract left behind after a cache find and the person leaving the tract is certainly an exaggerated comparison.
And my bringing it back up again here could be considered inflammatory.
It boils down to this....if anyone is sufficently confident in their beliefs then a piece of paper in an ammo can will do nothing more than make them push it one side and ignore it if they don't agree with what is written on it - no matter what is written on it. "Conversion" to a belief system does not come from external sources...it is strictly internal to the person...and a piece of paper, no matter how obnoxious or wonderful, cannot effect a person for good or bad unless they are susceptible to it because of a lack of sufficiency in their confidence in their currently held beliefs...whatever they are. Paper does not harm anyone. Opposition to written opinion is the first step to the majority banning the minority's beliefs and the start of the downhill slope to dictatorship. Its not religion that starts wars...its intolerance.
-
Yep...I saw em too...the wife almost caught me looking at them...don't know how I would explained that!
-
I think the most offensive part of the whole debate is some of the replies in this thread.
I'm a Christian and I've never pushed my beliefs on anyone. I don't consider myself better than anyone. I'm not of the opinion that those with different beliefs are more or less intelligent, enlightened etc, than myself.
Yet the needless and childish bashing of my beliefs seems to be extremely accepted in this thread - as well as pretty much anywhere else.
Seems that it's A-OKAY to believe whatever you'd like! (As long as you aren't a Christian. In which case, you're somehow naive, stupid and somewhat evil.)
Don't want to be insulted? Don't insult others. Adults should already know this.
Thank you....
Now divert auxillary power to the shields Scotty...here it comes
-
As for the Hershey Squirts, the local story I've heard is that they had no idea of the alternate meaning of their name when they chose it. I believe they had a couple young kids and they were from the Hershey, PA area so they called themselves the Hershey Squirts. Only after someone explained it to them were they clued into the other meaning of that name. At least that's what I've been told -- not directly by them though.
I'm not buying that story for a minute.
Well, I guess it could have referred to the two young kids...either way....
-
It's very likely that it is locally known description that only means something to those who are a part of that local community. Another example is "Georgia Style" which I finally figured out after finding a couple refers to a covering blanket of the ever present pinestraw....and you thought the term "Georgia Pines" was just a phrase from a Country and Western song didn't you?
-
I check into the forums now and then, often at long intervals. I have several other compulsive interests to keep up with and my petition for 36 hours days hasn't been approved so time is limited.
Good For You! Stay active otherwise you'll wind up looking like me!
-
Okay,
Comments keep getting made to me (at local events and forums) and about me that I'm basically not caching or not so active......
It's time to determine a caching catagory for me and I was thinkin' others might want to find theirs.
Here's my geocaching activity:
Finding:
I add about 100 finds or so a year to my stats on average. Events and caches with GOOD word of mouth are a priority as well as any cache that is convenient to where I'm traveling. I DON'T cache willy nilly to improve my stats or out of any OC need to find what's hidden. I don't find any cache beneath consideration. I'll find any cache in any catagory or any style of hide so log as it's convenient for me to do so.
FTF is NOT my drug of choice, but it's nice when it happens. O0
I NEED to find a cache in new places. Any cache will do. Coloring my world map red is my only real caching goal. (Besides getting all the cache icons.) I wish my wife understood that.
Travel bugs:
I move about 500+ TB's a year on average. Discovering does not blow my skirt up but I'll do it occasionally. I like to move 'em, move 'em. TBs and New coin icons are the only stats that matter to me.
I own hundreds of TB's and coins.... About a third of my TB tags are unactivated and more than 2/3 are unreleased.
Hiding:
I add about 15 to my hide stats every year on average. I host quite a few events, not because I enjoy it so much, but because I want to give back to the community that hosts so many great events for me to attend.
I've got literally hundreds of half baked ideas for future caches in some stage of planning or material gathering ALWAYS. The Snoogstress is NOT amused but she does tryyy to understand.
I'm more of a hider than a finder with a hide to find ratio of greater than 1:10. I get far more pleasure from reading a find on one of my caches than I do finding most caches.
Forums:
Whether it's here or hgcs.org or some other cachin' site, I post on geocaching forums daily.
SO, what kind of cacher am I. I'm certainly NOT retired, or inactive. On the contrary, I'm VERY active, but I'm also NOT into what everyone else is into.... What catagory do I fit in? Please, help me find out.
Well, I guess we need to define the catagories first, so I maybe some othe folks should post about their cachin' activity so we can sort them into some catagories..........
You are definitely in the catagory of "happy cacher". It would appear that you are satisfied with the way you do it and that should work just fine for the rest of us!
I have a long list of those caches I'll get to...as soon as I'm no longer distracted with Waymarking which I find that I enjoy alot more than going after the next PNG. I am working on figuring out how to do my first hide and have a bunch of ideas.
Most of all I have to do all of it while working for this guy who just insists that I accomplish what he pays me for. Besides all of that, its just too danged hot to do anything outdoors after about eight in the morning or before nine at night. I'll probably get pretty active this fall.
-
TX Arson Investigator here. (yes the ultimate low-life, both a Firefighter and a LEO)
OMG!... Does Your Mother Know???
Just Kidding!
Plano caught my eye...You guys have been making the national news a lot here lately...Weather and shootings...You about ready for a vacation?
-
A guggle?
A Huggle...Mom loves him after all...
-
I like the term 'squib,' too. It occurred to me independently of this discussion two nights ago when I was seraching for a cache. A man in the vicinity with his two children asked me if I was geocaching. I replied that I was, and asked if he had ever gone. "No," he replied, "But I'm aware of it." I immediately thought 'squib,' and then visited here to see if anyone had though along those lines. I think I will start using it in my cache logs (although I'm not likely to use it often, he is the first in eight years of caching to whom the term has applied). However, the sport is much more widely known than it was when I first started, so I imagine the number of squibs will increase accordingly.
A squib is term used to describe some part of the fire chain in an explosive devise I believe...perhaps that term would be more appropriately applied to a muggle who scatters a cache rather than just taking it...
Find a cache with Technology
in General geocaching topics
Posted
Isn't the trip the reason for the cache?
Would using "video presence" be allowed to do 1/1 skirt caches in another city when your caching buddy goes there on vacation? Just to say you do did a cache in that city? How about using your technique to complete a challenge? I think its probably not a good idea...