Mr Smiles

I'm an expert on the poison oak topic. TechNu makes three products. Pre-exposure Lotion, Post Exposure Soap, and Post Infection Lotion. Use them all and follow the instruction on the label faithfully and enjoy your outings. As further precaution, wash face, hands, and arms with Fels Naptha soap as soon as you get out of the woods. Take baby wipes with you in your pack. Use these on all exposed skin areas if you are going to be away from washroom/water for more than an hour. Be sure to reapply the TechNu Pre-exposure Lotion that you have wiped off. If you have gotten poison oak rash and are in the deep misery mode, get into the shower and begin to turn up the heat little by little until you cant stand it any more, then turn it up a little more. In about 20 minutes the body quits producing the histamines that cause the itching. You can get as much as 8 hours relief this way. Then, take the hot water torture again...for another 8 hours of relief and so on. Then, keep on posting those smileys!

Here is a quote from Stephen Wright on this subject you might enjoy. "My girlfriend had poison oak on the brain and the only way she could relieve the itching was to think about sandpaper"

I haveheard of this being called "Geogashing" (original from TrackerGma) and there are some interesting stories that came from Saddlesore by Desert(B)Rats check out GCHVFB

I would LOVE to have this capability!! And I would use it. You have added a goodie to the overall concept with the "Amazon.com" thing where I could see a composite of other's favorites too. Right Arm!, Cheesehead(s)

Sitting in my easy chair, wanting to know the distance between a point X and a point Y, and both are somewhere else in the world, I use the routes feature on the GPSr which tells me the leg distance. So far, I have not found this to be flawed. Are there situations where this would not be reliable?

Clayjar provided a formula for us to use in rating difficulty and terrain which has proven effective and useful. Cache OWNERS use this criteria to take some of the subjectivity out of describing their hides. A formula which provides some criteria for "lame" to "WAY COOL!" would still be subjective, but could, over the long haul, help to discourage placing lame caches and encourage way cool ones. The current method of writing about your visit is proving to be ineffective...for a number of reasons. The new system would be used by cache FINDERS to issue some kudos for a job well done, by cache SEEKERS, to help in the selection process, and by cache OWNERS, to get a clearer picture of what they are doing right and to get a heads up on caches that need maintenance or renewal. Local cachers with years of experience would likely not get as much direct benefit from cache ratings, but newbies and non-locals would find them to be invaluable. Often, the newbies, (and some ol-timers too!) don't really know what makes for a really cool cache...a Clayjar kind of formula and a way to use it...couldn't help but benefit the caching community. Thicketfella

The system you advocate has great merit. I don't have a perfect plan in mind, but trust the good folks that have done such a marvelous job of creating a worlwide phenomenon could implement a rating system that takes MOST of the guesswork, subjectivity, and "reading between the lines" out of selecting candidate caches to hunt down. I can't imagine a scenario where some system would not be better than none. The idea here is not to rate caches by difficulty, but by a criteria which includes location, container, contents, uniqueness, cleverness, etc. The ratings could be anonymous and impersonal. In time, the trend would be toward more rewarding caching experiences, and rewarding a cache owner for some extra thought and effort with a high average rating will help us all.

In the forums and at events, I have been advocating a finder's rating system to be incorporated in the GC.com web site. I can't imagine a single thing that the administrators could do to maintain and upgrade over time the integrity and overall satisfaction of our growing hobby. In the current scenario, it can take nearly as much time fleshing out some caches that would LIKELY be worth taking the time to seek, and it can be discouraging to spend a day simply putting up numbers if that is not your personal objective. The success of eBay has been dependent upon a ranking system and the similarities between the buyer/seller relationship of eBay and the owner/seeker of GC.com cannot be overlooked. I suspect that there would be some technical and administrative challenges to incorporating such a system, but if it were in place, hiders would tend to put more thought into their hides, and eventually the entire world off geocaching would be positively impacted. Do you agree?

Rating Found Caches: I don't profess to know how to do this to maximize the effectiveness of a rating system, but when I think of the risk/benefit possibilities, I think that it has the most promise to maintain the value and integrity of our burgeoning sport. Think of it this way; if you are going caching today, and you see on the website a choice of several similar caches, some with Four Star (Finder's) ratings, some with One Star (Finder's) Ratings, which would you be most inclined to go after? If you are planning to hide a cache, and of your previous 10 caches, 5 rated very high, and 5 rated very low, what kind of caches would you be inclined to hide in the future?

I advocate a rating system for finders. On the "Log Your Visit" page, finders could rate caches and if the caches got low ratings, there would be fewer visitors, and no fun "Stashing for Stats" only. Caches with high ratings would get all the action, all the TBs, Coins, and "Cool Stuff". eBay has a system that provides a way of rating sellers on there site that seems to work quite well.