Eric O'Connor

Or at least the way they are beginning to deal with small amounts of money... Their Octopus card has a little built in chip and can be used and reloaded as often as needed. You can even have custom ones printed up like phone cards are here. Fumbling for coins in Tokyo (even $5 coins) wasn't any more amusing than it is here in the states. People concerned with anonymity can buy these with cash ($20/each) and the black market crowd can just stick with the C-note. I already carry a card for the local subway and a seperate card for the parking meters.... One that will do it all sounds pretty dang sweet. If it's under $20, there shouldn't be a bill or a coin for it... this is 2002 folks.

quote:georgeandmary: Finding a cache is more than just finding something hidden in the bushes. It's figuring out the best route in, figuring out which trail leads there after taking 2 wrong turns, it's not being sure you're in right area since the tree cover is so thick and you're gettin really poor acuracy. If only because I'm ornary, I'll ask.... Cacher A (AKA - "The Hider") decides to hide a cache on a sunny Saturday. There is this wonderful park about an hours drive from where she lives, but it's remote and she doesn't feel safe going alone. She invites a buddy, Cacher B (AKA "The FTF") to tag along with her. The plan is that "A" will hide a cache while "B" seeks another cache hidden in a different part of the park. They agree to stay within radio contact throughout their visit to the park. What if the two geocachers are a mile apart and communicating on radios? That seems entirely reasonable to me and doesn't change anything I've said previously other than the distance apart. A mile is more than sufficient to be unsure of how to best get to a cache location. Another thing that bothers me about your definition is that it implies that prior knowledge is forbidden, that someone with a mapping GPSr loaded with topo maps hasn't reaaaaly found the cache. I know this isn't what you're saying but it seems to hint in that direction. -- Hipsters, Flipsters, and Finger-Poppin' Daddies - Knock me your lobes! I came here to lay Caesar out, - Not to hip you to him. The bad jazz that a cat blows, - Wails long after he's cut out. The groovy, is often stashed with their frames, - So don't put Caesar down. - Lord Buckley

quote:Originally posted by fizzymagic:I don't think the friend should log it as a find, period. My knee was jerking right there with you FizzyMagic, and then I realized that something else might be happening here. Cache hiders that do this might be playing it safe and hiking with a buddy. They tell the buddy "Wait here, I'll hide the cache and you can find it after I get back." The buddy sits down on a nice mossy log and starts to count bugs while the hider takes whatever time is need to find a good spot and grab some reasonably accurate coordinates. The hider verbally passes these coordinates to the buddy (since we still can't &^%$ Ir them back-n-forth) who then hunts the cache in the traditional way. The buddy carpooled to the spot and had to spend twenty minutes on their keister, but may not have done anything wrong in our eyes. Or maybe it's 2AM and I really need to get to sleep before I post more tripe?

Okay, okay, I'll ask already..... Who exactly is going to pay for the chit-chat bandwidth?

Every park around here has at least a few sleeping bags. It took me longer than I care to admit to hide my first cache because of this. This is actually one of my biggest complaints about this area. Because the city has a tolerant attitude, few of the businesses allow non-employees to use the restroom...etc. If they give access to the nice old lady, or someone like my five year old daughter whose bladder must be the size of a hummingbird, the people-of-roofless-living will complain that they're being discriminated against. A buddy of mine makes a couple hundred thousand US dollars each year. He busts his keester cranking out translations of technical documents from Russian, Chinese, and Japanese into English. He looks exactly like a homeless guy and I can never get over all the dirty looks we get while eating at a pizza joint or whatever. The guy bathes and is polite, but he hasn't seen a razor or barber in 20 years. I've been trying to bring him with me to some geocaches but he's afraid that exposure to fresh air and exercise will kill him. Even here in the Peoples Rebublic of Berkeley, drifters are treated with scorn. I vote we ship them all to Kabul, but then I've always been a softy.

A few feet of duct tape and an old eTrex tell me exactly where the cat was at night.

quote:thrillseeker69: Chainsaw aside, a winch would ideally be your best bet. Why am I suddenly flashing back to that scene in "The Gods Must Be Crazy"? (II?)

quote:thrillseeker69: Chainsaw aside, a winch would ideally be your best bet. Why am I suddenly flashing back to that scene in "The Gods Must Be Crazy"? (II?)

So, where can I find a sponsor for this program? "I take my hand in your, and together we can find what we could never have found alone."

Actually, I'd seen many references to how much better the reception was on QH than units with an antenna in the "patch" form factor. My GPS III+ (a unit renouned for it's ability to hold a signal) doesn't seem to fair much better than my Venture. If I'm heading out and am not sure if I'll have time to do a cache I'll grab the Venture, the fact that it's easier to carry makes up for any difference in signal strength. YMMV

quote:Originally posted by Dekaner:Geocaching Gift Certificates Now that's what I want!! I just wanted this idea to get some more light. Seems like an easy-no-brainer for the J-man. He can sell them in batches of ten ($1 each certificate) through PayPal and have the entire "certificate" take the form of an email message. The person buying these gift certificates can then.... A) Carve the certificate number/password on a block of wood Print them out on nice glossy paper on your trading card C) Stamp them into a coin/dogtag D) Mold them into clay and fire in the community kiln E) Sew them into a nice scarf/bandana F) Scribble them on a sheet of paper or whatever else tickles your fancy. The point is that we can at add actual value to an item that has intrinsic value. This might motivate people to get creative with their trade items. All Jeremy would have to do is setup a way for more travelbug~like codes to be generated/sold and a secure method of distribution/reclamation. People could cache..er..cash in these codes for the various products that Groundspeak currently offers. This would stimulate revenue for the site and possibly lower Jeremy's per-item cost as the volume increases. What are the downsides to Dekane's idea? (or whovever came up with it first) Is Jeremy (or his chosen lackey) willing to do this? I suppose caches could still be plundered but I can't imagine your common thief getting all hot-n-bothered over some arts-n-crafts. Might help do away with the McTrinckets too....

quote:oregonblackdog: no reason to give cachers a bad name. Yeah, that's my job. Actually, I've always been extra careful on private property. Not just while geocaching either, you never know what sort of history a place has or who might be secretly hoping for trouble. An obvious family outing on the other hand shouldn't have rasied any alarms unless your women happen to sport niqab. <- That's not ROT-13'd it's that Moslem she-mask thingy that only show the eyes. Eric " your eyes are like lipid pools and your skin.... well, beats the heck out of me..." O'Connor

quote:oregonblackdog: no reason to give cachers a bad name. Yeah, that's my job. Actually, I've always been extra careful on private property. Not just while geocaching either, you never know what sort of history a place has or who might be secretly hoping for trouble. An obvious family outing on the other hand shouldn't have rasied any alarms unless your women happen to sport niqab. <- That's not ROT-13'd it's that Moslem she-mask thingy that only show the eyes. Eric " your eyes are like lipid pools and your skin.... well, beats the heck out of me..." O'Connor

You don't know how easy you have it... Why back in the good old days we used to have to hand write coordinates on fig leaves by dipping a chicken feather in vegtable dye. And we didn't have any new fangled GPS neither, we used divining rods and we liked it.

Actually, I liked the story too but was wondering why they didn't give the troll a nickname... "Clan Ferguson" has a nice ring to it. Seriously though, flash-floods are a very real threat and going into anyplace of this nature is taking a larger risk than you might imagine. B'sides.... they admitted at the onset that this place had a foul odor. -- I would follow my GPS to the gates of Hell if it pointed that way. - GeoVamp

Actually, I liked the story too but was wondering why they didn't give the troll a nickname... "Clan Ferguson" has a nice ring to it. Seriously though, flash-floods are a very real threat and going into anyplace of this nature is taking a larger risk than you might imagine. B'sides.... they admitted at the onset that this place had a foul odor. -- I would follow my GPS to the gates of Hell if it pointed that way. - GeoVamp

I never thought I'd have to type this sentence if I lived to be 100, but there are *two* threads about the rescue of a chicken hypnotsist's bicycle.

Thanks Elias, that's exactly what I was hoping you'd say. It's also what I was expecting since the more hoops you make an end user jump through the less likely they are to make use of the service.....but enough about my marriage.

Is this limited to Springfield, MO ? I was born in Springfield, MA. Neither being all that close to me at the moment....but... This also begs the question as to just how many Springfields there are? Sure the one where you live is huge and many are not but were I to find all the caches hidden within the city/county/town limits of *every* Springfield within the contenental United States, I'll bet I'd give Team CCCooper a run for their title.

I noticed that windowsupdate.com offers: quote:Microsoft .NET Framework 21312 KB/ Download Time: 58 min The .NET Framework is a new feature of Windows. Applications built using the .NET Framework are more reliable and secure. You need to install the .NET Framework only if you have software that requires it. Is this something that would be prudent to download for the future search enhancements? Let's see 21000KB divided by 1024 is about 20-and-a-half megs.... Which translates to about a 75 minute download on my dial-up... Mostly I hate to clutter my system with stuff that's not needed. Is this an inevitable update for geocachers?

quote:Originally posted by Kernbob:You know the old saying,' if YOU hide one, they will come' Not to Temecula they won't. Nothing against Vagrant, I'm sure you're a stand-up guy and all but I hated Temecula with a passion when I worked there in the early ninties. Nothing to see, nothing to do, any just beyond the reach of areas that had plenty of both. I'll pick Duluth over Temecula anyday.... Well, that's a stretch.

That takes "playing with food" to a new level methinks. "When I snap my fingers you'll dance like a white man" --

That takes "playing with food" to a new level methinks. "When I snap my fingers you'll dance like a white man" --

quote:Originally posted by Team Dragon:I wonder how fast that would change if Jeremy planted an icon on the front page linking to Lowrance, saying this was the recommended manufacturer. I've been wondering that for a while now..... How many here would switch to an iFinder if Lowrance became the "Official" GPS of Geocaching.com and used Jeremy's logo on the case? I'd be tempted myself, if only because I love the idea of having a 10,000 point tracklog. What features would a dedicated GPS unit have? I'd like to see them include the basic mapping software and allow you (for a small fee) to download regional maps that contained *both* topo and street information, with a display that allows you to choose just what you'd like to see onscreen. If it could store and display extended cache descriptions (getting PDA-ish) so much the better. It uses MMC cards, so I'm not sure that this isn't possible with a current iFinder and a firmware update. They could ship the unit to you in a custom ammobox I don't own stock in or even know of anybody that works for Lowrance.

quote:Originally posted by konopapw:This thread lead with a burn from Jeremy about making this a member's only site. Actually, what he said was "I was close to making the site registration only after this one". Membership requires more than the email address that registration requires.