headybrew

Wow, those are some really old corpses. Perhaps there should be a comprehensive, searchable database somewhere of all the horses that have been officially declared dead. Otherwise, how are more recent members supposed to know which subjects they are not allowd to discuss any more?

I don't know. But maybe doing a pocket query on a city you're planning to visit is a good way to know what areas to stay away from.

Here's something interesting: Los Angeles Homicide Map (pdf) Notice how the areas with the highest murder rate mesh perfectly with the donut hole in the cache map. But also notice something else, the donut has a missing "bite" to the east, and the murder rates don't fill that bite... That bite would be "east LA" as in "born in east LA" ... I don't know what to make of that. There are other types of crime than murder. Perhaps there is a higher assault/robbery rate there. Perhaps there isn't, but it just feels like a bad neighborhood? Or perhaps it is more about economic status than crime??? Just pondering...

As for Wall-Marts, that area of town is where most of the Wall-Marts are around here. That's exactly why I don't go to Wal-Mart very often.

I just thought this was interesting. It's a pocket query of the nearest 500 geocaches to a set of coordinates. What do you suppose explains the big hole in the middle of the roughly donut shaped cluster? It's not mountains or anything to do with the geography. It's not a military base or private property or a national park... It's South Central LA. Where they literally produce more rappers and gang bangers than they do geocaches!

That ROCKS! Good for you!

Yup! I had a similar revelation one day while driving along with that song in my head for some strange reason. It continues: Akiddley divey too wouldn't you. A kid'll eat ivy too, wouldn't you? ( kid = baby goat )

<mushy_mode> To paraphrase the title of the Robert Fulghum book... Things I have learned from Caching (or in the fora): There is a great big world out there, with lots of amazing things that I never realized I was passing right by each day. I can walk a lot further than I thought, if I want to. Rattle snakes are scarey, but beautiful. Some Spiders can be worse than rattle snakes. Know my limits. But push them! It's not always important to win an argument Sometimes, I blare my opinions too loudly Lampost skirts are usually not bolted down. It's easy to convince a septuagenarian nudist that my GPSR is actually a sattelite phone. no matter how clearly you write it in the cache page, FTF hounds will still try to scale your neighbor's back yard wall to get to a cache in your front yard. how to tell an antelope from a mule deer Sometimes things are not what they appear to be, even when you're looking right at them. Bomb squads blow up more stuff than bombers do. Never bring your girlfriend into the most mosquito infested spot in the whole state of Maine. (but the rattle snakes, she can handle.) Okay, I'm sure there are many many more things to list... What's on your list? </mushy_mode>

Okay, I thought the title was Forum Censorship, and the discusion that followed has directly to do with that, and I didn't start the course variation, so I don't think *I* drove your topic off course or tried to hijack it, but hey, I am easy - I apologize anyway. Posters, set a course for the original topic! Happy? Ed Out Oops. Sorry.

Yeah, but that's kind of my point: There is viable competition! What constitutes viable? If a service has 3 caches in my area, I'll go find them. As a seeker, that's a viable service. As a hider, it depends on how much traffic you want, I guess. But there's no reason I can't list on one site, and seek on another. Or list on several sites for different kinds of caches.

Funny, I was afraid to say it, for fear of being told I wasn't a real cacher or something... But the last four or five urban caches I've sought were sans-unit. And I was planning to go pick up another one tonight. I can see from the picture that it's at a familiar street corner 3 blocks from my home. After I tried it, it turns out to be quite easy for urban caches. I just look at the map, then at google earth at home. Then when I get a chance during lunch time at work I run out and find the spot from memory. I think it's almost as accurate as a gps would be. ie: I can usually narrow it down to a single tree or a sight-line from an intersection. Funny that sometimes I just look at the big white arrows painted on the road and they point right at the cache. Then I go there and... There it is! It doesn't work for caches in the woods though, because thre are too dang many trees. And often rural areas aren't high-res enough on google earth. There, I admitted it. I'm an out of the closet sans-unit urban micro-nabber!

From the seeker's point of view, I still don't understand this emphasis on quantity. If there were 10 different listing services, each with 3 caches in my area, then I'd go seek all 30 of them. I have sought caches on 3 different listing services now. Why the brand name loyalty?

Well, one important use for them that some folks may be overlooking, is snake-probing. I use them to push the grass aside, etc. I'd rather it get bitten than I.

Yup. My ski poles don't have a spring shock, but I've noticed that the fiberglass flexes a bit to absorb shock and vibration. I prefer it to the feel of straight alluminum or hardwood which can both vibrate and jar when you're on hard surfaced trails or rocks.

In my experience, the problem with collapsable ones is that they collapse. In fact, they're most likely to collapse just when you need them most. And you end up face down in the stream you were trying to rock hop across. My girlfriend uses one, and she's very happy with it so far. But then she weighs less than half my weight! YMMV. I use a fiberglass ski pole. I bought a pair of them on sale. I got them long for downhill rock hopping. The strap and the angled grip are important to get right. I wish it had a second grip about 6 inches lower down. I've been thinking about adding one of my own. I'd use the lower grip for general walking, and the higher grip for downhills. I think it's important to get the strap right, so that your wrist can support most of the pressure when you are pushing down, and your hand can relax more. Hope that helps.

I have to echo the others' thoughts: The very first thing I thought when I was it was: BOMB SQUAD! on topic: I'd call it a small bomb.

No. YOU need another place to hang out. That's an agains the guidelines insult if I've ever seen one.

Don't worry, it won't be for long.

As it relates to geocaching, specifically, I can't help but ask: If the online comunity is a hostile place, does that detract from your enjoyment of geocaching? The online community of geocachers, who are geocaching, need to be able to speak to each other like adults. This directly affects our geocaching experience, and is quite relevant, I think. Angsty cachers aren't going to have much fun when they are geocaching, right? So it's important to the geocaching community that geocachers can discuss both the good and the bad feelings they get from the geocaching community. We are after all, geocachers who are geocaching. It's really hard to enjoy geocaching when your posts are deleted and you are told they have simply been moved. This increases angst. But an honest discussion of angst itself, by folks such as me, who are sincerely trying to do the right thing, should be allowed. Because it relates directly to geocaching, and it is a geocaching topic. Don't you think?

Yeah, I'm sure that's it. He was trying to turn his friend off from geocaching forever.

Well, actually, in the northern hemiphsere it's more of a southeaster/southwest rise/set. It depends on the season. But seriously though. I tried to post a generalized, "let's discuss angst" thread last week. I think it would be a healthy, healing thing to discuss. My thread got deleted from the system. Good luck with yours.

[HUMOR MODE] So hiding is just a "just a childish cry for attention" ?? [/HUMOR MODE] Yup, I agree that it's a combination of thin-skinned hiders, but also blunt loggers... I think I learned a lot from the example cache posted in that other thread... Don't have it handy at the moment. But it definately changed how I would approach logging a cache I didn't like. I see the point, though, that hiders do appreciate logs. So learning to word logs nicely may be in order. But I guess if online communication skills are running low for the logger (as they often are for me), then It's a valid option to just not log it. As my mom always said, "If you don't have anything nice to say, just don't say anything." I bet your mom said that too.

I guess I must have read the OP too quickly. I seem to have missed the part where he said he doesn't want to be a part of the online community. The message I got from it was that he just didn't want to participate in the drama, as outlined in some of the other threads. He can still participate in the forums part of the community. It's very hard for me to see that as "a childish cry for attention". I think he shared a valid thought with us.

Arrrrr! Tuesday Sept. 19 2006 is the annual Talk Like a Pirate Day! Lest ye forget, me Lads!

Found it! Great Location! I can tell the hider really put his heart into this one! Couldn't find the log though. Left a gold dubloon. Took heart. Those undead creatures really wanted the FTF. Hopefully they won't be back to bother the second finder! TFTC!