Proud Soccer Mom

In just about every circumstance where one can consider a geocacher to be cheating, the only person who's hurt by having an ingenuous experience is the cacher who does it. It's up to them whether or not they can live with that. I didn't become a law enforcement officer because I don't have the disposition for it so becoming a "Geocaching Cop" is the least of my priorities.

I haven't read all the comments in this thread but my two cents on trading with expensive items is that when I do drop in an extensive item, I don't announce it online. When I have, people will just go pick up whatever it was from the cache (sometimes not even bother to leave something, forget trade even/trade up!). By not announcing the item, only genuine cachers hunting the cache will have the opportunity to trade for the item (and would probably do so earnestly). I'd be afraid that designating a cache as a higher-value swag cache would invite these kinds of greedy people. If it works in some areas, that's great and I'm glad to hear it!

I agree with you and I've seen it applied to many other hobbies. It all depends on the offense or lack of value that a person places on another person's hobby. I've heard it time and time again. When it happened to me, it was an atheist former friend who, in what was probably a moment of extreme grouchitude, started to berate me for paranormal investigation. When I retorted that he should quit playing his guitar because it's not more important than curing Cancer, either. He never talked to me again. That would be someone who can dish it but can't take it. Imagine if everyone took the advice. We'd have hundreds of thousands of vastly unqualified people all trying to research a cure for Cancer and nobody enjoying their lives.

It looks like he got his username change.

I've slowly built up an immunity to Iocane Powder.

because I'm waiting to see if I get a username change before I go out signing logs again.

Just to be sure, check the email you sent to make sure you sent it to contact@Groundspeak.com. Doesn't hurt to double check. I'd wager that how long it takes depends on the workload. If there's a lot going on, these requests might sit lower on the priority list when otherwise it might not take long at all. Each username change is approved on a case by case basis. I'd assume this means they've told some people 'no.' I also assume they've emailed to let them know their request has been denied. It would make sense that they do. In my experience Groundspeak has always had positive customer service so I'd try not to be too concerned and hang in there.

I didn't bring my camera because this was supposed to be a quick one and it was right by the road. Go figure. I had to use my cell phone camera. He was curled up on a palm leaf minding his own business as I searched around for the cache. Cute little one.

I've not been to any event yet to get any kind of icon; but, I've practiced CITO.

More than likely, this person has a bone to pick with Geocaching or the geocachers in the area. I've seen similar with someone who was actually messing with other people's livelihood because of a grudge she formed when she was caught doing something wrong. There's currently a pending lawsuit. So someone like this may or may not go away. It depends on their mental health and their commitment to the grudge. I really doubt this person is that affectionate towards the environment.

*nods* Florida is really bad about it, especially because of the construction dumping. Roads have been blocked off in Charlotte County because of the illegal dumping. There's also surveillance cameras at these sites. One time we came upon four computer towers. My husband said, "Ooo! Parts!" and we definitely CITO'd that site. You can keep the scrap metal and sell it for extra cash (buy more fuel do more geocaching). And of course properly dispose of what you can. If something is decent (like a CD-ROM drive that works but you have no use for it) then Freecycle it. Nobody expects you to single-handedly clean up an entire area, but if each cacher does a little bit when they find the nearby cache, the place will get cleaned up. At least until the next dumping.

When I hid my hybrid, I have a logbook and a separate box within it for the letterboxing. The geocachers are encouraged to participate in the letterbox journal (by writing their name or trail name) and the Letterboxers are encouraged to write in the logbook... but neither is required to participate in the other activity if they don't want to participate.

No, you didn't. There is a big difference between "the GPS receiver is able to determine the timing of the signals" and "the satellite sends the time." Also, the GPS signals are not sent as bursts. In any case, the GPS unit does not determine the position from the absolute times of the signals, but from the differences in time between multiple signals. Aside from that, you were right. How GPS Works by RNPH Push the button on the right of the little yellow thing. Watch the little guy zig zag up to the top of the screen and plant the little flag. Watch the little lines hook up to the satellites. When you've got four, you can go geocaching. Follow the direction arrow until you have to get out of the car. Then follow on foot. When you almost get to Ground Zero, the distance gauge will go nuts and say you're 8... no, 10... no, 4... no, 6 feet away. Start looking around for the cache at this point. The End.

A maggot with travel bug ethics?

Fixed it for ya. And, seriously, as an herbalist I can tell you that there are some things that do not need a physician or mass-produced synthetic chemical full spray/ointment/lotion/drops/whathaveyou. If you have cancer, go to the doctor and let 'em do whatever they can do to kill the disease but a fire ant bite doesn't require an $8 product from Walgreens to relieve itching/pain and prevent infection. Not all homeopathic remedies are worthless, not all modern medicine is necessary.

Your logic seems to dictate that no one is playing or enjoying Waymarking or Wherigo simply because you obviously do not. I applied your logic to my television viewing preferences and realized that "Grey's Anatomy" - that I didn't even know was off the air and could not care less why - would be disliked by everyone because I had no interest in it. While the logic you've presented can be hard to follow, I tried my best. Perhaps you can understand the difficulty in accepting your conclusions about these games since you refused to grasp the point of the analogy. Since you now maintain that your personal opinion about these games has nothing to do with your conclusion, your conclusion is simply wrong and lacks any fact about the games. To refresh your memory, you statements were: "You know, the thing about waymarks? They have been around for a while now and they just do not seem to be all that popular." This is untrue. They are very popular, especially to Waymarkers. People not even playing Waymarking find Waymarks tremendously useful for research and preservation. The game is increasingly visible. While Geocaching has "muggles" who might relocate or get rid of a cache container, Waymarkers must be careful that their original photography and text is not poached by people not playing the game. Waymarks appear in Google searches (Geocaches do not) and, in Historical Societies, you'll hear Waymarking mentioned long before anybody thinks about Geocaching. "And Wherigo's, no one hardly ever mentions those. What? Does anyone know how many of those there in the entire world?" I'm pretty sure people who are building and playing Wherigo cartridges are mentioning them quite a bit to other people who are building and playing Wherigo cartridges. This game is new and has a lot of development ahead of it. The people who are playing it now are helping develop the game with feedback. How many cartridges were you expecting to be placed worldwide while in its infancy? How many discussions about Wherigo were you expecting in the Geocaching forum? Maybe you could look in the Wherigo forum...

Except by Waymarkers, who seem to really enjoy the game. Except people who build and play Wherigo cartridges, who seem to really enjoy the game. I don't watch "Grey's Anatomy" and what I've heard about it doesn't interest me therefore it is not a popular show. While "Grey's Anatomy" fans may respect my opinion about the show, however uninformed, they probably would not accept my conclusion. There are people who enjoy playing these games. It's just that none of those people are you.

This just reminds me that I have to plan a caching run in Lee County. Why is the guy from Colorado being so weird about a South Florida micro?

There's an everyone-must-clean-up law in my house.

We found a syringe, rubber tie, bent up spoon, and a baggie of ... stuff. That's not the fault of the cache owner, though. So it wouldn't qualify as a "worst cache" but it was the worst thing to find at a cache site. We called the LEOs and DNF'd that one. The worst was the soggy moldy log in a pill bottle stuffed in the tree that became prime fire ant real estate. No harm done there... just ewwie. So I guess I got it pretty good.

Waymarking.com did evolve from Locationless and Virtual Caches. As the evolution progresses over the years, it is now a completely different GPS-based game and should be regarded as such. Picking an analogy: This would be like saying, "Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?" was inspired by "Jeopardy!" Both are game shows on the television and both require trivia knowledge. However, the rules and format of these games are different enough to say that "Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?" could not be merged into "Jeopardy!" and provide those fans the same kind of experience, even if "Jeopardy!" fans wouldn't mind. So it is with Waymarking and Geocaching. Waymarking has traveled too far past the fork in the road to double-back and return as Virtuals. In addition, Geocaching has sustained very well without additional Virtuals, which were becoming cumbersome and difficult for reviewers. A large complaint is reviewing consistency and Virtuals made it impossible for reviewers to be consistent and clear. "Wow" factor is just too subjective and the lack of organization must have been a nightmare for site maintenance and search functions. If Groundspeak would provide a stat bar that displays stats for all of their GPS games, I believe everyone would be happy.

Except for Chik-fil-A... because under no circumstance can a BOOK ever be called a McToy. But, I'll tell ya, my kids still have the books and others have been recycled into school projects, scrapbooking and crafts. Try that with a plastic Spongebob Squarepants in a cowboy hat!

My kids don't like them, but they rarely want any of the swag anyway. They like poking through to see what's there but barely ever trade. Once there was a bag of shark teeth. My son really liked that but didn't have anything to trade so he left it. It was picked up by the next little boy to find the cache. We can say that shark teeth is a winner with kids! My littlest one likes finding cameras. At four years old, he knows you take a picture and put it back. The only time my daughter traded swag was for a Hello Kitty keychain... and that was a couple years ago. When we found a Hello Kitty themed cache last year, she just wanted to sign the logbook. Outside of caching, they appreciate the meal toys that come from Wendy's the most. They were giving out MadLibs for a while and then little travel-size games. There are better-made versions of these games in stores, obviously, but my kids enjoy them more than the plastic toys given by McDonald's or Burger King for movies and show that they enjoy watching. Maybe my kids aren't the usual. I don't know. In one of my cache hides I established a separate bag for the cheap toy swag. I figured this would make it easier for parents and non-parents to handle any swag trading... and provides even/up trading at both levels. It's a large container so there was room to fuss around like that. I haven't checked to see if the organization has kept up.

If I've read your post correctly, you walked away from the goobers, leaving them to play their game. If all of the reasonable, responsible, mature people walked away from this game, there'd only be goobers left. I think it's best to get rid of the goobers, rather than quit something I enjoy. If it's general gooberation, I agree with you. Many of these games involve participation from people from various walks of life, beliefs and opinions, and experiences. Not only will there be unique points of view about how to play the game, there can naturally be some conflict between personalities about any number of things. That's just living life as one of a gabillion people on the planet. But there's a line, I think, where one can say, "I don't have to put up with this." I think that line is generally when the irritation caused by others becomes impossible to ignore and overrules all enjoyment in playing the game. At that point, it's just ridiculous and an adult has to move on and leave those ... well, I don't think they would be goobers anymore but something more sinister... to their game. As adults, we really have no excuse not to make decisions that are in our best interests, whether that means a break from the game or quitting play altogether.

www.ticktwister.com - that's quite a tongue twister! A product named Tick Twister should only be a tiny blanket with colored polka-dots and an itty-bitty circle spinner.