GeoAnxieties

[Allie McG]

This is a fascinating topic! "GeoAnxieties" would make a fantastic username. BTW, what kind of gloves do you all recommend...

Edited July 9, 2011 by Allie.McG

[+RhinoInAToga]

I'm surprised nobody's mentioned battery-anxiety...

 

GPS Batteries dying (and replacement batteries dead too) when in the middle of nowhere

Flashlight batteries dying during a night cache

DNFs (especially when someone with 3 finds just found it easily)

Stingling Nettles

Poisonous Spiders

Creepy people hiding in the bushes

Urban caches

Cougars

Falling off a cliff (and worse yet, surviving)

The creepy people hiding in bushes and the bear being 10 feet away from me are definitely on the list. And, funny you should mention it, but our flashlights died in the middle of the woods tonight while doing maintenance on a cache!

Good thing it was our cache & I knew where we were..

I just replied with what I seem to always worry over the most. Everything else is (more or less) in-the-moment kinds of things. Although I have been getting wiser about them.

I like your caching name, btw. In your team, who's Jack-Jack?

[+RhinoInAToga]

This is a fascinating topic! "GeoAnxieties" would make a fantastic username. BTW, what kind of gloves do you all recommend...

Mechanic's gloves have been working wonderfully for us. Thick enough & hardy enough to flick a wasp nest, avoid spider bites, and grab briars..yet thin enough to handle anything you're trying to grasp.

[+RhinoInAToga]

Ive had frequent sightings of bears in the NC area. I used to be able to walk up to them without any fear when I saw them in the Smokey Mountain area. Then there was one incident when I was hiking alone in the area of the Fontana dam. It was during a drought, and I wanted to try to see where the old towns had been before they flooded the area in the 1940s. I was on the top of a ridgeline on a game trail when I heard heavy bushwhacking without any voices along with it. At first I thought it was another lone hiker, but I crouched down low anyway to try to get a view without being noticed. When I saw the bear, he was just going about his business without any problem, but then he stopped suddenly and looked directly at me. I was about 300 feet away on the top of a different ridgeline, but still in his line of sight. All the other times I had seen bear, there was never any eye contact, but this time there was. He started to move towards me, but there was a small valley between us. I jumped up, screamed, and slid on my rump down a very steep slope on the opposite side from him and ran out onto the open area of where the lake had been. You are not supposed to move at all, but there wasn't any way that I could not. I made a bunch of noises, started whacking a tree with a log and ran off. I definitely had surprised him, and I appeared to him to be only a few feet tall also. I ran about a mile back to my jeep, nearly had a heart attack, and the entire time thought that I heard him bushwhacking in the woods following me. Since then I have been overly paranoid at the slightest inclination of a possible bear. Walking in the woods, being slightly nearsighted and seeing a large dark cave or stump in the slightest shape of a bear sets me into a small panic. Before that there was a time when I accidentally walked up to one on a trail in Cades Cove. He was only 20 feet away, and I just froze and watched him. He knew I was there but didn't even look at me. A few hikers came up the trail, saw me but not the bear, and I didn't say anything to them until they got nearly as close because I thought it was funny. The look on their faces was priceless. But now, it's a little different..

I'm in NC as well. Lotsa' black bear! I think we (well, anyone who's dealt with them for some time) all had that phase..that carefree attitude when it comes to black bear. They seem deceptively calm, almost cuddly. I, too, used to mess with them, but in a much more stupid way.

A bear used to frequent my neighborhood. I'd see him wander down the trail & I'd drop what I was doing & take off after him. Often in PJ's & bare feet. I would follow him (closely) to see where he went in the neighborhood, & what he did. There were several times that I lost him in the little wooded area, as he made his loop back to the trail. Sooo stupid!

One day he was trying to get to our garbage cans (they were locked in a box, which you know is common) & I didn't want him clawing his way through the wood. So I threw a rock at the box to make a loud noise. It scared him, & he took off at a run back up the trail. I stood there for a long time, thinking how stupid I was! If he had chosen to run at me instead of away, I wouldn't be here today. Once you see how fast & powerful they truly are for yourself..it makes you think!

Funny side story: after that happened. One morning I woke up late for work, & I was scrambling out the door. I was pulling my shirt over my head as I ran out the door to the car, (modesty always went out the window when I was running late) & while my shirt was stuck over my head (stupid buttons) my neighbor yelled, "BEAR!" I peeked out the top of the shirt & he was in my garden, which was next to the car. Staring at me. I screamed & turned around & ran with the shirt still stuck up around my head & arms. Bumped into the truck, the side of the house, and the porch post before I made it back inside. I was really late that day!

[+The_Incredibles_]

I'm surprised nobody's mentioned battery-anxiety...

 

GPS Batteries dying (and replacement batteries dead too) when in the middle of nowhere

Flashlight batteries dying during a night cache

DNFs (especially when someone with 3 finds just found it easily)

Stingling Nettles

Poisonous Spiders

Creepy people hiding in the bushes

Urban caches

Cougars

Falling off a cliff (and worse yet, surviving)

The creepy people hiding in bushes and the bear being 10 feet away from me are definitely on the list. And, funny you should mention it, but our flashlights died in the middle of the woods tonight while doing maintenance on a cache!

Good thing it was our cache & I knew where we were..

I just replied with what I seem to always worry over the most. Everything else is (more or less) in-the-moment kinds of things. Although I have been getting wiser about them.

I like your caching name, btw. In your team, who's Jack-Jack?

 

Jack-Jack is our 3rd child which supposedly we will have in the future. Apparently, it had better be a boy also. LOL. Or maybe we could just change our guinea pig's name to Jack-Jack, that would be simpler and less painful.

Edited July 9, 2011 by The_Incredibles_

[+RhinoInAToga]

I'm surprised nobody's mentioned battery-anxiety...

 

GPS Batteries dying (and replacement batteries dead too) when in the middle of nowhere

Flashlight batteries dying during a night cache

DNFs (especially when someone with 3 finds just found it easily)

Stingling Nettles

Poisonous Spiders

Creepy people hiding in the bushes

Urban caches

Cougars

Falling off a cliff (and worse yet, surviving)

The creepy people hiding in bushes and the bear being 10 feet away from me are definitely on the list. And, funny you should mention it, but our flashlights died in the middle of the woods tonight while doing maintenance on a cache!

Good thing it was our cache & I knew where we were..

I just replied with what I seem to always worry over the most. Everything else is (more or less) in-the-moment kinds of things. Although I have been getting wiser about them.

I like your caching name, btw. In your team, who's Jack-Jack?

 

Jack-Jack is our 3rd child which supposedly we will have in the future. Apparently, it had better be a boy also. LOL. Or maybe we could just change our guinea pig's name to Jack-Jack, that would be simpler and less painful.

Less painful isn't that the truth! 9+ months of hormonal hades..then birth, because 9 months & the sacrifice of a body just wasn't enough. Lol yeah, I'd stick to the guinea pig

[+RobDJr]

I've only seen bear while driving

 

Never seen a bear while driving... Where I'm from, they aint allowed to drive.

 

I don't have any GeoAnxieties.

 

At least, I didn't until reading this thread.

 

Now I think I'm gonna have all kinds of issues.

 

But seriously, the only time I've ever felt any real anxiety while caching was doing a solo night cache in a wooded urban park. I generally don't have a problem going into a forest at night, but proximity to urban and industrial areas ratchets up the pucker factor by several scales of magnitude for me.

 

I don't get anxious about caches in someone's backyard, but I do dislike them and thus avoid them.

 

I just hope I never develop an ammo-can phobia. That would be bad.

[+hukilaulau]

A couple of different threads and a conversation tonight has me thinking about anxities and how they may relate to geocaching.

 

I have to admit to being a bit of a germaphobe. This all began with a microbiology course in nursing school. (Don't ever take this course if you are even a little bit concerned about germs - trust me!)

 

Surprisingly, that course made me feel LESS apprehensive about germs. I was relieved to learn just how many things have to come together for a germ to actually hurt you. (Entry portal, low resistance, sufficient quantity, etc.)

 

What I woory about most is chiggers. A bad case of chiggers will make you WISH you were only dying of Lyme Disease.

 

And I do worry about my truck at the trailhead. But the only times it's been vandalized in the six years I've been caching was once on E. 77th Street in Manhattan and another time in the main parking lot at a big hospital in Phoenix, AZ.

 

I was a little nervous a few weeks ago as I scooted out on an old wooden railroad trestle looking for a cache. It wasn't the height, it was the thought of bees and how long it would take me to get off of there if they started coming after me.

 

As Steven Wright says, "I'm not afraid of heights, I'm afraid of widths."

[+ARHogFanz]

I'm not crazy about sticking my hands into someplace I can't see. I'm getting better about using my pen to probe in there. I think I'm going to add a stick to my cache bag to probe with.

 

Caching up next to occupied buildings really makes me uncomfortable, especially on private property. I know that the rules say that permission must be obtained for placing caches but really - how many people actually do that? If it says that permission has been obtained, then I keep reminding myself of that, even when I'm getting the urge to leave. I just feel weird about being in someone else's space.

[+A & J Tooling]

Read the story recently about the two hikers attacked by the bear? She had cubs and defended them. Killing the guy and just shaking his wife around a bit. I ain't going into an area where I am not the top predator. Sharks, crocs or big friggin' bears. Ain't gonna' happen. Snakes, spiders and scorpions can hurt me but not kill me by tearing me apart limb from limb. That's my 'issue'. Being eaten alive and watching it happen.

[+Stealth Bobber]

All week long at work all I can think about is goin' "treasure huntin'.....I'm off weekends, and live in FLORIDA......so, what happens when I finally get all my cachin' stuff in the truck and I am my way, excited to finally be goin'? I get to the spot where the cache is supposed to be, of course it is just inside the scrub trees, and it looks like it is someones camp site less the tent. Trash everywhere, and I peer through the trees just hoping I can spot a micro from twenty feet away.....thinking the whole time some homeless person is gonna come up from behind and konck me on the head and take off with my truck, and I just can't make myself go into the trees......I just can't do it.

 

I also feel really weird going behind busineses that have their a/c units and stuff just about where the cache is suppoed to be. And I hate going in peoples yard even though it says placed with owners permission.....I feel like I gotta be in the wrong spot and whoever lives there is gonna come out and ask me wth am I doing looking around in the tree at the corner of their house.....

 

Oh well, there is always a next time.....lol

[+TheAlabamaRambler]

A couple of different threads and a conversation tonight has me thinking about anxities and how they may relate to geocaching.

 

I have to admit to being a bit of a germaphobe. This all began with a microbiology course in nursing school. (Don't ever take this course if you are even a little bit concerned about germs - trust me!)

 

Surprisingly, that course made me feel LESS apprehensive about germs. I was relieved to learn just how many things have to come together for a germ to actually hurt you. (Entry portal, low resistance, sufficient quantity, etc.)

Reminds me of Abnormal Psych classes back in college... by the end everybody was convinced they were nuts in some way!

[Allie McG]

Mechanic's gloves have been working wonderfully for us. Thick enough & hardy enough to flick a wasp nest, avoid spider bites, and grab briars..yet thin enough to handle anything you're trying to grasp.

 

Great, thanks! I know where I can get some right away.

[+user13371]

I'm not happy with bees. Not as phobic as I was as a child. Never stung as a kid, but once as an adult. When it happened I was startled and amused, like "That's it? That's what I've been afraid of all these years?" But I still have a startle reflex (okay, I admit I jump, and sometimes yell, with great comic effect) if one buzzes past me ear.

 

And while not actually hunting a cache, but on a bike ride home from looking for one today, I unintentionally pedaled through a whole swarm of them. Literally saw a yellow glittery "cloud" at the end of the street, wondered what kind of bugs they were. Wasn't until I was too close to turn back that I realized, and then had no choice but to blast right through. A few pinged off my glasses, arms and legs - but no stings. A block later I felt an itching in my t-shirt, grabbed a handful of material and squished. Then got off the bike and rinsed bug bits from my chest and shirt with my water bottle. No sting.

 

But I still hate coming across them while cache hunting.

Edited July 10, 2011 by Portland Cyclist

[Allie McG]

My geoanxiety is bumbling into poison ivy or something the like. Yeah, yeah, "leaves of three, leave it be" - I get it! But there are so many other plants out there that have leaves-of-three! If I avoided them all, I wouldn't be geocaching at all or out there tromping around weating a plastic suit.

 

I'm sure I've seen poison ivy, but since I've never had direct contact, what the plant looks like hasn't been seared into my memory. This site, Poison Ivy, Oak, and Sumac Information Center, tackles anxieties head-on. You can upload plant photos to their "Is this poison ivy" thread where someone tries to i.d. them. Don't miss the weird-hypnotic rash photos either!

 

For a more "Just the facts" approach, I like these two pdfs on Eastern Poison Ivy and Poison Sumac from the U.S. Army.

[Paperstraw]

I'm going to have to go with the "sticking my hand into random holes/rotting wood" idea.

 

I'm an amatuer entomologist, so I know what kind of insects and arachnids live in my neck of the woods, and what they're capable of. On the 7th I was actually working on collecting samples of Elateridae specimens for a gentlemen in the States and as I reached into some wood to turn it over looking for the beetles I got a sharp pain right above the cuticle of my right ring finger, I noticed some ants near by and figured one bit me, and didn't think any more of it and left them alone.

 

Two day later on the ninth my finger became swollen and bloated, and felt so weird when I bent my finger (not painful), I though an insect or spider had bitten me then and there, but I hadn't noticed anything, it wasn't until last night I realized what probably happened.

 

The swelling is just starting to go down now.

Edited July 11, 2011 by Paperstraw

[+larryc43230]

I'm going to have to go with the "sticking my hand into random holes/rotting wood" idea.

 

I'm an amatuer entomologist, so I know what kind of insects and arachnids live in my neck of the woods, and what they're capable of. On the 7th I was actually working on collecting samples of Elateridae specimens for a gentlemen in the States and as I reached into some wood to turn it over looking for the beetles I got a sharp pain right above the cuticle of my right ring finger, I noticed some ants near by and figured one bit me, and didn't think any more of it and left them alone.

 

Two day later on the ninth my finger became swollen and bloated, and felt so weird when I bent my finger (not painful), I though an insect or spider had bitten me then and there, but I hadn't noticed anything, it wasn't until last night I realized what probably happened.

 

The swelling is just starting to go down now.

I had something sort of similar happen to me a couple of years ago when I was rummaging around among some rocks on a hillside in the deep woods looking for a cache. I reached into a hole in the ground, and suddenly felt a sharp pain in the ring finger of my left hand (I'm left handed). The pain quickly subsided, and I continued looking for the cache (never did find the thing).

 

A couple of hours later, the finger that got the sting started swelling, and didn't stop until it was about twice its normal size. It never really hurt, but it felt like an over-inflated balloon and was difficult to flex for days. I never saw what exactly nailed me that day, so I have no idea what it might have been.

 

Did it teach me to wear gloves when I go poking around in dark places? Of course not! I'm lucky it hasn't happened more than that one time.

 

--Larry