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Does anybody know SFJerod?

 

He picked up Stumpy the Wonder Turtle from his first and only cache find 3.5 months ago and hasn't logged-in since. I sent a polite email 4 weeks ago but got no reply.

 

It would be great if somebody could track down the travel bug and get it moving again (if you can't find a cache it'll fit in then you can always bring it to the Picnic on 10/4 icon_wink.gif).

 

I know this is a long-shot, but it's worth a try.

 

Thanks

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Hey, listen up Bay Area cachers!

 

There is a themed cache that has been around forever - For Your Eyes Only - and it has a sequel - You Only Live Twice. A whole group of us discussed these at a cache event a couple of weeks ago, and we agreed to try them out on Sunday.

 

The first cache was originated in July, 2001 - it is probably one of the very earliest themed multi-caches.

 

The story line is great, hunting the legs is fun, there is a surprise at the end, etc.

 

I think because they are old, so they are never on a new cache list, and because they start between Davenport and Santa Cruz on Hwy 1, that many people never see them in their 'closest cache' list.

 

That's a shame. These caches were fantastic. However, take our advice: Start at the starting point. Allow yourselves 5-6 hours, including eating, enjoying the area, etc.

 

Again: These caches are fantastic. I am talking "Double Agent", "Operation Futari" and "Fellowship of the Ring" here, folks!

 

-Jif

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Having done many other Iron Chef caches I'll stand up for him, too. While I've just begun to gather the pieces for these, I'm looking forward to completing them.

 

When you're in the area, check out more of the Santa Cruz / Scotts Valley / Felton caches as well.

 

My compliments to the Chef!

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Funny you should mention the Fellowship of the Ring cache, TeamJif! It just won the 'Cache of the Week' award for last week. Congratulations to Mbrill for sweeping the balloting.

 

The list of past winners (the award's only been going a few weeks) is at: http://www.svmoms.org/svgeocachers/winners

 

I would love to hear about the kind of caches that Jif mentioned in his recent post as nominations for this award. It's a way to acknowledge older caches that have been around and may not come up on the to-do lists of new cachers. Email me about these kinds of caches, along with a few lines about why you love 'em and we'll get them the mention they deserve.

 

In the meantime, nominees for this week include some caches loved by their nominators. They listed on the balloting page at http://www.svmoms.org/svgeocachers/vote and are:

 

* Yes Way, Jose By Aargnzarf & Kikipopo

* Water Park By Tammie the Dog

* The Two Towers By Mbrill

* Men of Stone By MaxEntropy

* Northern CA Solar System Model: Planet Earth By TeamJiffy

 

Kristine

 

Kreebelle

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quote:
Originally posted by Kealia:

Having done many other Iron Chef caches I'll stand up for him, too. While I've just begun to gather the pieces for these, I'm looking forward to completing them.

 

My compliments to the Chef!


Credit where credit due:

Actually, the first cache, For Your Eyes Only, was Coralgeo's brainchild. If you look at the logs it looks like Iron Chef was FTF on it. His name may be on it now because he might be helping maintain the cache.

 

Since Iron Chef didn't log a find on the second in the series:You Only Live Twice, maybe he had a hand in placing it. Still, many kudos to Coralgeo (and all who were involved) for a great themed series of caches.

 

--Marky

"All of us get lost in the darkness, dreamers learn to steer with a backlit GPSr"

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quote:
Originally posted by Marky:

 

_Credit where credit due:_

Actually, the first cache, http://www.geocaching.com/seek/cache_details.aspx?ID=4095, was Coralgeo's brainchild. If you look at the logs it looks like Iron Chef was FTF on it. His name may be on it now because he might be helping maintain the cache.

 

Since Iron Chef didn't log a find on the second in the series:http://www.geocaching.com/seek/cache_details.aspx?ID=13709, maybe he had a hand in placing it. Still, many kudos to Coralgeo (and all who were involved) for a great themed series of caches.

 

--Marky


 

I stand corrected cute.gif

I remember Iron Chef being part of this, but didn't actually go back and look at the cache page before posting.

Thanks for the correction Marky.

 

[This message was edited by Kealia on September 30, 2003 at 03:40 PM.]

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I wanted to tell this story in a log, but I didn't want to give anything away, so I thought I'd tell it here.

 

A few months ago I was trying to fill a position at work and I had to interview a candidate.

 

The candidate looked promising, but I wanted to see how smart he really was - how well he thinks and solves problems. I also sometimes like to ask general knowledge questions to see how well-rounded the candidate is or is not.

 

At the time I was working one of The Rat's caches and it occurred to me that it would be a perfect test of all these things. I hadn't finished solving it myself yet, but after spending several hours on it, I figured I was about 70% of the way there. What a great idea, I thought, I could get this cache figured out and evaluate a candidate at the same time! I modified it slightly to take out geocaching-specific references and brought it to the interview.

 

I asked him the standard stuff first, then I gave him this test. He got flustered pretty quickly and had trouble even with the easier parts of the puzzle. He spent about 15 minutes staring at it, looking pretty stupified the whole time. Giving up at the end of the interview, he took the puzzle with him when he left and said he would try to get back to me with a solution. I didn't hear from him again and we decided not to hire him.

 

Later, when I discovered the solution to the puzzle, I felt kinda bad that I had done that to him. Still, it was pretty revealing and an interesting use of these puzzle caches!

 

Jeff

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quote:
Originally posted by boulter:

At the time I was working one of The Rat's caches and it occurred to me that it would be a perfect test of all these things. I hadn't finished solving it myself yet.... I asked him the standard stuff first, then I gave him this test. He got flustered pretty quickly and had trouble even with the easier parts of the puzzle. He spent about 15 minutes staring at it, looking pretty stupified the whole time. Giving up at the end of the interview, he took the puzzle with him when he left and said he would try to get back to me with a solution. I didn't hear from him again and we decided not to hire him.

 

Later, when I discovered the solution to the puzzle, I felt kinda bad that I had done that to him.


 

I don't know whether to feel honored or embarrassed. I know how nerve-wracking a job interview can be anyway, and I never intended to add to a candidate's misery. I hope that if the successful candidate did well on the puzzle he/she also does well on the job. Otherwise, my cache would only serve to identify people who purport to be intelligent while in fact being useless.

 

Speaking of my puzzle caches, I have a new one out: Sleb Slob. I strongly suspect that if you had handed that unsuccessful candidate the printout from this new cache and the two of you had looked at it together, you would have solved it. You have to think about why that is so....

 

I made it Members Only just for the fun of seeing the audit trail. As of yesterday 23 people (excluding me and the approvers) had looked at the cache but only one person was watching it. Fizzymagic was the first to look at it after the approval, and he only looked once. That tells me he solved it as soon as he saw it and didn't need to look again. This is an amusing sidelight. I'll take it off Members Only status in a couple of weeks or so, so that kablooey and the other anti-monopolists or impecunious among you can log it.

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quote:
Originally posted by The Rat:

That tells me he solved it as soon as he saw it and didn't need to look again.


Well, that at least answers one of my questions about that cache. Of course, you can probably see that I've looked at it a few times.

 

--Marky

"All of us get lost in the darkness, dreamers learn to steer with a backlit GPSr"

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quote:
Originally posted by The Rat:

I don't know whether to feel honored or embarrassed.


 

Take it has a compliment. He candidate had other issues that didn't make him ideal, so the puzzle was not the deciding factor.

 

quote:
Originally posted by The Rat:

I strongly suspect that if you had handed that unsuccessful candidate the printout from this new cache and the two of you had looked at it together, you would have solved it. You have to think about why that is so....


 

Well that definitely confirms I've figured out at least some of that puzzle, but my hunt for this this morning was unsuccessful. I thought that when I got there something would pop out at me, but I guess I need to research a bit more.

 

quote:
Originally posted by The Rat:

As of yesterday 23 people (excluding me and the approvers) had looked at the cache but only one person was watching it.


 

That would be me watching it! I did that because I knew you'd be watching the audit trail and I didn't want to jack up my numbers too much checking for new logs. :-)

 

Jeff

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quote:
Originally posted by The Rat:

Fizzymagic was the first to look at it after the approval, and he only looked once. That tells me he solved it as soon as he saw it and didn't need to look again.


You're right about that! I thought it was a fun puzzle. My main complaint is that I've hidden some cool new puzzles for him and he hasn't done them yet. [icon_frown.gif]

 

I enjoy looking at the logs of who's looked at a cache also. There are ways to do it without doing a Members Only Cache, but they require that you have access to a Web server that can run scripts and do IP address tracking, neither of which is trivial.

 

Anyway, now I am glad I didn't go back to Sleb Slob to check my answer! Of course, I haven't found the cache yet, either! [icon_smile.gif]

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quote:
Originally posted by boulter:

 

quote:
Originally posted by The Rat:

As of yesterday 23 people (excluding me and the approvers) had looked at the cache but only one person was watching it.


 

That would be me watching it! I did that because I knew you'd be watching the audit trail and I didn't want to jack up my numbers too much checking for new logs. :-)


 

Well, now you've got company. Three watching and 42 who've looked at it. I suspect the people watching are some of those who've solved it and just want to see who else does and how long it takes them. Interestingly, the ones who've solved and logged this one are not necessarily the same folks who usually solve the hard puzzles quickly. That's because this one doesn't require the same skill set as most of my others. C'mon, TeamJiffy, I can see you're trying hard from the audit trail, but your reputation as the leaders of the South Bay Brain Trust is dimming on this one.

 

So how was the picnic? My new computer and router arrived yesterday, so I had to set up everything. It took more than all day, but it seems to be working.

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quote:

 

C'mon, TeamJiffy, I can see you're trying hard from the audit trail, but your reputation as the leaders of the South Bay Brain Trust is dimming on this one.


 

That would have been 2 of us looking at the page multiple times (thus increasing the page viewing statistics that much more), especially this morning as we both had printed it out before heading out there, yes, this morning. We've been running behind because a picnic and some out-of-area caching got in the way, not to mention outside activities. icon_smile.gif

 

quote:
So how was the picnic? My new computer and router arrived yesterday, so I had to set up everything. It took more than all day, but it seems to be working.

 

And speaking of the picnic, what a blast! We missed you and others who weren't able to make it.

 

One more thing: quit spying! Wait, I'm saying this to someone who's the creator of “FBI Quiz” and “Operation Futari”? Who am I kidding? icon_rolleyes.gif

 

All kidding aside, check our logs of the cache as well as your “Nykebut” cache and you'll know how much we love tearing through your caches. When's your next one? icon_wink.gif

 

-Fy icon_biggrin.gif

 

[This message was edited by TeamJiffy on October 06, 2003 at 02:38 AM.]

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ironchef 0wnz me. Half of my dnfs are on his caches and all of his caches but one that I've found required return trips. And the one that I found on the first try is one that he says was deliberately made easy to find.

 

Of course, if you hang out on #geocache, you might have seen the URL I posted to the photo I took, showing an ironchef cache, on the day I logged a DNF for that very cache.

 

Marty Fouts

ae6ip

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I found Jeffrey Chan's GPSr by Rocky Cache in South San Jose last night and would like to get his GPSr back to him.

 

Jeffrey, if you are reading this, please contact me.

 

If anyone reading this knows Jeffrey or his geocaching name, please let me know so I can contact him.

 

Thanks!

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quote:
Originally posted by bykenut:

I found Jeffrey Chan's GPSr by Rocky Cache in South San Jose last night and would like to get his GPSr back to him.

 

Jeffrey, if you are reading this, please contact me.

 

If anyone reading this knows Jeffrey or his geocaching name, please let me know so I can contact him.

 

Thanks!


 

Check the GPSr to see if he has a coordinate loaded as HOME or such. Then you could deliver it to his door!

 

...and that's why we don't rent pigs!

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I did find his home coordinates, being a good geocacher (plus he had his address written on his GPSr), so I did attempt to drive it to his door. Unfortunately it was an apartment complex and he didn't include his apartment number in his address. Also his coordinates for home pointed to the parking lot next door to his complex.

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The Silicon Valley Geocache of the Week

 

Yes Way, Jose, by Aargnzarf & Kikipopo

 

You can view the winners list (all past winners) at http://www.svmoms.org/svgeocachers/winners/

 

The nominators of the 2 star micro said: I love this cache because the container, hide, and placement are really clever. Definitely the best micro I've ever found!

 

It is near San Tomas Expressway and Winchester Blvd, which I think is in Campbell, near the Los Gatos border. Go find it!

 

The Geocaching.com URL is: http://www.geocaching.com/seek/cache_details.aspx?guid=2b13af3d-8cb6-4b9f-b695-bbd9ffdb0896 , the waypoint is GCG391.

 

Congratulations Aargnzarf & Kikipopo!

 

New nominees are up (sorry for the delay, they should have been up this weekend but were delayed due to a series of unfortunate events like the thrashing of my DSL line ... my is dialup primitive or WHAT?). You can view and vote on them at: http://www.svmoms.org/svgeocachers/vote/

 

Nominees for the week are:

 

Cache Me if U Can

Operation Futari

Ransom Note

Celebrity Mole

Henry Schmidt

 

Thanks for all the great nominations coming in. Keep them coming!

 

Kristine

 

Kreebelle

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quote:
Originally posted by bykenut:

FYI - I've found Jeffrey Chan and will reunite him with his GPSr tonight. Amazing the information one can glean about someone from the waypoints that are stored on their GPSr.


All you'd find out about me from my waypoints is that I cache in the San Jose area. big_smile.gif Okay, maybe you could figure out that I use GPX Spinner. bad_boy_a.gif

 

--Marky

"All of us get lost in the darkness, dreamers learn to steer with a backlit GPSr"

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quote:
Originally posted by Lamneth:

Does anybody know SFJerod?

 

He picked up Stumpy the Wonder Turtle from his first and only cache find 3.5 months ago and hasn't logged-in since. I sent a polite email 4 weeks ago but got no reply.


 

Looks like Stumpy is MIA. Maybe Joani and reicarnate him for you. big_smile.gif

 

--Marky

"All of us get lost in the darkness, dreamers learn to steer with a backlit GPSr"

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Yes, even robots have dreams...

 

Mine is to eventually find every cache in the SF grid.

 

I generally hate going into the city, but maybe with a couple of fellow cachers, it will be more fun (and efficient).

 

So...anyone interested in caching in San Francsico on the weekends of 18Oct03 and/or 25Oct03?

 

I'm mostly trying to get the caches in SF proper (NE corner of SF). Here's an aerial shot of the goals:

 

http://www.lakemercedcoc.org/SF_caches_10Oct03.jpg

 

I'm flexible as to what caches to get (or not get) if someone already has gotten some of them. I just want to take a bite out of the sheer number of caches to start with.

 

If you're interested in coming along, drop me an email and we'll organize something. I'll also post on the main board.

 

Dreaming...

 

John (no robot kids on this adventure)

 

The Robot Family

 

[This message was edited by The Robot Family on October 09, 2003 at 11:47 AM.]

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I figured I may as well post here. I'm moving to the Bay Area. ::bounce::

 

I'm psyched to get to meet a bunch of new folks, and especially to get my hands on the tons of caches around.

 

I'll finally get to finish mbrill's FOTR, which I started back in April. And go nuts trying to solve kablooey's puzzles.....

 

I can't wait!

 

-Cortney

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The cache of the week for October 10 is ...

 

Henry Schmidt by Stacy & Jerry.

 

This innovative microcache has pleased many of us with its great design and "aha!" quality. Congratulations Stacy & Jerry! You can see all the winners listed at:

 

http://www.svmoms.org/svgeocachers/winners/

 

Nominees for this week are:

 

* Parqinryde

* Zoofaunics

* Code Breaker

* Creekside Trunk Cache

* NOT The Yankee Clipper

 

You can read details about all these caches, and cast your vote, at:

 

http://www.svmoms.org/svgeocachers/vote/

 

I'd also like to hear nominations for super geocaches you've placed <grin> or visited! The nomination form is at:

 

http://www.svmoms.org/svgeocachers/nomination/

 

Kristine

 

Kreebelle

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A few weeks ago there was a discussion in one of the NorCal regional threads about finding archived and abandoned caches, and retrieving the containers for re-use elsewhere. Since then I have been keeping a list of those I've run across on the website that look abandoned. I've created a repository here.

 

I'm sure some of you will be able to quickly suggest additions or changes to the list.

 

Hemlock - Cleaning up the world, one cache box at a time.

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I found a helpful site on the web that might be of use to other geocacher's. The URL below links to a site that converts between three coordinate types. The most useful for me was the conversion from the standard Geocache format to one of the two MapQuest compatible formats. Yes, you can do this in Excel but here is another option!

 

Coordinate Conversion

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quote:
Originally posted by KennyHannahJacob:

I found a helpful site on the web that might be of use to other geocacher's. The URL below links to a site that converts between three coordinate types.


 

I've used that site in the past too, but two things about it annoyed me: you had to enter the longitude and latitude separately and you still had to cut and paste the coordinates to map them.

 

So, I decided to fix those problems and put up my own page. You can just slap in a string of coordinates and click right on over to a map.

 

Yet Another Coordinate Converter

 

Thanks for the opportunity to introduce it and I'm interested in feedback on how to make it even better.

 

Jeff

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Hey,

 

If you have been following the California Geocoin thread, you know that we are very close to taking orders (we are working directly with Pressed Metal on a few design tweaks to finalize the pricing). Though $3 per geocoin seems likely (but that does not include shipping). I am hoping to post that information by this Friday, Oct. 17th. Then I will give until Nov. 17th to receive the orders (i.e., the money in the mail).

 

In order to cut down on the price & time time of shipping a lot of geocoins, I am looking for a volenteers to host distribution cache sites. Anyone who picks their geocoin up at a cache site would not be charged any shipping fee. I have a bunch of preorders from the S.F. area. Is anyone from the S.F. area willing to host a cache distribution site? Touchstone & Kealia have already voluteered to host a distribution cache in the Santa Cruz/San Jose area.

 

The timeline for getting these Geocoins minted is going to be extremely tight if people want them before Christmas. Though, I think it is possible to have a state wide distribution caches site events on Saturday, December 20. But that is assuming that there are no unforscene delays & I get an order of at least 250 geocoins by November 17th.

 

If you are interested in hosting a distribution cache site near the city center of San Francisco, please email me (bobkat92@AOL.Com)

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quote:
Originally posted by Kealia:

Watch out San Mateo!

 

I'm starting a new job tomorrow right down the street from the recent Event Cache!

I'm looking forward to doing some of the great caches in the area that I've heard about.

 

Looking forward to doing some caching outside of the Redwoods!


I don't envy your commute. I am looking forward to seeing you hide some caches along your commute route though. icon_wink.gif

 

--Marky

"All of us get lost in the darkness, dreamers learn to steer with a backlit GPSr"

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Whoo hoo! icon_biggrin.gif I finally got reservations to hike the newly-opened Fifield-Cahill Ridge Trail in Crystal Springs area of the peninsula watershed. Details are on SFWater.org's website:

 

http://sfwater.org/detail.cfm/MSC_ID/68/MTO_ID/121/MC_ID/4/C_ID/1558

 

My first trip will be a 5-8 mile hike this Saturday (10/18). Really looking forward to it; I just hope I don't go into "withdrawals" when going on a non-caching hike. icon_wink.gif

 

Land managers being as strict as they are, it's obvious that no regular caches will be allowed. My question is, would the approvers allow virtual caches there?

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quote:
Originally posted by BpSnake:

Whoo hoo! icon_biggrin.gif I finally got reservations to hike the newly-opened Fifield-Cahill Ridge Trail in Crystal Springs area of the peninsula watershed.

 

Land managers being as strict as they are, it's obvious that no regular caches will be allowed.


I don't know anything about this area, but a quick look at the website shows that its a watershed area run by a public utility. These areas have been all but shut down to geocaching all over the state. And since the hikes are guided it would be pretty tough to hide and/or search for any physical caches.

quote:
My question is, would the approvers allow virtual caches there?
If it meets the guidelines, yes. Pay particular attention to point #1 under Virtual Cache Posting Guidelines.

 

A trail is a trail, a view is a view; but a trail/view is NOT a virtual cache. A cache has to be a specific distinct GPS target - not something large like a mountain top or a park, however special those locations are.

 

Take your GPS and camera with you and see what you can find. Feel free to run any ideas past me before you submit a virtual. I will be happy to work with you to determine what is approvable.

quote:
Originally posted by Marky:

...Be nice to your fellow geocachers, they might be Hemlock...


Ha ha I like that! smile.gif

 

Hemlock

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quote:
Originally posted by Hemlock:

If it meets the http://www.geocaching.com/about/guidelines.aspx, yes. Pay particular attention to point #1 under Virtual Cache Posting Guidelines.

 

Take your GPS and camera with you and see what you can find. Feel free to run any ideas past me before you submit a virtual. I will be happy to work with you to determine what is approvable.

quote:
Originally posted by Marky:

...Be nice to your fellow geocachers, they might be Hemlock...


Ha ha I like that! smile.gif

 

Hemlock


 

Hemlock - Thanks for the info! I'll keep it all in mind (or on my PDA icon_wink.gif) during the hike.

 

Marky - Love the new sig too! icon_biggrin.gif

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Cachers in the San Mateo area:

 

I just visited GCH078 and left a pair of Free passes to Six Flags/Marien World in Vallejo! They expire on November 2nd so they need to be picked up and used ASAP!

I wasn't going to be able to use them so please enjoy!

 

(Now if anybody has some Sharks tickets and they find themselves in the same boat, I'll gladly send you the coords to my house/office icon_biggrin.gif)

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quote:
Originally posted by Kealia:

(Now if anybody has some Sharks tickets and they find themselves in the same boat, I'll gladly send you the coords to my house/office icon_biggrin.gif)


 

Funny you should mention Sharks! Last night I went to Sharks Opening Night with fellow cachers, Squints and Kablooey. It ended scoreless, but was still a fun game to watch.

 

I have 4 SharkPak tickets (Plan A) this season, plus I can buy group tickets for a few select games through work. If you (or any other local cacher, for that matter) are interested, let me know!

 

Sorry - I don't make enough to offer up tickets for free. At least not yet! icon_wink.gif

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