PUNK'D - Work Edition

So today my unit had to go to another work site for a meeting about a specific file. Afterwards, we had a second informal meeting with the local unit, who belong to the same department as my unit.

Part way through the meeting someone popped into the room to let us know about some brownies & ice cream cake in the lunch room that were free for the taking. Myself and couple others heeded the invitation and each grabbed a couple brownies and a slice of cake.  After the meeting broke we then went to Boston Pizza because it was now lunch time and after lunch we all went back to our respective locations.

When I got back to the office I went to hang up my coat. But I decided to check the pockets first to make sure I didn’t forget anything later. When I reached into my right pocket I felt something a little heavy and wrapped in paper towel.

“Weird” I thought, “ I don’t remember putting any paper into my pocket”. I pull it out to look at it and I see that something is wrapped inside. I unroll it to find what at first glimpse looks like a piece of turd!  But I quickly realized it’s just a bunch of brownies (note the chunks of walnut) mushed together and molded into that shape of one.

After a few minutes of whodunnit discussions, a couple accusations and insane laughter I finally found out who the pranksters were and gave them a well deserved kudos on a prank well played.

The Urban Cache

So far I've been doing mostly urban caches, which means mostly micros & nanos.  There are the usual suspects: light pole skirts and traffic sign magnetics.  I like the ones that are a little more inventive.

I also recently signed up for a premium membership.  The idea was to make planning caches along a roadtrip easier.  But I also get to sign up for email notifications of newly hid caches.  Mainly because I'm eager to get a FTF (First To Find) under my belt.


I was online this morning making a bookmark list for an upcoming day trip when I noticed this cache. "Hmm" I thought, "I don't remember seeing a cache in that parking lot before".

But it wasn't until I was on a completely fruitless cache run on my lunch break that I saw the email notification of a new cache. Woo hoo, I can get my first FTF. So I open the Geocaching.com app on my iPhone and load the cache. DOH! It's already been found.

But I had some banking to do after work so I swung by and figured I'd give it a shot. I got out of my car and saw a guy walking around patting everywhere and holding a GPSr in his hand. Wooohoo, my first bump in with a fellow geocacher in the wild.

We fumbled around for a few minutes before Big Zee made the find but was kind enough to offer me first to sign. We traded stories for a lil while before we each made our way home after an afterwork cache.

New Years

New Year's is a little extra special for me. I guess it's because it's my birthday. That's probably why I've never really bought into the hype of New Years Eve.

I'd rather focus on the fact that people all over the world celebrate my birthday (an international holiday). Ha ha.

I've also never really been into making resolutions either. Okay, I've never really kept any of my resolutions.

We call them resolutions... goals... whatever... but this year I have 2 of them:

1) Get & Stay Physical - Yeah, I know! Everyone says that. But with a new baby girl I want to healthy enough to enjoy life with her for many years to come. Plus, this year I have a motivation: Geocaching. The hard is going to be the same as it always is: finding time in the daily grind to do it.

2) Fellowship - Between visiting family at least once a month, having a new baby, & sometimes just not feeling well we've missed a lot of Sundays at church and Small Group on Tuesdays all together the past 6 months. This can't go on. We need to find a way to get connected again to our faith community.

New App!!!

So I'm trying out the new Blogger app on my iPod Touch. Typical Google product, it's fairly intuitive and actually has a similar interface to the G+ app.



So far I have 3 suggestions:

1) The switching between blogs should be the main screen not a setting under options.

2) Labels should should be a drop menu of previous labels sorted by most frequently used.

3) It took you long enough. Really? Your just launching an Apple app now?

Mucky Yucky Fun! (Geocache)

Today I decided to tackle a geocache that is within walking distance from my work.  I really need to get motivated with going out for walks/geocaches and I think this cache is going to do the trick.

From reading the logs previously I knew this cache was in rough shape.  A lot of people have mentioned that the container is cracked and that the log is soaked.  Since the Cache Owner (CO) hasn't been out to fix it in some time I had planned to throw together a replacement container at work.  But with some very pathetic options I decided it best to check the cache out first and then buy a suitable container.

So I grabbed a pencil, some sheets of lined paper, a grocery bag (didn't have any Ziplocs), my iPhone (with Geocaching.com app) and my my iPod.  Jamming out to some tunes I made my way to and down the path that led towards the cache.  But once I reached the end of the path it looked like I was going to have to cross creek 6 feet across and 2 or 3 deep.  I knew it was wet & muddy out but I wasn't prepared for THIS!

I took a minute to boot up the iPhone app and see where I was in relation to GZ and spotted thinner and more shallow end of the creek to cross.  It took some balancing on rocks and ducking under some branches but I made it across safe, sound, and DRY!

About 10-12 feet from the creek I met up with the original path and continued towards GZ.  When I got to GZ I knew I had to push past a couple trees to get to the search area.  Despite being an overcast day the view was still quite nice.  I had to wiggle around a ledge.  But once on the ledge the cache was easy to spot.

I pulled it the lock-n-lock out from the rocks it was half hidden under to find the other cachers had not been exaggerating.  It was busted up good: cracks in the lid, a hole in the bottom and (of course) a soaked log book.  I took out my paper and logged the find on them.  I was going to put the paper inside the grocery bag to keep it dry but there was a toy inside a plastic bag.  SWEEEET!

The walk back to work was much nicer because after crossing the creek I had noticed another path that seemed to lead back to the road without crossing ANY water.  Although I emerged with muddy boots and mucked up the back of my pants with mud spatter I'd have to say this has been my best caching experience yet.

Along with logging the cache I messaged the owner about helping out with container AND log maintenance.  My plan is to 'adopt' the cache.  This way I'll have a reason to get out for walks on my lunch hour more often.

(#14)

Maps

Up until a few months ago I only ever used Yahoo, MapQuest, & Google for my mapping needs.  In fact, I got rid of all my old paper maps years ago.  Why bother when you can just download the map you need & print it off?  And with smart phones now you have the maps with you.  That's one of the main reasons I never bought a GPS unit for my car.  I figure why bother whn I have a map function built into my iPhone?

But ever since buying my Garmin eTrex Legend GPS for going geocaching I've realized there are many more map options out there for different purposes.  The Geocaching.com website and iPhone app have different options for different types of maps.

Street Maps
Just what you think they'd be: maps of streets.  However, different websites provide different details and different levels of accuracy.  I find Yahoo & MapQuest to be more accurate with where an address is located on a street.  But I find Google has more recently created streets.  This time the Geocaching website & app chose to use Bing, Google and OpenStreetMap.org (OSM).  OSM is an open source mapping system.

Sateliette Maps
Sateliette maps are actual images of the area taken at different levels of magnification.  Depending on the website or service you use depends on how recent the images are and their level of magnification.  The Geocaching website and app use Bing, Google, & Google Hybrid (Google Street Maps overlaying the satelitte images).   Since I don't need extreme detail or recent images I use these free versions too.

Topographic Maps
When hiking, camping, or doing anything outdoors it's always helpful to know ahead of time a lay of the land.  You need to know when there are sudden or gradual changes in elevation or the type of terrain you'll be going through.  Topographic maps use lines to show you changes in elevation.  So the closer together the lines the steeper the terrain.  This time the website and app use OpenCycleMap.org (OCM).  OCM is also an open source mapping website.  However, this one is geared (hahaha!) towards cyclists because with topographic maps they can know how many hills are on their planned route, how big they are and how steep they are.  Of course, it also comes in handy for hikers and geocachers.

So far I've been talking about free mapping solutions.  However, there are many proprietary mapping solutions too.  A perfect example of this are maps for GPS units.  Most GPS units come preloaded with a set of basic maps.  Depending on the manufacturer, model, and purpose you can upgrade your maps for free or for a fee.

Well the base map on my Garmin eTrex legend unit is basic.  I mean so basic it only shows MAJOR highways.  I looked up the cost of the highway maps for the Garmin maps North America and they are being sold for about $100.  That's more than I even paid for my GPS unit.  So I started looking up ways I could upgrade my maps for free.

In my searching I came across a page on the OSM wiki page about creating your own maps in Garmin format from OSM exports.  I was able to download the image tiles I wanted (thanks to OSM user computerteddy).  Then using the command line program CGSMapper SendMap Pro I was able to create a Garmin compatible IMG file.

But when I tried to use the SendMap tool to actually send it to my GPS unit it wouldn't work!  I think it's because the tool is looking for a USB connection instead of a Serial connection (which is what my unit uses).  So I'm going to dig out my USB-Serial converter to see if that works.  I also noticed that one of the pages mentioned that I need to change the connection mode my GPS is using.  But there is no USB or Serial mode!  Grrrr!!

Anyone know what I'm missing?  Or is this just an impossibility with my model of GPS unit?

Prospecting For Geocaches

Yesterday was Thanksgiving in Canada and since we had already done Thanksgiving dinner with the in-laws on Saturday (leftovers on Sunday) we took Monday for just family time.

The offspring slept in a little bit, so we got to sleep in a little bit for the first time in a long time.  We had the whole with nothing to do so the night before we had planned to go geocaching at a local park.  We would get as many caches as we could in the park before the little one needed to a break and then we'd stop and have a picnic.

So I loaded up a dozen or so caches in my iPod Touch and GPSr and we headed off to Prospect Park.  It's a local park with an indoor gymnasium, 2 baseball diamonds, a splashpad, tennis courts, a leash park, and the site of the Acton Fall Fair all on a peninsula that juts out into a small lake.  the terrain to & from each cache was fairly tame and mostly a gravel path.  But there was still some adventure.  All in all we wound up being 3 for 3 for the day.

Prospect Park during the Acton Fall Fair

Incredible Acton - Prospect Park (GC32VB9) was the first find of the day.  Up until now all my finds have been micro/small urban caches.  This cache actually offered little bit of a challenge terrain-wise.  While searching at ground zero I had to be careful not fall off the sloping hill into the water.  The log container was a little chincy but the cache itself was well hid.  Once I read the hint I saw it right away.

Interesting Acton 1 (GC2T8D8) was the second find of the day.  As the name suggests this cache is part of a series of places in Acton (my hometown) the cache owners find interesting.  Again it was very easy to get to.  I just had to hop back on the trail and keep walking.  As I approached GZ I was fairly certain I knew where the cache was but as I got closer I started to doubt myself.  I check the hint on my iPod and my initial instincts were right.  As I filled out the log and carefully replaced the cache in it's hiding spot my wife checked on the youngin' who was passed out in the stroller.  SWEET!  I can keep pushing on for the 3rd cache in this park before breaking for lunch.

Interesting Acton 2 (GC2TCP1) was the third and final find of the day.  The crazy thing is that despite being the lowest terrain & difficulty level of all 3 caches it proved to require the most effort to find.  It was easy enough to get to the cache but we had about half a kilometer of backtracking to get to GZ.  Then, despite being in a relatively open field with on 2 or 3 trees that stood 3 metres high my GPSr started jumping all over the place.  Ugh!  So I give it a minute and try walking in a straight line hoping it will even out to no avail.  Stumped again I resorted to reading the hint.  It still meant checking 3 spots about 20 feet from each other.  On the way back to the 3rd spot my GPSr evened out again and declared THIS spot to be the winner.  But I had already searched here.  Or so I thought.  Because I stick my hand into the hiding spot again to find my fingers to come across a well hidden micro.

We then found a nice picnic table in the shade of a tree beside the splash pad and sat down to have lunch: PB & J sandwiches, chunks of honeydew melon & pineapple, with Dr Pepper to drink.  While the wife packed up the containers I logged the finds with my iPhone thanking the owners for a day of "'prospectin' for caches".  Before leaving we got some cute pictures of us with the little one in a Bumbo Chair and a few on the ground in the leaves.


A Bumbo Chair helps a baby sit up straight without falling over

I learnt a few things on this caching trip:
1. I think I have a better idea of how people hide caches.
2. I also learnt that I need to be patient and trust my gut.  I think my first (non-urban micro) cache find without using a hint will feel good.
3. I'm also excited about finding caches in more natural settings.
4. I forgot the level of awesomeness that is a PB & J sandwich.