It's been a year.....

1st Sgt sends me an e-mail....to remind that it has been a year! WOW...a year of geocaching.
I really don't think I am any wiser ( older, but not wiser!) I have made some progress since day 1. I am richer....Monetary (?)...ah no, as I am still waiting on the movie deal. No... I am richer with Friends and Memories!

I have come across lots of critters, some dead.... some alive.....and some rubber. I have donated lots of blood to mosquito's and named my first tick. I have been scared "half to death" at least twice!

I am happy to say that I have been able to log a few "I found it" along with my DNF's. Grabbed me a couple Travel bugs over the year, and even sent one of my own out.

I have fallen down embankments, hugged a few trees ( to keep from falling) I have been attacked by thorns and a killer corn stalk. I have tripped over my own feet.. other peoples feet and had my hand stuck in a historic monument. Happy to report.... no broken bones...(yet!)

I have slid on the ice, slid on gravel, I have been stuck in the snow and stuck in the mud. I have parked on sidewalks, driven in ditches and jumped out of cars before they were put in park. I have raced to FTF's and ended up on unnamed roads ( not intentionally) Happy to report... ( as far as I know) never caused an accident. (Yet !)

I have been in more cemeteries than a funeral director. I have had to reboot my I-phone, reboot my Tom-Tom, reboot some friends, and reboot my brain!

As far as knowing...Up from Down...North from South, well I am still working on it! I have been lost in woods, turned around, turned upside down and have experienced an occasional "out of my mind". I have been reacquainted with "my other right" ..had a show and tell on poison Ivy was in attendance for the" Latest on Ticks" lesson... and...( best of all) fell in Love with Duct Tape all over again!.

I have learned what a LPC is, a preform, lock -n- lock, Bison tube and a nano. I have come across locks, screws, rocks and magnets ...all containing sign in logs. I now know that a Difficulty of 3 and a Terrain of 2...is all perspective...and I am STILL looking for "the" tunnel. I have re-confirmed my thoughts...that when it comes to hints...Men are from Venus and Women are from......( let's just drop that one)

My vocabulary is full of TFTC...SL...TNLN....FTF....BYOP...SWAG...GPS....CITO....GZ....ETA ...TB! This I get... but I still don't know what OBCJY stands for !

It's been a year....and still having fun! So, to all my geocaching friends...here's to year 2! Let's get older and wiser together! Happy Caching...see you on the trails!

No longer tickless....

I got my first tick. If I do a statistic page, I could add that to....first cache...first TB...first FTF...100 caches's and 1st Tick!

Who knows where I actually picked this little guy up...somewhere between cache 1 and cache # 10 for the day.

I decided to name him....dead tick...dead, dead tick!

It all started as I was waiting in the car while Peanut ran in for snacks ( she is a good snack person) the whole sweet/ salty/chocolate thing going on. Anyways...I look down on my jeans and there is a bug....a small black bug...right on the thigh of my jeans! So, I do the obvious...I squish him...but he doesn't squish! I am thinking...is this a tick?

Sitting next to me, in the door thingy...is a bottle of nail polish remover...I grab it and sprinkle some on my jeans...okay...I pour some on the jeans...then I take the cap and
hold down "the bug". With my free hand I spray the remaining contents of my "deep woods off" over my entire body.

Peanut returns to the car...she is over come by fumes as she opens the door. "Don't panic", I tell her...but this may be a tick! I lift the cap....yep she says...."it is a dead tick" And then she proceeds to explain, the dot on the belly, the deer tick explanation...the whole burying the head in your skin...the sucking the blood..the Lyme disease....

OMG! I am "feeling" ticks all over me for the rest of the day. The 20 minute shower was not hot enough when I got home!

So far....no sightings!

Anyways ...a landmark... my first tick...a very dead, dead tick!

WARNING.... Don't mess with me...I am armed with nail polish remover!

And so it all begins...

Previously....on The Blog. Peanut goes geocaching for the first time, and becomes instantly addicted. Turns out she is pregnant with triplets. Summer ends, triplets come....Aunt Yoda buys them geocaching t-shirts. Peanut returns to work. The holidays role around, all 3 boys are finally home, Peanut and I occasionally get a chance to say "hi" at work. The New Year roles around and Peanut switches to the day shift. The car pool begins...

On a typical drive home from work...after a typical weekend shift....Peanut and I are doing the usual chit-chat. I am driving and not paying too much attention. I swear, I thought the car knew the way home. Suddenly I realize that I have made a wrong turn. So, it looks like I will be "snaking along" the back roads, just a few ( lots of few) blocks out of my way. Peanut knows this area. She starts telling of her grandma stories ... she is pointing out a small area of trees, part of a walking course ... and peanut says..." This would be a great place for a cache"

And so it all begins....

Fast forward to the next am....( make that 4:15 am, to be exact) and I am picking Peanut up, for yet another "day". On the ride in, she is downloading the Geocaching site to her Blackberry. Yep, the whole wrong turn has stirred her geocaching addiction! The download is complete just as we enter the Kankakee area ... and she is all excited ... there is a cache, just a few blocks away... in fact it is in the same area that I was driving through yesterday... in fact it is on the walking trail! Yes...yes...yes... Calm down, I tell her, we will stop and "pick it up " after work.

And so it all begins....

Like a kid with a new puppy, she could hardly contain her excitement all day...we were going geocaching! I am trying to hide my excitement ( ha, ha) By the time we leave work I am versed on the childhood stories...the parks, the walking trails, the huge white tree....and on and on. I am just so happy she knows the area, seeing I am "tom-tom less" ( I didn't even know we were going geocaching after work!)

We get to the scene of the squirrel cache and she is out of the car, before ( I swear) I have it in park. There are no words for her enthusiasm ... after making an easy grab ... I check my phone for any nearby caches, and sure enough....THE white tree! Really, if you have done the cache, you know it is not really in the tree, but the hint and the story tell of THE tree. I really, truly have not seen anyone as excited about getting a cache... and this was probably what I was remarking on ... when I opened the cache. OMG... there was a "rubber rodent" of some type on the top...I jumped back so fast, I nearly dropped the dumb thing....this , of course, made the ripple effect...Peanut jumps, and then says..." oh, don't scare me like that!" Yea right...like I knew it was in there! So, like typical 8 year old children...we poke it...and take a picture!

And so it all begins....

We recover quickly and are heading home in record time...2 caches under our belt...I am smiling and Peanut is playing on the Blackberry...oh wait she says...There is a Travel Bug nearby....I want a travel bug...I have NEVER had a travel bug....

And so it all begins....

YES !!

2 days after our big disappointment, I check my e-mail to see that yet another has gone and found the cache. Unbelievable. I just forwarded the e-mail to my friend, no comments needed...really wanted to see if I would get some type of response. Oh Ya...a response indeed. They are convinced we are going back. And you think I was obsessed! Many e-mails and conversations later...a Saturday "pick-up" was suggested. Well, I work every Saturday...but yes it should still be day light after work. Scientifically, when you run the numbers...blah, blah, blah...it will be ....blah, blah, blah. In other words it IS there!

After "doing my time" at work, and managing to get out on time...we meet up, this time the rendez vous being in the Hobby Lobby parking lot...and not only are we obsessed, we are also paranoid, because we take a different vehicle! I guess we are hoping to out-smart the stake out! LOL The trip out to the cache was quick....the mood was DETERMINED.

No need to park, take the GPS or even shut the vehicle off, we just get out and walk right up to it. AND...it was not there! Had this been my first cache...I swear I would not be into geocaching today as I would be convinced that NOTHING is out there. We searched around for a few more minutes...with every sound someone made was followed by the words...you got it? ... nope ... find it? ... nope ... got it? ... not yet ... find it? ... no ............
and then suddenly I "see " it ... and with that the first good words of the day...."I THINK I got it"

Did you ever want to have one of those great moments where the whole scene is played in slow motion with some really cool music in the background. Music like maybe ... Eye of the Tiger ( wink, wink) well this was the moment. If there were muggles, cops, baby strollers or even a stake out... we didn't see it. But we had the cache. I was snapped back into reality (literally) with what sounded like a photo shoot. If you know me, you know I HATE to have my picture taken ... but, they did go through a lot for this cache with me ... so okay, 1 picture! for all you cachers out there ... go easy on the comments, after all I did just finish a 13 hour shift!

We did end the day with a celebratory dinner. And the chance to write off another DNF. Maybe the obsession came because it was our first time out caching ... maybe because it was a previous DNF ... I know some people say it is in the hunt .... others say it is in the find. Some even get all caught up in the hide ... But for me and GC1MTTZ it is in the name...

Past, Present and Future!

YES !!!

Still looking.....

Full of burgers and running on caffeine...we go back to the scene. The new strategy ( otherwise known as plan E) parks us in a new location. We get out, GPS's are powered, and we walk right up to the site! We are stoked! We are wrong! It is not there!

Sometimes ( especially when you are trying SO hard to find something) something happens that you lose all sense of everything. This would include sense of direction, sense of worth and common sense. Suddenly our GPS units are a piece of junk, and can't be trusted...so we begin to search EVERYWHERE! I think it was when I was on all fours searching through gravel, when 2 ladies walked by with a stroller, ( true story here) and the 1 lady says to the other..."somebody must have lost something" And in my mind, I am thinking....Yes, we have totally lost our minds. We are two adults, we are not invisible , we are not 8 years old, we are 2 people who will probably be taken away and committed! With that thought...starts the laughter, the " I can't believe this " laughter. Where the tears are coming down the cheeks. The Oh my gosh, my gut hurts laughter , the we are insane laughter!

It was with the turn of my head ( to wipe away the tears) that I first see the cop. We are so far beyond stealth mode that there is no turning back. The cop SUV is circling, and decides to park and watch. He is a short distance off, and had he had a cup of coffee, this would have looked like a stake out. It was when the "other" SUV pulled up and parked a few feet away, that we decided...maybe we should leave.

Not making eye contact with "them". We quietly got up, brushed off the debris and nonchalantly meandered back to the vehicle. My only whispered words..."Dude, you know they are totally running your plates"

The drive home was a little quieter. Actually it did make me think...who would I call to bail us out? Hmm...I wonder if my friend has "friends" or better yet..."friends with connections"

So...another day is done...the cache still not found.

One of My DNF's

Ahhh...GC1MTTZ one of my DNF's. This cache been used as a conversational tool on several occasions. And then... just recently a friend of mine says, " let's JUST go find it." So, ( it just happens) as I open my mouth to say my typical response, of how I am so busy, I have to get such and such done for a deadline...and all the other excuses I usually come up with...I just say...Ok, let's do it!

So, here I am, in the middle of the week, when my desk is piled high, with "my to do list", with things in the yard that probably need to be... "mowed, mulched or weeded, with all my deadline projects hovering in the background...what am I doing? You got it, I am getting ready to go out geocaching.

The suggestion of lunch had been brought up, and they were convinced they were going to walk right up to this, ( I WAS convinced THEY would walk right up to it) so ... ya, we could do lunch after the find. Why not! Sounds like a plan.

As I was getting ready, I was picturing a nice light lunch outdoors on one of those patio restaurants...you know where all the cool people go...sitting there relaxing, having lunch, acting like they have no cares, no deadlines, no stress. Ya...I can picture this. Ok...enough about lunch, let's just get the cache!

The plan was to meet up, at a mid-point and drive in together. So, it was on the drive-in that I realized I was actually getting nervous ... about a stupid cache! But, all was cool, we discussed "our strategy"...and "what we know for sure"... that is when I finally had to admit...I don't know ANYTHING for sure, when it comes to this cache. Change in strategy... we will approach this cache, like we have never been there before! Good Plan!

We get " to the scene" both GPS units going ... I am having a little deja Vu ...or maybe I should call it flashbacks ... but I know ... my friend is gonna walk right up to it!

Did I mention... I don't know Jack ( with Jack being an expression, of course) we start the search out pretty casual ... then more intense ... then the " you have got to be kidding"...this was JUST found ... it HAS to be here! Hours later, yep I said hours later ... we go back to the vehicle and re-group! Focus people ... Focus! LOL After re-reading the logs, the description, and the logs again ... we realize there are no "hidden" clues in anything we read. Being a little stubborn, we are back ... we are searching ... we (I am sure) are looking like a couple of idiots!

Not wanting to admit defeat..we try the lunch idea. Just to let you know... there are NO patio restaurants, there are NO relaxing people, there will be NO sipping drinks in the sun! Which just goes to show you , how my "mind" always wants the perfect scenario! Haha There are a couple of "slightly intoxicated " people sitting in a dark bar...so that's lunch...hey give us a break...there are only a couple of options!

The relaxing lunch has turned into inhaling burgers. As it turns out, we re-look the original log...and yep, we got a whole new strategy...

I think we are really on to this now!

I Remember Geocaching....kinda!

Thankfully a cacher sends me an e-0mail to let me know one of my caches needs attention. I like that because, it is not like I routinely drive around and check them out. I get the e-mail on Friday, so with me working the weekend, I decide that I will put it on my "to do" list for Monday. Sounds like a good plan!

The Academy Awards kept me out half the night...and the Awards, is really not my style...unless, of course, I was being nominated for my movie...which is YET to come! Anyways by the time you get to bed, you have been up for almost 24 hours...But, as most of you know...it doesn't matter how much sleep you get, it seems you are up at the same time every day. Thank Goodness I don't need beauty sleep! (At this point, 1st Sgt will say he is ROTFLMAO)

Got through my whole coffee, e-mail, bills, etc routine. Did my work-out, and after going to tan, I decide to swing by and replace the cache. This is when it hits me....I truly am hoping, I don't run into any fellow ge0-cachers!

Normally, this wouldn't be a fear...but, really...here I am, in baggy old sweats, my Punxsutawney Groundhog Day sweatshirt...no make-up, hair is not combed...I have the perfume of a combo...work-out/tanning bronzer going on. No socks, and flip flops. Please do not let anyone be out here!

On the way...out to the cache, which by the way, I DID remember where it was hid...AND how to get there! (LOL) I was thinking back...hmmmm, all the times I was out with 1st Sgt, we never ran into anyone...and when I use to cache with the Potstirrer....we never ran into anyone...been out on my own a few times...and never saw anyone...so I am safe, to think, it will be ok!

The area was pretty deserted...the drive in was MUDDY, and for a second there, I spun a little on the tires, ( no way, would I be able to call someone to get me out...not looking like this) but able to do a little maintenance on the cache, and get out. Whew!

So, with nice weather approaching, and my new found knowledge on "mudding"...I am thinking I should be out soon. So, to all my peeps, don't give up on me yet!

See you on the trails...I will make a point to have my make-up on! :)