My First Cache {Kevin}

What is geocaching? I didn't know until Brandi explained it to me. I had heard the term, but never really thought about what it was. Well, now I know. It involves using your GPS to find hidden "treasures" that other people have left. You locate them based on the GPS coordinates. Even when Brandi told me what it was, I never realized there would be so many. They are all over the place. They are right next to places I've been numerous times. However, this is about my first geocache find. It definitely wasn't in a place that I had been before. It was definitely memorable. This geocache was in the woods. We knew that as soon as we got near it. That didn't worry me. I've trampled through the woods my whole life exploring, trying to get to hidden fishing spots, etc. The first thing I noticed was that we had to avoid stickers. No big deal. Then we explored with the GPS trying to get a bearing and find the geocache. Being inexperienced, it took as little while to get the hang of figuring out which way to walk to get closer to the correct GPS coordinates using the handheld GPS. Then, I looked down just in time to notice I was about to step on a coiled up snake. I noticed too late to avoid stepping on it. It wasn't a huge snake, but it wasn't a little one either. I remember it as black with red bands. Brandi said she thought it was just black. I just know it was a snake and I stepped right on it. I'm pretty sure I screamed. I know I jumped up and ran 10 feet away from it. Brandi apparently saw the snake. She asked if it bit me. I didn't feel any pain, so I was pretty confident it had not. I was ready to give up. My primary goal was no longer finding the geocache. It was looking for snakes to be sure I didn't step on them. Brandi didn't want to give up though (she probably would have felt different if she stepped on the snake). To get to the geocache, we had to walk right through snake central. Luckily, it was nowhere to be seen. It was probably scared to death after being stepped on. We did eventually find the geocache. It was a fairly large metal box. So things were looking up, right? Sort of. As soon as we stopped moving, the mesquitos swarmed all around us. They were annoying and biting us before we stopped. However, once we stopped to look in the box, they were unbearable. The box itself had alot of stuff inside. CDs, trinkets, etc. We both would have loved to look at everything in it. However, the mesquitos were just too ferocious. We took a quick look, signed the sheet inside, dropped off our "treasure", and high taled it out of the mesquito and snake infested woods. A very eventful first geocache find.

A cache

So what is a cache? What does it look like? A cache can be anything really. Some are small, and some are large. Some are official geocache containers, others span the gamut of creative things people have re-purposed from around the house – tupperware, 35mm film canisters, altoids tins, and even old mayo or peanut butter jars. Some are camouflaged (using camo duct tape – who knew??) some are in plain sight. At a minimum they contain a piece of paper or “log” for finders to sign indicating that they found it. Some have pens, others are BYOWS (writing stick). The most fun though are the ones that house a treasure trove of goodies – small trinkets like old McDonalds happy meal toys. If you come across a trinket you like you are welcome to trade it with something of your own of equal or greater value.

The first cache I found was a small Tupperware container covered in camo duct tape. Since then we have seen magnetic key holders, altoids tins, film canisters, decon containers, giant ammo cans and a little bit of everything in between. You never know what you are going to find. You might stumble across something tiny like this guy here.

Or something much larger, and more unique like my mom’s find of this gator long after I had given up.

Not all finds are straight forward either. Some are puzzles that you have to solve that will lead you to the real destination. Some are merely a starting point. There is a great series or a "multi cache" in a park not to far from my mom's house. The starting coordinates lead you to a statue. From there, there is a story that leads you to coordinates for the next, and so on. We had a great time trying to figure out the clues of the tale. One part, for example read: "The Chief (the statue at the starting point) also told me a story once about a little boy who he sent out to find the buffalo. The boy using his pail in hope to bring them back by helping the grasslands to flourish so that they would have grass to eat and WATER to drink. The Chief told me that if I sought the boy out in the north WEST I will find the information I seek, the boy will have the RIGHT answer at HAND." It turned out to be a statue of a little boy holding a watering pail about 40ft away. The west coordinates of the address were under his right hand.

Each cache is a new adventure. Especially when you are still trying to figure out how to use your GPS... :)

In search of a cache

When I looked up geocaches in our area I found one in our neighborhood in a place we drive by every single day. So one day on the way home with the boys I stopped by the park, pulled out our GPS and started to search.

Following the GPS to the specified coordinates we ended up between an island flower bed and a forested area. The boys were surprisingly cooperative holding my hand or staying close by while I looked all around. After two or three trips around the area where I was sure it had to located with no luck I decided that I would have to try again another day and took the kids to the park to play.

When the weekend rolled around we were headed to the nearby pool and I decided to look around again for a few minutes. At one point Connor took off towards the edge of the lake and chasing after him I ended up slipping in some mud in an impressive stepped on a banana like move a stuntman would have been impressed with. I had clay like mud from elbow to toe. I can only imagine what I sight I must have been. I managed to get down to the water and wash enough of it off to look semi-presentable. Or at least presentable enough to make it past the attendant at the pool gate where I could clean up in the bathroom.

Determined to find it I made another pass a few days later. The army of neighborhood gardeners had been busy putting out new pine mulch so I picked up a stick to probe the area. I saw a big pile of turned up mulch, but came up empty. Looking around again I found it almost immediately. Grinning ear to ear I raced back to the park to share my find with Kevin and the boys. I couldn't have been more thrilled. Unprepared to actually find it I had to go all the way back to the car to retrieve a pen to sign the log. I spent a few minutes looking through the previous visitor's entries amazed at the number of people who had been there before me and wondering if I had maybe seen them as I had driven past at one time or another and never been the wiser.

The start of a treasure hunt

Before my birthday kayaking trip I stopped by my local REI to check out GPSes before we ventured into the wild unknowns of the San Jacinto river. It wasn't that I didn’t think I could get us back to where we started because I actually have an uncannily accurate sense of direction unless the roads are windy and curvy, you know, like a river. :) But it never hurts to have a second opinion on which way we should go - especially one that is always right. And we all know we can't trust Kevin on that score. The man is geographically challenged. He's the worst map reader I have ever met.

So as I was looking at all the bells and whistles on the GPSes I saw a checkbox on several that said "Geocaching." I had no idea what it was. So when I came home to do some homework comparing models I clicked on the convenient little hyperlink and stumbled on a whole new world.

Geocaching is essentially a modern day treasure hunt. It's a high tech game of hide and seek. And it is astonishing the number of caches (hidden "treasure") that you walk or drive by every single day without even realizing it.

The premise seems simple enough - you are given the exact location or set of coordinates where something is hidden and it is just a matter of going there and signing a log book to say that you found it. Sounds easy enough right?? HA!!

A day at the beach...

We had planned to join some friends for a morning at the beach. Unfortunately due to a forecast of 30% scattered showers around dawn and in the late afternoon they decided to wait for a better day. We had really been looking forward to the trip and decided to go ahead and take our chances. We wouldn't melt in a little rain, and would probably already be so soaked from a dip in the ocean that we wouldn't even notice the difference. Not to mention the fact that the threat of less than ideal weather would mean that the beach was likely to be less crowded.


And it was. We found a great pull-in spot next to the stairs at one of our favorite sections of beaches. And while we certainly weren't alone on the beach there were far fewer people than there typically would have been on a nice May morning. We also had the added bonus of some shade and far lower temps than we had been having making it a super pleasant day all around.

The one thing we didn't think about though was the tide. With what looked like storms out on the horizon the swells were larger than normal and there were red flag warnings up. Not that such a little thing would deter us from letting the kids run right on in of course. :)


But before we did we dumped a mountain of beach toys on the sand and let the boys rake, scoop, fill, and dump to their hearts' desire.

Even Kevin had fun creating his moat while the boys helped build up then topple the pile of his excavated remains.

Ryan actually helped build up the piles, while Connor the destroyer flattened them the second they were built.

The boys eventually decided that while the sand was fun it was time to get their feet wet. So suited up with their life jackets they made a mad dash for the water.

And it was in that frenzy unfortunately that I lost my camera. This was indeed the very last photo taken from my camera just before Connor chased a wave into the water.

Before we left Galveston for the day we drove towards Jamaica beach to find this house. My mom and I had found it once before though late at night so we weren't able to get any good pictures of it. Can you imagine living here? I would love to get a peek at the inside to see just what it looks like.

In the mind of a 2 year old.

Every day on our way home I ask the boys what they did at school. If they don't proffer an answer I inevitably ask if they played with their friends today. Ryan always pipes up telling me that he played with his friend Dean today. Connor will immediately follow up indicating that he played with his friend Jadon today.

Today when I picked the boys up Connor had a stinky diaper so while Connor was being changed I held Ryan and asked him about various things. It went something like this:

Me: "What did you do at school today?"
Ryan: "I played with my friends today."
[Jadon, Dean and Rohan were making laps around the class pushing the "bicycles."]
Me: [pointing at Dean as he made a pass by us] "Who is that?"
Ryan: "That's MY Dean."
Me: "Oh, is that YOUR FRIEND Dean?"
Ryan: "No. That's MY Dean."
Me: [pointing at Jadon who had just rounded the corner and was headed toward us] "Who is that?"
Ryan: "That's CONNOR's Jadon."
Me: "Oh, He's CONNOR's Jadon?"
Ryan: "Yeah."
Me: [pointing to Rohan] "Who is that?"
Ryan: "That's Rohan."
Me: "Is Rohan your friend?"
Ryan: "Yes, Rohan is my friend."
Me: "Is Rohan Connor's friend, too?"
Ryan: "Yeah. Rohan is Connor's friend, too."

I am not sure what the distinction is there, but I am sure we will have several more coversations about this one... :)

Internet shopping

Dear Internet,

You know I love you. And shopping with you from the comfort of my couch in my pajamas is of course one of my favorite past times. What I do not love is the lack of instant gratification after I click the buy button. And what I am loving less than that is the sneaking suspicion that Amazon in an attempt to sell more $79 prime memberships is intentionally delaying the arrival of my packages. 7 days for something to ship to me? From where? Hong Kong?? It's either that or my love affair with the UPS man is coming to an end as I would be sorely disappointed to learn that he couldn't get something to me from anywhere nationwide in 4 days or less. Because if ever there were a miles club for shipping I would certainly be elite. :)

I ordered a new camera tonight. My last one met a tragic end in the Gulf of Mexico almost a month ago. I did manage to get it to power on tonight much to my surprise but it has a lens error. You can hear the sand grinding as the lens attempts to move in an out. Though what would you expect from a camera that went into the ocean and straight to the sandy bottom to be tossed around for probably 15 minutes in a red flag whopper of a tide apparently while turned on?

It was past time to get a new camera or so I was recently told both my family and by Kevin, too as I attempted to not so secretly commandeer his old camera to satisfy my picture taking needs. I was excited as always when I finally convinced myself to not to peek at the price tag in the cart and just push the checkout button. Only to feel an overwhelming let down when I saw the estimated delivery date. The thing better be stamped from some small far away country when it arrives. Like Taiwan. Or Rhode Island.

Priceless

Sometimes I wish I could have been there...

Let me set the scene for you:
It was chaos. Pure chaos. What else could it be with 16 - 2 year olds in one room? The teachers were out numbered. 2 of them against an army of mischievous little souls. One teacher was in the bathroom supervising potty time. The other was working her way through the diaper crew.

The teachers aren't completely defenseless in the jungle - they use a whole arsenal of gorilla tactics to ensure the cooperation of their sometimes mutinous crew. And for the record I strongly suspect one of my children as the ring leader for most of the antics in the room. I won't name names, but I bet you don't need more than 1 guess....

One of those methods that seems to work particularly well is a tupperware jar full of candy corns. I was told it is the "positive reinforcement" for "putting something IN the potty." Though I believe it is used a bit more liberally than that and have in fact seen it used as outright bribery. At one point, not long after Ryan first moved to the room one of his teachers admitted that Ryan often got one for just setting foot in the bathroom as he went through a phase where getting him into the bathroom was a lot like the reaction you would get trying to put a cat in the tub - paws outstreached, clawing madly at anything and everything wildly trying to latch on to anyone or anything that would prevent him from being uncermoniously being tossed in. To say that he was a bit resistant might have been a tad of an understatment, though ironically enough he loved to play in our powder room at the time and quite frequently would shut himself or he and Connor into the pitch black powder room to which they would both laugh histerically before attempting to unroll the entire roll of toilet paper and flushing to toilet at least 15 times.

While I would prefer the reward be a ink stamp (soon to be proven cancerous I am sure), or stickers (watch out for that toxic glue), or maybe even cheerios or something else perhaps a bit more healthy I am sure I would resort to far worse for a moment's peace and cooperation if I were in their shoes.

But I digress.... So the teachers were busy making their way through potty time. Apparently at some point during the melee Ryan, unobserved, made off with the candy corn container. I can only guess at what happened next, but when the director came into the room she found him holding court in one corner of the room. He was standing facing a full semi-circle of children seated before him. Each one patiently waiting their turn as Ryan doled out the candy corns to all of his loyal servants, I mean classmates. She said it was the cutest and funniest thing she had seen in a long, long time. What a character. Hey - at least he was sharing!

A three hour tour!

A three hour tour!

Just sit right back and you'll hear a tale,
A tale of a fateful trip
That started from this typical port
Aboard two tiny ships.

The mate was a mighty sailing man,
The skipper brave and sure.
Two passengers set sail that day
For a three hour tour, a three hour tour.

The game warden was tough,
One tiny ship was stopped,
If not for the quick thinking of the fearless crew
The day would be lost, the day would be lost.

The ship set ground on the Kingwood shore
With Brandi,
And Kevin, too.
Here on Brandi’s Isle.

So this is the tale of the castways,
They're here for a long, long time,
They'll have to make the best of things,
It's an uphill climb.

The first mate and the Skipper too,
Will do their very best,
To enjoy their meal,
While waiting on a vest.

No keys, no straps, no steps,
Not luxury of time.
Left Ryan and Connor
Waiting as long as can be.

So join us here each week my friends,
You're sure to get a smile,
From two stranded castaways,
Here on "Brandi’s Isle."

Human Pancake

How I was almost flattened by the trash cart...

What a way to go, huh? Pancaked by the trash cart. Wouldn’t that be great office urban legend. One time this girl was working late at night (they never get these details right you know) … Though the word “cart” doesn’t quite do it justice. Empty, it is about 5ft tall – allowing plenty of visibility for a driver of average height to have a clear view of the road ahead to avoid obstacles like say pedestrians. It’s also about the size of a compact car. And it drives kind of like a man powered tank (don’t ask how I might know that…). Anyways…. So back to my story. I got on the elevator on the ground floor (how’s that for lazy karma??) and pushed the button for the 4th floor. I had just gotten a new badge holder which I was pre-occupied with trying to get to actually stay attached (it kept jettisoning itself off like a mini rocket every time I moved). So I was looking at it only half paying attention as the elevator dinged and the door slid open. As I took my first step off the elevator I came practically face to face with a box. I squeaked in startled protest as the mountain of trash appeared out of nowhere and was headed straight for me. I spent what seemed like ages rooted to the spot watching the oncoming mountain in slow motion with the dawning realization I was about to be pancaked before my feet finally responded to the command – MOVE (implicitly implying anywhere but towards that thing, and as fast as possible). I narrowly edged out the other side as it finally slowed to a stop where I had been only seconds before. I finally saw the driver peering sheepishly around the side of the cart probably wondering as to the source of the squeak.

Needless to say I survived unscathed, and it probably isn't nearly as funny in the telling as it was in real life - but I got quite a chuckle out of it.