Starting With Monday...

On Monday I went to the trash event in Harbison Canyon, and to exchange jackets back with Mar., and to try this geocache.  Here we see a successful team approaching the end of their labours.  Yes, they are blindfolded. If the camera was facing the other way we would see the the unsuspecting team not aware they are going to fail.  But we, I mean they, WILL be back!

Wednesday I took a mini-vacation in the afternoon to Mission Bay, at least to start.  After finding and not find some caches there I went over to the kite store on Sports Arena Blvd, right next door to Soma, it turned out!  It's Kite Country, and while the shop is tiny tiny tiny, the owner is extremely knowledgeable.  And he can do it all, for a fair price, mind you.  You bought a cheap import kite that won't fly?  He can probably make it fly.   But it may cost more than the kite did.  Maybe you should have bought a kite from him in the first place! I'm seriously thinking about getting a beginner's parafoil stunt-type kite.

He used to manufacture fighter kites in the 70s.  I searched a bit and found one of his kites sold for more than ten times what he used to sell them for.  Wow!

I picked up a couple of caches on Kurtz, the next street over.  It's a one way street, so I had the usual drama getting there, and then of course the muggles.  Saw this boat and had to take a picture of it.  It's one of the Il Moro di Venezia America's Cup Class boats from the early 90s.  There were five boats, I don't know which one this is.  Even though it is in the Consignment Classics yard I don't know if it is for sale.  Probably just an opportune place to store it.

Next I drove over to Old Town and actually found a place to park.  Near a particular cache I saw this big 'ol pumpkin nestled in the bushes.

Later in the Presidio trail area I found, instead of a cache, a pot smoker's pipe under a rock!  What a surprise.  I quickly put it back.   And found the cache a few minutes later.

And today, Thursday, I have secured a couple of pics of the renovated library, into which we are scheduled to move back around May 11th.

The library office picture has way to much reflection, but it's not very close to being done, to my mind.

Well, we will see how it goes, I'm maybe grumpy because it is so unseasonably WARM in the bungalow room.

Thanks for reading!

Saturday Morning At The Lakes

BUT FIRST...The geocaching.com map thing now limits the number of caches displayed, initially, which is a boring way of saying it looks like this if one zooms out, and I just thought it look cool.

Today, this morning, I went to a trash pick up event at the Santee Lakes, along with many geocachers and several other groups. It was cool and overcast, so very nice.  It's the first time I've been to the lakes since the 60s, I think.

This is our bucket about a third of the way through the walk.  We picked up at least 80 cigarette butts and lots of fishing line pieces.  Also, Easter basket "grass".  Shouldn't that stuff be biodegradable?  Someone take up the banner!

After the event I went around the area for a few caches I had avoided since I didn't know one can park outside the park and walk in for free (fishing costs, though), and we all know how thrifty I am...

After I got home and logged the event "attended" this souvenir badge popped up on my geocaching profile.  w00t!

I also took a couple pics of these cactus flowers.  Which one was taken with the iPhone and which one with a good camera?

The First One

The Second One

ANSWER:  SvefgbarvfgurpnzrenGurfrpbaqbarvfgurvcubar  (Link toROT-13 decoder.)

I can't think of any more stuff to add, so I wish you well and say good-bye!

Mostly Thursday

The other day, Grocery Day, I saw this Polaris parked, but with a trailer, wouldn't that be fun to cruise the Interstate on?

I've been playing with knot-tying the past few days, you may have noticed.  I did this one yesterday, all nice and tidy, then I got the bright idea to add another strand, so I took it off and loosened it, but then there wasn't enough extra rope to DO another strand, so I tightened it back up, cut the extra bits off, and tucked the ends in out of sight.

I made a panorama of the latest incarnation of The-Library-In-Exile.  It's rather out of proportion 'cause I had to speed up the rotation of me, or at least I THOUGHT I had to.  One of the students tried to get in the shot but just ended up a flesh-coloured pixilated blob.

I can not think of anything else at this time.  Happy Friday to you!

Minimum Day

I ditched out the afternoon, using vacation hours, to go geocaching.  Actually, the impetus was to buy a fid at a Shelter Island business.  They had some plastic ones, which I purchased, and they said their other store might have more, having a different focus, but I'll give these a try.

I found three geocaches on the Island itself.  Two that Matt and I had not been able to find in the past, and another that replaces one that we did find. 

A view to North Island from where I was sitting and using the camera to conceal my search...

Next, walking to the store for that fid I saw this nifty Moto Guzzi. I thought
Jackal" might be the owner's sobriquet, but I find it is the model name.

 After the Guzzi but before the store I found another cache near here, where the rails meet the sea!  Or bay...

I had solved a puzzle cache that ended up being over at Spanish Landing, so I got that one, too.  It was full of hopefully clean sprinkler water, so the log and assorted trinkets were extremely wet.  I'm sure the trinkets will survive, but that log will never be the same. I dried everything, except the log, as best I could.  I signed it (the log book) anyway, with my trusty gel pen (thanks, Matt!), and put in a replacement log sheet, in TWO plastic bags. 'Cause I'm a GOOD guy.

Harbor Island has one cache that has eluded me several times.  It continues to elude me.

And then I endured the rush hour drive home.  A drive with not a whole lotta rush.  The 5/8 interchange was stop and go, as one would expect, but the 8 picked up speed after the 805 folks got themselves merged, so that was OK.

And that is all for today!

Geocaching During The Week

I felt a momentary surge of enthusiasm and energy after work so I went geocaching.  Over in Chollas as I was stopped to check the phone GPS I looked over and saw this, what may be a sacred totem to someone, but I'm sorry to say my first impression was of a television charactor from public television.

Is that a teepee or a folded patio umbrella next to it?


This terrifyingly mutilated doll was laying on the exact GZ of a geocache, so I poked it a few times to see if it WAS the geocache, or maybe even haunted, but it seem it was neither, I found the cache twenty feet away.

It is coming up on time for the annual Cache In/Trash Out (CITO) Day, a day where geocachers meet up to pick up trash in an area.  I'm planning on going to the Santee Lakes event.  Today I was at a park where I found some loose pages from, and even several complete, "adult" magazines in the brush, so I took it upon myself to pick them up and dispose in a trash can, covering the magazines with pine needles, "not unlike a geocache" I believe is how I put it in the log.

Yes, the geocache GZ (ground zero) IS in the picture, don't tell anyone.

In another part of the park there were some very fabulous sculptures, here is one of them.

So sad, a discarded bottle of jaeger joy, how the mighty have fallen.

I got nothin'.

It IS such a pretty green, though, don't you think?


I read an on-line article reviewing the Harbor Freight wood toolbox, comparing it to the Gerstner tool boxes.  It was agreed that the Gerstner is MUCH nicer (heirloom quality!), but it costs between $445 and $1,345, and up, and this guy only cost $80.  The author and I decided we can live with that.

Anyway, now I have a place to stick all those little modeling tools that are getting underfoot.

"Airing out the stench of cheap imported wood"

That's all for today!

Sunday Morning And A Filthy Bird Bath

OK, OK, so I don't clean the bird bath often enough. It HAS been a whole week.  But Gummi worms? Really?

And are the birdies really leaving bits of paper on the edge?  And there are even tiny little Styrofoam-like balls floating in there. 

I need a surveillance camera back there!

I was watching Sunday Morning, uh, this morning, and Kate Mulgrew was on there talking about being reunited (seventeen years ago) with the daughter she gave up for adoption.  The daughter said when the agency told her who her birth mother was they asked her if she watch Star Trek.  That pretty much cracked me up!

That's all for now!

Catching Up, Again

Two Ford trucks, different years, I guess.  Not twins, but maybe siblings?

New shirt, suspenders, same old misspeling on the warning sticker.

Rode the bike to work on Thursday.  I should have posted this picture on the bike blog, but I didn't.

I drove again on Friday, went geocaching before work.  What do you suppose this is?  I'm glad I didn't stick my hand in there first!

There, now I can say I've accomplished something today!

P.S.  I forget if I've mentioned this before.  My oatmeal was 160.8 degrees F. after I added milk-ish to it.  My tea was 182.5 degrees F. when I measure it.  Isn't that interesting?

Catching Up On Stuff

Sharpening pencils in preparation for testing next week.

On a ridge just south of Batiquitos Lagoon on Sunday.

Still on the ridge, but this picture makes it look like we are much closer to the lagoon. Matt spent a lot of time over there at that bush taking pictures of bees.

There was a discussion of kringle on The FB the other evening, I had to post this picture of my favorite (and only) Danish recipe book.

Got some new duds, had to share THAT with folks!

Well, that's about enough of that!

Saturday In The Park

I went down, or over, to Balboa Park this morning.  I found a puzzle geocache that I've looked for several times before.  FINALLY I looked in the right place!

I did a short multi-cache that I was able to walk to from the same parking place, so no gas wasted.  I didn't understand there was some math involved to calculate the location of the final cache.  I just looked at the hint, went there, and signed the log.  Although I ALMOST didn't find it.  I was sitting and thinking for quit a little while before I realized I was right next to it.

Next drove over to the other side of Florida Canyon to Bird Park.  I didn't have a clue on this one, and I've been here before looking, back in 2013.  This time I had a very slight nudge from someone and it finally clicked after a bit of thinking.

After finishing up there I drove BACK across Florida Canyon to Myrtle Way.  I actually parked on Upas St., though, and walked.  There are some very nice houses in this area!  There used to be an old pergola here, but it fell down during a storm in 2004. I don't know HOW old it was, but I saw a picture of it dated 1924.  Now it's just a fenced area.  Which wasn't locked. Which is how I got on the inside...

Some years ago the City of San Diego set aside a half-million bucks to fix the pergola, but some people thought that was just a bit too much money for a shaded bench, so most of the money was used to fix the leaky roof of a museum.  I'd like to see the pergola, but you could build a HOUSE for a half-million bucks!

I headed down the steps into the canyon, then hung a right, went north a bit, then east again.  What ho!  Another canyon!  I managed to find two caches there after a great deal of aggravation.  One was very small, one was rather large.  Both were in irritating places.  I walked back to the vehicle and headed on north.

I tried to find a cache near the Vermont St. bridge, but failed, as did the two previous cachers.  I did get some Bob's oatmeal from the nearby Ralph's, as I parked in their parking lot.

Lastly, I almost forgot there was a cache on Park Blvd. I had figured out, yet another puzzle cache, but fortunately not one involving encryption, math, or the scoring of obscure sports.  There was a picture of where it was, you just had to figure out where that where was.  It took me about a half-hour, then I realized I've been in that building dozens of times, and even in the building previous to that one, having bicycled there for supplies, once, back in the 60s, as a lad.  And an easy find it was.

So much for today!

Last night I made this frozen pizza for dinner.  Too much work, too many decisions!  I'll NOT be going that route again!

I have loan of the temperature sensor this week.  I measure my oatmeal this morning, it was 160.8°F after dumping lukewarm milk into it.  After coming back from geocaching this noon I made some tea, it was 182.5°F.

That's all for now, thanks for reading!

Thursday the Ninth of April

I could have SWORN I had a bunch more poppies than that... maybe gophers??

Nope, the yard guys strike again!

And I'm SURE they salvage the DOZENS of poppy seed pods that were there...

At least they leave the flowers on the bushes alone.  There's a passel of these blooming right now.

What am I reading? Why, I'm reading the second book in the "Imperial Radch" trilogy, Ancillary Sword, by Anne Leckie.  It's pretty good.  Although I get confused about the genders.  "Who knows which is which, and who is who?"*

EMTs and Fire Trucks at work today, but don't know anything about what happened.

Very warm in the bungalow. Had to turn on the fans.

Had a first (or second) time geocacher not find one of my caches today, said it was scary there.  By Albertson's? Well, sort of.  I checked it on the way home, it's still there.  And the urban camper that used to live there is long gone.  I sent a helpful e-mail to the neophyte, I hope they try again.

I ordered some clothes from a store online, it was quite a big step, for me, to order clothing.  I used my new pink cloth tape to measure myself.  I seem to be a "medium" now, not a large.  We'll see if it all fits!

Well, that's all I can think of!

*Us And Them, by Pink Floyd

Catching Up On Stuff Again

SUNDAY

Easter morning I went geocaching at Balboa Park.  Didn't find the one I was looking for, again, but I did verify one for someone else, so that was good.  Then I went down to Buchanan Canyon, near the 163 and the 8. 

Here we see the 163 in the background before I turn to my right and head into the canyon.

There were WALLS of poison oak, it was quite amazing.  I found one cache ok, but the other just had too much P.O. around, even though SOME previous cachers didn't see it as a problem.  It just freaked me out so I left.

Some pretty poppies, some blue flowers you can't see very well in this picture, and that wall of poison ivy!

I wanted to show you my rather expensive miniature trash can that I use for storing bird seed.

MONDAY

At work the guys did the pad extension over the break.  They were removing the forms this morning. I believe I took the picture on Tuesday, though.  I wasn't feeling extremely swift on Monday.  Probably ate too much on Sunday!

TUESDAY

Finally managed to make one of these folded dollar bill shirts. Definitely needs a tie like the one on the web site.

In the men's facilities I've been wondering at the placement of the hot water heater.  I'm SURE (HOPE!!) it is waterproof, but it is liable to have soap dripped on it, don't you think?

WEDNESDAY

Driving home I noticed this car awkwardly parked.  Several vehicles honked as they had to swerve around it.

The solar-powered birdbath was not working this afternoon.  After much troubleshooting I discovered that algae had blocked the tube.  Cleaned it out, now it squirts like a champ!

I also refilled the bird feeders.

I tried to apply some window film to a test window on the kitchen door.  It went badly.  I am very disappointed, but now I understand why the film I took off the windows some years ago was so badly done.  It's HARD!!

I felt somewhat better today than Tuesday, and especially Monday.  Today was very busy, for a change, as I went to three classes to check out novel sets to the students.  I had the usual suspects after school, and a concerned parent who was told I was responsible for something that didn't get done, when in fact it turned out I didn't have anything to do with it at all.  But it was all very confusing for a bit.

I finally finished The Name Of The Rose.  It quite fascinating, and quite involved, and I'm sorry I couldn't give it the attention and appreciation it deserves.  At least I made it through, which is more than I can say for those two books that come after Neal Stephenson's  Quicksilver, I forget their titles.

Better quit while I'm ahead, thanks for reading!

Yesterday At The Bay

After a day of sloth on Thursday I intended to do a lot of things on Friday, but I didn't bestir myself until almost noon.  And THEN I finally got on the road and headed out to a puzzle cache I had solved some time ago and not found.  The cache owners replaced it while I was on my trip, and I found it after only ten minutes of looking.  I checked the hummingbird nest, too, and looks like a chick in there, but it wasn't moving, and I didn't see the parent anywhere around.

I went down to the bay to find a large cache where I could drop my new TB.  I went to this field of flowers, found the cache, dropped the TB (that's a Travel Bug trackable item).  That is the SeaWorld tower back there.

After that I crossed the road to find another cache, then returned to the vehicle to drive to Fiesta Island for a relatively new cache, and found that one.  I drove over to the dog park and walked out to the point for a cache there, but it turned out to require some physical maneuvering that I didn't care to perform without some assistance. And maybe a couple of Valium.

Next I drove over to Vacation Isle for three, count 'em, THREE, caches, one of which I had DNFed years ago with Phil.  Low tide was helpful in this case.

After that I headed home and made Big Plans for today, none of which have come to fruition at this point.

Out On A Wander

Text is coming, but at least you can look at the pictures!!

Soooooo, on Saturday I left on the BIG TRIP to Arizona.  And, of course, some geocaching along the way!

First I stopped at the March Air Force Base Museum.  It was completely dark, I had to use a flashlight to look at the exhibit.  There are a LOT of interesting planes, but since the place wasn't actually open at 6:30 AM I had to look at them through a fence.  Well, most of them.  When these pictures were taken the sun was not yet up, it was MUCH darker than these pictures show!

That is a B-52 out there.

An F-4 Phantom.  These are what we had at George when I was there. Not that they let ME get anywhere near them!

F-4 nose.  Some of these you could get close to...

There was a stoplight a couple of miles away that I was pretty sure was the spot where I hitchiked to San Diego so many times, and once a B-52 taking off flew right over my head.  There's a geocache there, but I didn't find it.

I drove up to the old George Air Force Base to look for a cache there.  I found it, but a zillion soccer players and their families may have seen me fumbling around!

Not a very interesting picture, but it helps the narrative move along.

Next I drove over to Barstow to the museum at the historic train station.  Found the cache there, too, after MUCH looking, and sitting on those nasty desert thorns!

EVENTUALLY I made it to Arizona, where my mother took a picture of me.  I know she will hate this one, but I gotta share!

I took my mother geocaching with me on Sunday.  We drove out into the desert to reconnoiter a piece of geocache art I was going to cache at.  I never did get around to it, but we saw this boat, maybe five miles from the river.  No houses or nothing anywhere around.  There IS a city dump to the east a bit, though.

This picture really comes before the other, we are at the Von Schmidt iron column marking the border between California and Nevada.  Except it doesn't. Interesting reading!

On Monday my brother drove us up to Oatman.  It's very touristy, but still interesting.  The people are nice, and VERY helpful.  The wild burros are annoying, and smelly, but photogenic.

We then drove the 66 towards Topock, then back to home.  This is a picture of my mother waiting for me to take a picture of myself with the Route 66 sign.

This is the picture of myself with the Route 66 sign.

My mother was telling me about some of her stuff.  This is an incense burner that I remember from my childhood.  I think she told me she got it from her mother.  It says "Made In Japan" on the back.

This is a game she played when she was young.  I don't know the date of this particular edition, but the game itself was released in 1935.

This is Rondo, a set of round playing cards.

A spur given to her father back in the 1940s.

On Tuesday I had to return to the Von Schmidt to correct a technical geocaching error on my part. After a hint from the Cache Owner I successfully completed the requirements of the cache.

I wanted, nay, NEEDED, a cache in Nevada, so I dragged my poor mother across the border to find one.  This is the obligatory picture at the border.  I do not know why the expression, except that my ankle was bitten by a giant fly back there at the Von Schmidt, and it itched a LOT!

My brother (and I don't know why I didn't take any pictures of him!) observed this spider in the kitchen window, and after fooling many minutes with the manual focus I managed to take a couple of decent shots.

Here the spider has captured a fly!

This is Charlie the dog, a fuzzy little lap dog who is a vicious fighter and not afraid of anything.

This is Miss Bailey, who was quite put out that I was sitting on HER rocking chair.

My picture of my brother's dog, Abra, was too blurry.  Abra didn't like me too much, she barked at me a lot.  A good looking German Shepard mix.  There where two more cats, too.  Bully looked like a Holstein cow, and the black one whose name I forget.


On Wednesday I left for home.  I took the scenic route via 29 Palms.  This is the only tourist bicyclist (EDIT: Found out his name is Marc Nutter) I saw the whole time.  Although about a mile before I saw the cyclist I saw a guy carrying an American flag, I think it was this guy.  He waved. Yup, now that I see the car on the web site I am sure it was him.

I stopped by the exclusive village of Snow Creek to find a geocache, and rudely drop in on a friend, but they turned out to be at work.  Well!!  That will teach ME to not call in advance!

I never did make contact with my other brother.  There isn't any cell coverage at my mother's house.  I was so isolated!

Is this finally the last picture?  Yes, it is.  I'm eating a Double-Double at the Morongo In-N-Out.  Good stuff!

I made it home with no accidents, no one hurt, and gas to spare.  But did I mention the red light I totally ran on Saturday?  No, I did not.  Right HERE. THAT scared me!  I was totally focused on traffic and trying to see the upcoming freeway entrance and totally blew through the light.  Sure surprised the guy in the oncoming turn lane!

Thanks for reading!