Morton Fox's journal

Sunny, 85-90°F. I had a choice of events this evening. I decided to go to the geocaching one because it was a sunny day. Given the recent weather, I figured I ought to make full use of a day when it isn't raining heavily! The geocaching event was O WOW DOG in Wrightstown, PA. I didn't go there directly though. I started with a set of geocaches at the periphery of the King of Prussia Mall. Then I continued with more geocaches in Conshohocken and Plymouth Meeting.

At Plymouth Meeting, I ran into Goalie003 at a cache site. He's traveled to Plymouth Meeting from Ohio for a Livestrong event and was doing some geocaches in the mall area near the hotel. He helped me search for "Almost Off Your Rocker - Plymouth Meeting". Then I asked if he'd like to join me for the puzzle cache, "Spatial Distortion's Reverse Geocache", just a bit down that trail since I already had the solution coordinates. So we went and did that too, and he had a bonus find without having to solve the puzzle.

After Plymouth Meeting, I took a longer drive to the next batch of geocaches near Warminster. I didn't have time for too many before the event because it was already getting close to 6pm. Good thing there were some quick ones. Progress towards the event was slow. Apparently, there was something called a "Grange Fair" going on in that town and it caused a terrible traffic delay on Route 413. Eventually, I arrived at the event, which was at O Wow Cow, an ice cream place in the Carousel Village. I had blueberry lemon ice cream. Only the top scoop shows up in the picture though. The scoop below that was espresso bean flavor. Although the event was only up to 8pm, we stayed until it was dark because the conversation was good.

After the event, I did some of the special geocaches that were placed for the event. Those were all "I Scream" themed. :) Then I cached my way down through Newtown, Langhorne, and Bensalem. I'd originally wanted to go to Philly Chinatown for a late dinner but since there was a geocache, "T.G.Eye.F.", just outside TGI Friday's in Bensalem and since I had some rather good coupons, I had dinner there instead. Which was Parmesan Crusted Crab Flounder, a wedge salad, and free chips and salsa for being a Stripes member. (even though I'm not a tiger! :) ) So it was a rather full day of activity.

( The caches... )

Sunny, 45-50°F. It was another day when I wasn't really able to get out for an extended period of time because of a busy morning. However, I did bag a bunch of geocaches in a few towns near the Philadelphia border since that area is only 30 miles from home. Of those, "who turned out the lights?" turned out to be the most physically challenging. This geocache was really high up and I had to climb up on the railing of the park pavilion to retrieve it. Well, that was my minimal gymnastics skill.

Dinner was at TGI Friday's in Wilmington to use the $15 coupon the restaurant chain sent me. I had Baby Back Ribs. Since they're buying, I might as well get the whole rack of ribs. :)

( The caches... )

Sunny, 60-65°F. This afternoon, I returned to the south side of the C&D Canal to continue what I was doing two days ago. This time, I accessed the canal road from St. Georges, near the US-13 bridge. Then I drove for a few miles on the road at the edge of the canal. I actually caught up with this ship, which was probably going at a mere few miles per hour.

The first geocache of the day was C&D Mayhem Cache #3 Gamerboy's Junket. I was wondering if there was a problem with this cache because the last log was a DNF. However, the problem turned out to be one of inaccurate coordinates and I found it when I examined the other side of the thicket. Next, I went for Cat Tails. For this one, I had to park the car and take a walk because the dirt road didn't pass near the cache site. And finally, I proceeded to A.C.C.E.N.T. #2 Warm Fuzzies from Maryland. This one was quite a challenge because it's in a swamp. However, the biggest hurdle was psychological. It turns out that the swamp was only a few inches deep. Once I stepped in and saw that, I simply walked around in the water until I found the cache. It was quite an adventure.

After that, it was time to leave the C&D Canal Wildlife Area. I drove back out to St. Georges at sunset. Dinner was a bacon cheeseburger at TGI Friday's in New Castle. They sent me a $7 coupon, so this is how I used it. It's a nice restaurant but they've got to stop using those 20-watt light bulbs. I had to ask for a table in a brighter part of the dining area.

Sunny, 75-80°F. This is the 3rd geocaching trip to South Jersey in a week, but I figured it isn't a long drive and there are enough new geocaches to justify the bridge toll. This time, I started in Logan/Swedesboro/Woolwich and continued to East Greenwich, Woodbury, Mantua, and Deptford. There were a few parks with two or three geocaches in the same park, so I didn't have to drive around as much as I thought. The best set of same-park caches today was "Bass Lake", "Enough Micros Already!" and "G&S Woodland Walk". Those were all moderately challenging and the trail looped around so there wasn't any backtracking except for the gravel driveway.

After dusk, I tried finding a few caches from the "Westward Ho" series in Lawnside/Audubon since those are mostly parking lot caches and doable at night. (in theory anyway) I'm disappointed that #66 in this series has already run into a property manager issue. I read about the problem in the logs and skipped that one. I don't think any of the caches in this series were placed with permission. That's the sad state of urban geocaching in general. However, if several people already mentioned in their cache logs that they got yelled at by the McDonald's manager, why hasn't the cache owner archived this cache?

I got back a little late and found that, at least in Northern Wilmington, only TGI Friday's was open after 10pm. So I used the birthday coupon from them. (I have a stack of bday coupons from many places because I'm on too many mailing lists. :) ) I had an Ultimate Sicilian Chicken Sandwich and a brownie obsession. Since this restaurant (and probably the whole strip mall since the same SSID is also detectable at Red Lobster) has wi-fi internet, I worked on the digital photos with the EeePC and posted them as I ate. Had a little conversation with someone from the restaurant because he thought it was cool that I was doing the photos right at the dinner table. He had his netbook, a HP Mini, there too.

( The caches... )

My family doesn't really celebrate Christmas so it's a quiet day of rest. Nevertheless, a few things did happen. Shortly after 1am, I scored some Random Cr*p on Woot. I haven't managed to do that before because the Woot server usually gets bogged down whenever they post this sale. This time, however, they added a new twist by putting up a fake sale page with a link to the real sale in the text description. Judging by what went on in the discussion forum, dozens of regular Wooters missed that subtlety. I found the link and was able to place the order before it ran out for real.

TGI Friday's sent me an appetizer coupon valid on Christmas Day only. I thought that was odd because I'd assumed nearly all businesses would be closed today, but I called them and found out that they were open regular hours! So I went to their New Castle location in the evening and got takeout tostada nachos to add to our dinner at home. Dinnertime entertainment was The Secret of NIMH on Hulu. I spotted this title in Hulu's list of movies today and since I'd never watched it all the way before, I figured it was as good a time as any to see it.

( Friday Five )

Sunny day. Around 60°F. Went out to Western NJ for a "Baskin & Route 31" geocache marathon, although I did find a bunch more geocaches aside from this series. Got 32 geocaches and finished just before sunset.

Then I used a credit card reward to get free gas in Hackettstown.

Then I used a TGI Friday's "free burger" coupon to get a Jack Daniels chicken sandwich. All in all, it was a pleasant, low-cost day. :) And now, I have to pack again for another trip to Delaware to oversee the Verizon phone jack installation. Oy!

( The caches... )