Cache-ing!

About two years ago I was talking to a friend about running, and I mentioned that I bought a jogging GPS. She started teasing me about how ridiculous it was, but I defended it's value (and I still do). She said "Oh, are you going to go geocaching now?" I asked "What's that?" She explained "It's this really stupid thing a guy I know does. You put co-ordinates into your GPS and go trudging to the woods to find stupid stuff other people have left there." I replied "That sounds awesome!"

I checked it all out, and even found a great site to locate caches, but never actually got around to trying it. That is, until Erica came down last Saturday for a visit. When she visits me it's kind of tricky to come up with something to do, but she suggested we go for a hike at one of the many parks down here. Which, I'm ashamed to admit, I'd never even visited. We ended up at the St. Mary's River Watershed Park, which is the one I have visited, as it was the site of my disastrous foray into mountain biking with some work buddies the first year I was here (I won't go into details- suffice to say it was the last time I've been mountain biking). In any case, the park was rife with Geocaches, so I loaded some into my GPS to hunt for along the way.

Saturday was beautiful, so it was the perfect conditions for a hike. We managed to locate the first cache- it was expertly hidden in a hollow log. The cache was a tupperware container filled with trinkets and log books, the idea being that you take a trinket, leave one, and sign the book. Well, we were fresh out of keychains and happy meal toys so we just signed the book. I mention this because it was the first time Erica has seen my kindergartner-like handwriting, and she didn't run away screaming, so that's a plus. I declined to blame it on my hand injury (as my Mom always suggested) or even make up a valiant reason for the injury itself (Mom suggests saying that I saved an infant from a burning car or something).

We failed to locate the second, albeit not for lack of trying. Only later did I look it up to realize that it was a "micro-cache." Instead of being a nice tupperware bin, apparently it's a mini-maglight housing with a rolled up log list inside. Had we known that, we might have had a chance, but it was way outside of our paradigm.

So, after batting 500 we decided to head for home. We rounded out the day by watching Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (which is always a fantastic film) and Bottle Rocket (which was new to me, and I really liked). Plus watching Bottle Rocket led to Erica's first use of a movie quote to express herself, which of course made my day. As it stands I'm constantly making Family Guy and The Office references that are totally lost on her.

My other favorite exchanges of the day:

(while walking through the woods and explaining my ideal housing location)
Me: See? This is where I want to live. In the middle of the woods with absolutely no other people around.
Erica: You sure talk a lot for someone who says he doesn't like people.

(while discussing my toast for Carly & Daniels wedding)
Me: So far all I've thought of is [no spoilers], but the rest should write itself.
Erica: Let's hope.

So sorry it took so long to get an actual update post. Have a great weekend everyone!