Geocaching Ups and Downs

So, it's been another year and then some...  OK, two years and then some, since I last posted on this blog.  I've come to realize I don't like writing blogs so much when nobody ever reads them.  The worst feedback is no feedback at all, ya know?  But, then there are times when I just want to write about my experiences whether or not anyone else cares.  Geocaching has been on the back burner for a while.  Life has its way of showing you what you need to do and when you need to do it.  At any rate, I have to go so far away from home to get more than a couple of caches, and only occasionally do new ones pop up in my area.  They're mostly inscrutable, unsolvable puzzles.
Anyway, life has its ups and downs, and geocaching does, too.  That's just how it goes.  

Yesterday was an up day.  I spent the day in Alameda, gathering just a few caches, then drove into Oakland for a couple more.  While much of the Bay Area, including my home in the South Bay, was sweltering around 100 degrees, Alameda and Jack London Square were a very comfortable 78 with a nice breeze.
I met a street character as I was walking back to my car from Jack London Square.  As I passed by, I heard him say, "Even the police don't know I'm ICORPS."

Well, I just knew this would be interesting.  I turned around and said, "You're ICORPS?"
He said, "Yeah, do you know ICORPS?"
I shook my head.
"You don't know ICORPS?  I'm the military CIA.  I go all over the world to kill people."
"Oh, OK."
He muttered a few other things about his job as an ICORPS assassin before I could ask him:
"So, where are you going next?"  I imagined a story of how he planned to track down Edward Snowden, or possibly go after Morsi or some other newsworthy figure.  But he waved his hand in a dismissive gesture.

"Ah, I'm dead."
"You're dead?" I asked.
"Yeah, I mean, I don't.. I'm 64 now. I'm dead."

Then his face brightened.

"But I got a 33 year old lady chasing me!" he bragged.
"In a good way?" I asked.
"Yeah!  And you know, she's got a son, and I said to her, 'do you want a daughter?'"
We both laughed, and I wagged my finger at him, saying, "Oh you..."
I did not say, "dirty old man."  I left it unsaid.  Then I said, "Well, you have a good day," to which he replied, "You have a nice life."

Street people can be colorful and interesting, but I often wonder how many people even notice them.  Oakland has lots of street people.  As I continued to walk around the downtown area, I saw some that looked very colorful, some that looked very scary, and some that just looked sad.  It made me sad.  I've always been just one unfortunate incident resulting in a very large bill away from being on the street myself.  But I know there's an element of choice, too.  I know how to rescue myself, if need be.  And I have lots of friends.

Anyway, this is not the kind of ups and downs I was referring to in the title of this post.  I was actually going to complain about tree caches.  I hate them.  I cannot climb trees or fences or anything even remotely vertical.  I have a hard enough time staying vertical myself!  I went splat on the sidewalk just a few days ago, and have two nasty bruised knees to show for it.  I also wanted to complain about caches that make me have to sit on the ground to reach them, because getting back to my feet is also difficult, especially if I have to roll onto my knees.  Those were the ups and downs I originally intended to write about.  But, that wouldn't be my style.

So Many Puzzles, So Few Brain Cells

I love geocaching puzzles. I've always enjoyed solving puzzles, finding answers and having people think I'm clever. In my area, we have the most creative puzzle creators I could never have imagined. This, coming from someone who once imagined what the world would be like if inanimate objects had feelings and could talk:

Left sock - "Oh, please! Haven't you dealt with that that toenail fungus, yet?"

Right sock - "You think that's bad? We don't even match! We're supposed to be seen in public together?"

But I digress.

The recent rains have forced me to stay home more than I like. I'd completed all the available maps in Treasure Madness (fb peeps know about this) and boredom was beginning to cause inertia. Once again, I looked over the puzzles on my Closest Not Found page and then rifled through the stacks of notepaper sitting in heaps around my computer. I picked the one I thought was most difficult to try solving, since I had already worked through about two thirds of it. I got my notes, opened the cache page and got a fresh cup of tea ready.

An hour later, I got a response to the email I'd sent to a previous solver begging for help while sipping my tea. So much for solving it unassisted. Luckily, most of the puzzle cachers around here are a great group of friendly folks who are happy to help and often form teams to brainstorm ideas while solving puzzles. This gives me hope that maybe someday, I won't have to click on the Closest Not Found page and see nothing but blue question marks. Not that I get picked for teams, mind you. Having two of my own puzzles labeled "impossicaches" by one of the better puzzle creators in the 'hood seems to have placed me in the same relative state I was in back in high school - too small, too slow and too obscure in my abilities to get picked. I didn't mind then, and I don't mind now. At sixteen I had it All Figured Out. At fifty I could Not Care Less. I guess that's true for most people.

So, after several hours of trying, once more, to solve a puzzle, hoping for some divine spark or other external torch of brilliant light to illuminate the ever shadowy pathways of my mind, I finally gave up and went to bed. Maybe listening to Radio Classics for an hour in the dark would help ease the frustration. But, as I lay there, listening as Superman saved Lois Lane for the very first time, the puzzle began working its way into my brain. The more relaxed I got the more the puzzle became clear. Suddenly, I sat up in bed, forgot Superman, and stumbled over to my computer. The light from my monitor was all the illumination I needed right then, as I began scribbling stuff down on paper.

Don't you just love it when a puzzle comes together and the numbers you were looking for appear in front of you as if written by some other hand?

The next day, after locating the cache and signing the log, I think I did a little happy dance. When I got home, I looked at the next puzzle on my Closest Not Found page, got out pen and paper, a hot cup of tea and keeping my mind as relaxed as possible, fired off an email to a previous solver.

I just love solving puzzles.