Mr. 0

So I have decided to make the move over to Blogger. I've copied all of my old posts over there, and I am going to keep them here as well. Any new posts will be made on my Blogger account. As I mentioned it's nothing against LiveJournal, I just like some of the features and settings over at Blogger a little better.

You can find it here

http://mr0geo.blogspot.com/

My yearly subscription is almost up here, so I'm considering moving over to Blogger, since I like the features there a little better. If I do decide to do so, I'll make sure to post an update here, move all of my past posts over, and update the Waymarking page.

A month or so ago I got in contact with the director of the Marion County Parks District after she had posted on the GC.com forums. Essentially she had heard about Geocaching and thought it might be an activity the Parks District would be interested in. I've spoken with her on a few occasions and also presented Geocaching to a few groups in the area. She passed my name on to Marion's local newspaper, The Marion Star. After exchanging a few emails and phone calls with a reporter there, I stopped in there to do an interview for an upcoming article on Geocaching. Basically we met at the paper's headquarters where we talked about Geocaching, and I showed her around the website while a photographer took a few pictures. The reporter mentioned that she had read an article about Geocaching in a magazine over the summer, and was interested in it, but didn't know where to start. She, and the photographer both seemed to be excited about it on a personal level, so maybe they'll start caching.

After a few minutes in the office we went out to find a nearby cache. I was hoping to take them to a more traditional cache in a more interesting area, but it was pretty snowy, so some may have been a little dicey to find. The one we finally settled on was within walking distance, which made it much easier. It was a micro in one of the towns newer downtown pocket parks. As I mentioned, I would have liked to have taken them to an ammo can or something, but this one was ok in the end.

I'm not sure when it'll make the paper, but when it does, maybe I can Waymark it under the News Article Locations. Unfortunately while I was there, I forgot to get coords and pics to mark the Marion Star under the Newspaper Headquarters.

Today started out very foggy, and while we both wanted to get outside we just couldn't until around noon when it finally cleared up. After grabbing some lunch we visited a few places around the Columbus area. I managed to Waymark a Freestanding Arch, which I still need to add a few pictures to. I just haven't gotten my film developed. I also snagged a couple of Ohio Historical Markers and a Worldwide Cemetery. One of the Ohio Historical Markers also falls into the Irish-American Historic Places category as well. I so managed to sneak a visit in for an Ohio Historial Marker.

I managed to post all but one of the Waymarks that I discussed earlier; the ones I just had to get posted now. The one that I didn't, I realized I don't have decent enough pictures, so I'll have to head back out to that site soon to take care of that.

Anyhow I managed to resubmit the Honda plant in Marysville, Ohio. I originally submitted it to the "First of its kind" cat back in November, however it was declined because there is no sign on site showing that it was the location where the first Japanese car was built in the U.S. It was suggested that I submit it to the Superlatives cat instead. I kept meaning to do that, but never thought about it when I was able to do so. In addition to that I submitted a Horse Crossing Sign in the "Uncommon Crossing Signs" cat, a Drive-In Movie Theater (I'm hoping to get back there this summer to catch a movie, and Waymark the neon there. I want to get some good night shots), and a Former School.

The former school has actually been pretty high on my list to get posted for a while. I didn't attend this school, but I did go to school in one of the other 3 Marion County School Districts, and I worked directly across the road for a few years. Also, Dewgrl, DID go to this school, and graduated just a couple of years before the story broke that led to its closing. In short the school was built on a waste dump that was formerly part of a U.S. Army base and POW camp during WWII, and into the early 1960's. In the late 1990's a former student of the school noticed higher than normal Leukemia rates in students who attended the school. After some misleading information, and cover-ups from the Ohio EPA and Army Corps of Engineers, over 75 chemicals were found on the school's campus at hazardous levels. The schools were closed in 2003, after the OEPA, Ohio government, and Army Corps gave money to build new schools elsewhere. A longer, more descriptive narrative can be found on the Waymark page once its approved. I guess because it was handled through the Army Corps, it never seems to have been listed as a Superfund Site.

I was fooling around on the PC tonight putting together some Geocaching information to give to a local parks department that has become interested in the activity, and I started thinking about some of the Waymarks in my backlog. There are a few that, for whatever reason, I got it stuck in my mind that I wanted to post very soon. There's no reason for it since they've been sitting in my backlog for a while. After a little while of tracking down the pictures, and coordinates, I finally started posting. I only got 2 posted this evening, Plane Crash Site and an Airport. I was originally going to use the Plane Crash Site for the September contest over in the Flickr Waymarking Group. I figured it would be a creative "Final Resting Place," since the plane is buried where it crashed. I didn't end up using it though since I couldn't get a pic that fit the "Seasonal Change" theme.

I still have several to post that I've had in my mind that I must do right now, but I'm not certain when I'll get those up. I'm hoping to do it tomorrow, but I doubt I will since I had that meeting with the Marion County Parks folks.

This past weekend Dewgrl and I went out of town for her sister's wedding in Knob Noster, Missouri. We flew into Kansas City, and had a little down time during which we did a little Waymarking and Geocaching. On Thursday, after we arrived in KC we visited the GARMIN HQ for a Waymark visit, and to grab a virtual cache. It looks like there are many who are doing some armchair caching on this one, but we really did visit there. After that we drove over to a great BBQ Joint. One of my goals in going out there was to try real Kansas City BBQ, and this spot fit the bill perfectly. I had a few more Waymarks that I wanted to visit but we were both a little tired from traveling, and with our bellies full of BBQ we just wanted to get to our hotel, which was on Whiteman AFB. Since access is obviously restricted, we had to have Dewgrl's sister meet us at the main gate to get us in, and take care of getting our passes and such. She was running a little late, so we took spent the time in nearby Warrensburg finding the Several Bridges Road (Version 2) cache there. We finally got our passes and into the base where we were lead to the hotel. Once there I logged the caches and Waymark visits, and we went to bed.

Friday was mostly free for us. The only things that were planned was a tour of the Oscar 1 site on base, and the rehearsal and rehearsal dinner. We got up early that morning to run out to Otterville for the James Gang cache. We DNFed it, and I'm pretty sure that it's not there any longer, however it was still an interesting site to visit. This spot was a location where the James Gang robbed a train for over $20,000. While there I waymarked the Blue Star Memorial Highway Marker and the site as an Infamous Crime Scene. On the was back through Sedalia we stopped for an early lunch at a local diner which was great! We got back to the base, and met up with the groom to be for our tour of the Oscar 1 facility. Basically it is one of several sites around the U.S. that were used from the 1960's until 1993. These underground bunkers were sites from which the Minuteman missiles would have been launched. Because of our nuclear disarmament agreements most of these sties were dug up and destroyed. This one was left due to it being one of the only ones located directly on a military base. The silos and missiles that it controlled were destroyed though. The tour guide, who is stationed at the base, made what could have been a dry, boring tour, a lot of fun. The groom's father also worked in one of these facilities elsewhere so he was able to provide much additional information as well. Following that we drove past the flightline to see the B-2 bombers that were out on display for a visiting officer. I also got to see a few A-10's that were tied-down outside the maintenance wing. Once that was over we had a little more time before we had to go to the rehearsal and dinner, so we drove back out to a Missouri Historical Marker we had passed to Waymark it. We also found another Blue Star Memorial Highway Marker there, and directly behind the park where these markers were located was a cemetery that we drove around to find and Waymark. On the way back to base again we made a quick stop at the Backroad Bridge Micro cache. The rest of Friday evening was taken up by wedding festivities.

The actual wedding was on Saturday. Everything was held on base, which made it convenient for travel. Everything was within just a few minutes of our hotel. It turned out to be a nice day, and it was a beautiful wedding and reception.

Sunday we had to check out of the hotel by 11am, and head back to Kansas City to catch our flight home. We got up early and went back into Warrensburg where we visited the Courthouse which is also on the National Register among other things. In front of the courthouse is a statue of "Old Drum", a dog that was the center of one of Missouri's most interesting damage suits, and from which we got the term that a dog is "Man's best friend." The statue is also the center of a virtual cache which we logged as well. On the way back to the base for the final time we found another MO Historical Marker which we Waymarked. We got back to base around 10:30am, checked out, picked up some folks that we were taking back to the airport and traveled to KC on our way home.

As you may have noticed I've taken a bit of a break from posting here, and haven't really been very active with Waymarking. I've just been a little busy lately and haven't really had the time to do much on the site lately. I have managed to grab a few Waymarks here and there, but they've pretty much all just gone into my backlog for now.

This past weekend however I was free so I took the opportunity to visit a few places that I've been meaning to get to for some time, as well as knock off another county worth of Ohio Historical Markers....sort of.

I started out the day by heading to nearby Marysville, Ohio so I could mark the Scotts Miracle-Gro Company for the Publicly Held Corporation Headquarters, then on to find a new historical marker. I hadn't done my research to see that it was already listed, but I got to visit it anyhow so it was no loss what-so-ever. From there I headed just outside of town to hit up the Honda plant there since it was the location where the first Japanese car was made in the U.S. in 1982. I marked it under the First of its kind cat, of course.

I left Marysville heading further west to stop in Bellefontaine. I've been here several times before for other Waymarks, but there was one Ohio Historical Marker that I couldn't find before. I wanted to stop again, because it's the last one I need to complete Logan County. I'm pretty convinced that it's missing. There are photos of the marker from November of 2006, and I'm 99.9% certain I was in the same spot, but it's gone now, which is a shame. After that it was a quick stop for lunch. While at lunch I mentioned to Dewgrl that there was a small cemetery not far from the park where we tried to find the historical marker. I had already been there, so I didn't think about it, but she wanted to see it, so we went back out there. It was only a mile or two away, so it was no big deal, plus I hadn't Waymarked the cemetery before. So we marked Blue Jacket Cemetery in the Worldwide Cemeteries cat.

Along the way to Rushsylvania we happened across the Stanfield Pioneer Cemetery, so we stopped to look around, and of course Waymarked it. Then it was on the Rushsylvania Cemetery (I intend to Waymark it, but haven't posted it yet) to see the memorial for Jeremy Michael Hodge. He was a National Guardsman who was killed in Baghdad in October of 2005. There have been several local television and newspaper articles about the headstone because it's large and very detailed. It's almost life size and features a portrait of him on the front. While walking around the cemetery we also found some Zinc headstones which I still need to submit. We quickly stopped in Rushsylvania on our way though to Waymark the mural there, which, again, I haven't submitted.

After leaving Rushsylvania we headed north toward Kenton and the surrounding areas to mark Hardin county's Ohio Historical Markers. We stuck out on the first two. One of them had only a vague listing of its location, so it really could be anywhere, the other I know we found the location, but there was no marker. While looking for the first one, we stumbled upon another cemetery, which also had a Zinc marker. After missing the second historical marker we moved on to the next nine markers in the county and did manage to find all of them. There were a few stops along the way for various cemeteries we passed.

The sun was starting to set about this time, and we still had one more stop we wanted to make before it got dark. Yet another cemetery in Fostoria, Ohio which I had seen pictures of over at Geocaching.com. There used to be a cache there and it looked interesting so I wanted to visit and Waymark it as well. We got out of there just before the sun set, and headed on up to Toledo to grab dinner at Tony Packo's

Tony Packo's has now been marked under the Celebrity Hangouts. Dewgrl is a big fan of the television series M*A*S*H, so she has wanted to stop here for a long time, and I've always wanted to see what all the talk was about. Packo's was discussed in several episodes of M*A*S*H by Maxwell Kilnger, who was played by Toledo native Jamie Farr. Farr liked Packo's so much that he wanted to make sure that it was included in the scripts. Farr still visits from time to time. Over the years hundreds of celebs have visited there and have signed hot dog buns (they use foam buns actually) which are hung all over the walls. I personally was pretty impressed with the food. I didn't expect much going into it since the featured menu item is a hot dog, but it's actually really good. They actually use a Hungarian variety of Kielbasa, which is cut to various sizes for different hot dogs. They're then loaded with onions, chili sauce, and shredded cheddar cheese. They also offer several kinds of chili, along with a few other things that I forget about now.

I just had my 400th Waymark accepted. It ended up being the Rolls Royce Neon Sign that I listed. I posted several others this evening, including a History Museum, 2 Bells, a Caboose, a Professional Sports Venue, a topiary, a Unique Steeple, a Static Aircraft Display and an Exact Replica which was a cross post of one of the bells.

This past weekend while gathering those, I also managed to visit a few Waymarks as well.

Along the way I took some pictures of a couple of other sites, that I thought I could fit into a category, but now I'm not so sure. Specifically there is the Field of 6' tall Concrete Corn in Dublin, Ohio (can be seen here, here, here, here, and here). This was a public arts project to memorialize Central Ohio's agricultural beginnings, and to symbolize the corn fields, and homesteads that stood here before they decided it was a good place for highways and office buildings.

The other is locally famous "Art" sculpture/sign/whatever (can be seen here, here, and here). It's located at the Columbus College of Art and Design in downtown Columbus, OH. It stands probably about 50' tall, and bridges the street there. The local folks like to have fun with it. There is one perspective where photo can be taken with a couple of light poles that can be made to look like the letter "F" in front of the "art" sign.

I just got off tonight's Waymarking chat....a little abruptly since I lost my connection for some reason....and there was some pretty good dialog this evening.

One thing that was brought up was the requirements for visiting Waymarks. Most seem to be in favor of reducing or eliminating visit requirements. This is something that I completely support personally. Sure, there is a possibility that folks could "cheat" or that people will just log their visits with "TFTW," however that's not something that really concerns me. If people want to log a visit on my Waymarks when they haven't actually been there, that's their problem, and their loss. It really doesn't effect me in any way. With the quick logs of "TFTW," again, that's the visitor's thing. If someone isn't inspired to write a novel about a Waymark of mine, that's certainly understandable. I don't expect everyone to love the Waymarks I've posted....people are entitled to their own opinions.

I think that fewer requirements will help new folks better embrace Waymarking. If we keep telling people "Sorry, that's not good enough. You need to do this and this, and post a picture showing this...." then folks aren't going to want to try to visit, or post Waymarks anymore. Certainly, it's nice to see folks post photos with their logs, but there are still plenty of folks who don't have digicams, and don't want to figure out how to use one. There's no reason why I should exclude anyone from playing just because they don't have the want, or means to post photos. In the long run I think most will still post photos, and really, it'll make the photos that DO get posted that much more of a surprise, of sorts. I don't like having to meet special requirements to tell others that I visited a Waymark. To me, it's about being there and experiencing the location, and arbitrary and difficult photo requirements actually take away from the experience for me. I'm more worried about meeting the requirement than reading the sign, or looking at the sculpture, or whatever.

Of course this doesn't really apply to the "Waymarking Games" department, since many of those are set up a certain way that would still need specific requirements.

On a side note a few folks were discussing traveling to various parts of the world to go Waymarking, and to visit other folks. I've been thinking about doing the same. Especially since Skybus came to town earlier in the year. $10 airfares to many major cities makes it much more attractive to travel around just for the heck of it. I don't know how much they've been advertised in various destination cities, but there has been a lot of talk here, since they're based out of Port Columbus International Airport.....so I invite all of you in, or near their destinations to come out to Ohio for a day or two. :)

Tonight I was in attendance of the Columbus Blue Jackets first pre-season game, against the Nashville Predators. I wish I could say that I was excited about this year's team, but to me, it looked a little lack-luster this evening. To their defense, there have been some pretty big changes in the organization from the top down, and they only had two days of training camp before the game. They're also trying out some new lines this year. One in particular that should be interesting is Rick Nash and David Vyborny being centered by Nikolai Zherdev. In the past Zherdev has been a wing, but they decided to try him in center since he's always had a tendency to center the puck anyhow. Unfortunately Vyborny left the game early tonight with an injury to his left leg. Nashville's Martin Erat made a cheap hit on Vyborny. Vyborny laid on the ice for a few minutes, but was able to get up and skate off, although he was assisted by a few teammates. Last I heard he was taken to the hospital, and nothing is going to be released, or decided about his condition until morning. All in all, it should be an interesting year. Hopefully they can make it to the playoffs this year, and lose the title of being the only team to have never been to the playoffs.

This weekend Dewgrl and I managed to grab a few Waymarks. On Saturday we had only planned to go out for some breakfast at an Amish style restaurant in a near by town. After we left there I decided that I wanted to grab the two Ohio Historical Markers in Madison County. After marking the second one I wanted to go to nearby London, Ohio, to Waymark the courthouse, but we decided to head out to Springfield instead to see the Madonna of the Trail out there. In all we got the two historical markers, a few cemeteries, an infamous crime scene, a few Zinc headstones, a solar power location, an outdoor warning siren, and probably a few that I've forgotten. I haven't posted most of them yet, simply because I've been lazy, but I'll probably get on that soon. Over all it was a beautiful day. It was much cooler than it has been recently, and it was nice and sunny. It made for some good pictures.

I apologize in advance for the long editorial that follows....I know it's a change from my regular posts, but this just got under my skin a little. I'm also tired, and throwing this out there quickly so I can get to sleep, so I also apologize if it's rambling and I'm repetitive or talk in circles. :)


For a while now I've been using a Firefox plug-in called StumbleUpon. I was introduced to this little app by an art gallery owner in Columbus when I went to visit and Waymark the Art-O-Mat she has there (I never posted the Waymark for it because none of my pics came out. It sits in the front window of the shop, and the sun coming through at that time of day made it impossible to get a good pic of it....I just need to find time to get back in there). StumbleUpon works by the user setting preferences as to what sort of sites they want to see, and other users marking pages of interest as they come across them. You click the little button on the toolbar, and it'll randomly pop up a new page based on your interests. You then can say that you either liked or disliked it or just move on. Liked pages go into a links list under your profile on the SU.com site. You can also post comments about a site for others to see.....that's all really beside the point.

Anyhow I was happily Stumbling away this evening and came upon "GreenDimes". At first I thought it sounded a little interesting. I mean who doesn't want to reduce junk mail AND feel like they're doing something good for the planet? I got to looking into it a little more and I'm not totally convinced that this is anything more than a way for the owner of the site to make $15 per person, per address, every time someone moves...

The idea is that you send them $15 and they take your name off of mailing lists, and plant a few trees in your name. Great, right? Well one rub is that you still have to pay another buck (Yeah, I know, it's only a buck) to actually submit the form to take your name off the mailing lists. Another thing is there's really no proof to me that any of the $15 is going toward planting any trees. The companies they "partner" with to plant trees do so in "India, Haiti, Senegal, throughout Central America and in the U.S." Sounds a little vague, and easy for them to not provide proof. Dewgrl recently signed up through the Arbor Day Foundation to receive a few free trees. They sent a letter the other day about when to expect them to arrive, and a catalog of saplings available. Most of the saplings they offer were between $0.99-$5.00, and they throw in a free Red Maple with every order.....I'd rather do that, and plant the trees myself with the knowledge they've really been planted. I can also visit them whenever I want to be reminded that I'm a good little environmental monkey.

Since I have to go an send in some info and pay a buck to get my name off of mailing lists, and I'm not sure about the plantings, then where does the $15 really go? They claim, "each month GreenDimes checks [The DMA]lists to make sure your names are still active." I guess that's what folks are paying for...that and for the site owner to keep their pretty site and blog in service. Also, if you move you have to re-register and send them another $15 per person to keep the "service" going.

At least they don't go into it like most "save the trees/recycle paper" sites, but to me, recycling paper isn't necessarily the answer to saving trees. I know that in some countries they are in fact cutting down virgin forest for timber/paper/etc, but in many areas, paper producers plant their own forests to use for paper. They want to be able to control the quality of the wood, and make sure there is plenty available. They often plant quick growing trees that are used for wildlife areas, hunting/trapping area, parks, and general green space. Anytime they cut down a tree, it's replaced with another so they have a constant supply. Some studies actually show that the acreage of trees is actually increasing rather than decreasing. Paper plants have also evolved to use every part of the tree. What isn't used for paper is used to help power the plants.

Recycling is still a good idea, and something I practice, since it keeps paper products out of the landfill. However, I don't feel recycling should be done under the guise of stopping Global Warming, or saving trees from being cut down.

I know that trees are good, and throwing away paper is bad, but GreenDimes doesn't seem like the answer to me.

Edit to add: I just checked The National Arbor Day Foundation again, and I see that they will give you 10 trees when you sign up with a $10 membership. So that's a better deal. A quick Google search shows that the stock they send sometimes is a lot of work to keep alive and growing. I like working with plants, and again, I would know they were actually planted so it still seems like a better deal. I'm not sure though where Dewgrl found the free trees they're sending. I know she didn't sign up for a membership with them or anything....I'll have to ask her about it.

Last week I was on vacation with no real plans of any sort. I spent most of the week visiting a few places around the area, and driving some of the backroads to get there. This lead to visiting so smaller rural towns with a few Waymarks along the way.

I've already posted a couple of Lustron Homes in Team Farkle 7's new category. I've been interested in this since it was first brought up in the forums. It was something that I never knew about, and found there were a few in some nearby towns. I also grabbed a few new Ohio Historical Markers, a lighthouse, a unique weathervane, and a few others that got me some new icons.

In addition to that Dewgrl and I spent some time up in nearby Marion, Ohio. The Marion Area Convention and Visitors Bureau up there is have a contest of sorts called Marion's Amazing Treasures. Basically they have a list of various interesting and historical sites in and around Marion. You visit them and get either a stamp or sticker on a "game card." There are locations that are manned, such as the Union Station, and those that are unmanned like the Harding Memorial. The manned stations involve speaking to someone or taking a tour to get a sticker, and the unmanned stops have a green wooden box that has a small stamper inside so you can stamp your own card. Depending on how many of the 30 squares you check off, you qualify for various prizes. Many of the locations we were already familiar with, but some we were not. Either way it was still interesting to visit the various locations. It worked out well that I was on vacation...Dewgrl works nights so we were able to get to most of the various museums and such that hold odd weekday hours. There are still a few we need to visit, so we're planning to wrap it up this weekend.

Aside from the running around I got a little caught-up on my W'marking backlog. I mostly went through and posted those that are in categories I hadn't covered yet to get some new icons. I still have plenty more Waymarks to get through, so I've got some work ahead of me still.

I haven't been posting on here much lately because I've been somewhat busy. There have been a few new caches to go after, Dewgrl has recently found a love of rockhounding, I've been going up to Mid-Ohio for some races, helping my folks build a shed, and catching up on my W'marking backlog. The weather has been fairly hot lately as well, so I've opted to minimize my activity outdoors. It's pretty much typical for Ohio in late July-August, but it's been a mild summer up until now so it just seems worse than it is. The other day my thermometer was reading 101.5°f. Some of that is due to radiant heat because of where the outside sensor is located, but it wasn't too far off. Plus the humidity has been way up there. I also observed that this past winter my thermometer recorded a low of -17.1°f, so we've had nearly 120° difference in temperatures.

This past weekend I was at Mid-Ohio with my brother and sister-in-law for the Honda Supercycle Weekend. I've watched a few superbike races on TV, and have always wanted to go up for this event, but just never made it. I was there on Saturday for practice, qualifying and a few races. After getting sunburned at the last 2 races I've been to up there, I thought I was doing everything right. I picked up a light, long sleeve, fishing type shirt, put on jeans instead of shorts, and had on my everyday ball cap. I forgot to put any sunscreen on the few exposed areas thought and am suffering the result. I ended up with a decent burn on my face and neck, resulting in some blistering on my chin...maybe next time I'll remember the sunscreen!

As I also mentioned I've been working through my Waymarking backlog when I've had a few free moments. For the most part everything has gone smoothly, and most of them have been posted in categories that I've posted in before, so no big deal. This evening though I posted one in the Rails to Trails category. I didn't realize it before I went to post that they require one to not only upload pics to the gallery, but to also post them in the long description as well. I know that some folks do this on most of their Waymarks anyhow, but it's not something I'm accustomed to, nor regularly practice. I guess it wasn't too much of a big deal, basic HTML is easy enough, but it just seems unnecessary. Uploading into the gallery or posting in the description, one or the other, would suffice. It just seems arbitrary to require both. I did so to meet the requirement, but I'll think twice about marking, next time I come across some rail trails.

I finally managed to hunker down and get a few more Waymarks posted this evening. I've been meaning to work on them for a while, especially since I grabbed a ton of new W'Marks this past weekend.

This weekend started out as just going to a nearby farm market, in Mt. Vernon, Ohio, to see what they had to offer. Dewgrl and I make it out there every couple of weeks. Interestingly in going out to this market we pass near at least 3 other farm markets that are much closer to home. We just like this one since they have a large variety of fresh fruits, vegetables, and baked goods. The main reason we drive about an hour, instead of 5 minutes to the nearest one, is their selection of organic, grass-fed, free range meats. For me personally it's not that I'm some eco-snob or anything, I just prefer the taste, and it tends to be lower in fat and cholesterol....which is a big plus for me.

Anyhow, neither of us had anything to do on Saturday, so we decided to explore a few cemeteries that we always pass on the way to the market. We both like to explore old cemeteries for the history they offer...plus we were Waymarking them, and looking for Zinc headstones as well as Revolutionary War veterans, and bells which frequently appear in local cemeteries. We then decided to make a drive down to another cemetery in Kirkersville, Ohio, about an hour further away, that we had tried to find before. Along the way we managed to find an anchor, a few more cemeteries, and an Ohio Historical Marker. From the cemetery outside of Kirkersville, we traveled up into Granville, Ohio to grab some lunch. On a whim we stopped at an old Victorian themed cafe. I got a tuna melt, which I greatly enjoyed. Dewgrl got some turkey panini sandwich thing...I think, which she wasn't too fond of. After that we walked around the main part of Granville to grab a few Ohio Historical Markers, a bell, a few National Register spots, a museum, and some other Waymarks that escape me right now. We then headed back toward home, stopping along the way to check on one of my caches, and Waymark the spot, since it's a covered bridge, and on the National Register.

Sunday started out with a trip to the nearby Olentangy Indian Caverns. After taking a few Waymarks, and the tour, we headed up to the town in which I grew up, Prospect, Ohio. We planned to take a look at their progress in demolishing the Truss Bridge that I had Waymarked here. It's sad to see this go. It's really about the only thing this little town had in regard to history. As I mentioned on the Waymark page, to some it may have been just a rusty piece of metal, but it was a source of pride to the townspeople.

From there we were going to visit the Prospect Cemetery to mark the Zinc headstones there, since there are at least 11 of them waiting to be marked. We didn't make it there though. We ended up getting sidetracked by a few other little cemeteries, then decided to save it for another day, even though we passed right by it on the way home.

It's been a little while since I've posted here. Mainly because I've been busy, I haven't had much time for Waymarking or caching lately. I did manage to get up to Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course this weekend, and Waymark it, but it wasn't my main goal in going there.

Normally I head to the Pontiac Excitement Nationals for the pro NHRA drag racing, at National Trail Raceway. This year the moved it a little further away to Norwalk Raceway Park. I haven't been to that track in years, and I kind of wanted to go up there since they've updated the place, and this is the first year they've held an NHRA event. On the other hand I've always wanted to go to Mid-Ohio, since I've never been there but heard plenty about it. My father grew up near there and if I remember correctly he worked there for a little while during his youth. I've never asked, but I sort of suspect he may have raced there, or at least been around the track. He mentioned before that he knew the original owner very well, and my dad owned several different British sports cars when he was young...so putting 2&2 together....Anyhow, like I said, he talks about Mid-Ohio frequently, and I always wanted to get up there. I guess I always thought I wouldn't enjoy it as much since I always enjoyed drag racing, and NASCAR so much. I've watched plenty of road course events on TV, and found it a little hard to follow.

So I was left with the choice, drive almost twice as far and pay over twice as much for a ticket to go to Norwalk, or go to Mid-Ohio for the Vintage Grand Prix. Cheaper all the way around won out, and I have to say I'm really glad I changed my "tradition." I enjoyed the racing, the track and the atmosphere immensely. I think I've even found a new favorite racing genre. I guess seeing it live is a completely different experience. I now see where road courses are much more about the driver and the track, than it is about the cars. In drag racing, and NASCAR, a poor driver can still do well if the crew can manage to dial the car in just right. It just doesn't seem to be as much of a challenge to the driver when compared to road courses. Mid-Ohio was just a great place to spend a day. I also found that the food and souvenirs were cheaper than what they've been at most other races I've been to, so that was a nice bonus.

Today was spent cleaning up my Jeep and putting the interior back together so I can sell it. I don't really want to get rid of it, but I rarely drive it anymore, and can use the garage space, so it's gotta go.

I see now that you can download Waymarks into Google Earth. I haven't had a chance to look at it yet, as the laptop I'm posting this from runs very slowly (need to burn a bunch of Waymarking photos to CD and free up some room, among other things.)

I think this is a pretty cool deal. For me personally, it'll mostly just fill some free time, looking around at different waymarks on GE. It is one step closer to .GPX and PQs. For me those aren't that big of a deal. If I want to visit some Waymarks, it's still just as easy to download waypoints using .LOC files....I really don't need to take the entire description of a place with me at all times. I only need to know the logging requirements, and I'm good to go. I guess I don't understand why there are folks out there who refuse to participate in Waymarking just because .GPX files aren't available. Sure, it means the Waymarking site and functionality is different from Geocaching....but that's the whole point of Waymarking being a separate site.

I had a few moments free this evening so I decided to go through a little more of my back log. I posted 5 locations in the US National Register of Historic Places; The Hotel Harding, Ohio Wesleyan University Student Observatory, The Dr. David Henderson House, the Hanby House, and Towers Hall. All of those were quickly approved by silverquill, and I'm beginning to think that he does nothing except approve Waymarks :) . In addition to those I also stacked a few locations as well. I dropped The Oldest Concrete Street in America into the "First of its kind" category, after previously listing it under the Ohio Historical Markers, and Superlatives categories. I also put the register for Ohio's highpoint into the Summit Registers, and Guest Books categories. While technically I didn't mark this in any other categories, I did mark the highpoint itself, which is only a few feet away, in the Superlatives, and Ohio Historical Markers categories the other day. The First of its Kind, Guest Book and Summit Register haven't been approved yet.

A few days ago I mentioned having posted over 100 Waymarks in the Ohio Historic Markers category, to which Hikenutty replied. I was going to reply to that, but I figured I'd just do it as another entry since I realized that what I had to say was a little lengthy.

Having posted that many in that category really goes back to how I started in Waymarking. When Waymarking first came around, I looked at it, but I wasn't all that interested. There was nothing about Waymarking that turned me off, as a matter of fact, I had always enjoyed locationless caches, it was just that I was too lazy to take a couple of minutes to really explore the site. A few months later in some of the local Geocaching forums there was a challenge thrown out to try to get the Ohio Historic Markers above the Pennsylvania Historic Markers in terms of being the largest. For what it's worth, PA currently has more Waymarks listed in their category than Ohio has markers in the entire state....in other words, no way we'll ever win.

So from there I decided that I can certainly help in the effort, and I've always enjoyed stopping to look at the markers when I run across them. My first foray into Waymarking was solely in Ohio Historic Markers, and I took a couple of trips around through other parts of the state, just to mark historic markers. One day I decided to finally sit down and see what else Waymarking had to offer, and realized that it is really appealing to me. So a lot of the reason that my numbers are so high in that category is that I concentrated just on that one category for a while before getting into full-blown Waymarking. Because of that I feel that my numbers appear a little inflated for the category, but who cares, since I've had fun with it just the same.

I just returned home from Muncie, IN where I stopped over for the national opening of the GPS Adventures Maze exhibit. It's a pretty cool little setup they've got going on, and from the sound of it, it's going to be touring the US. I suggest checking it out if it comes around to your neck of the woods, especially if you have children. In conjunction with the maze the folks at Minnetrista have set out a few pseudo-geocaches to be found on the grounds. I ended up getting there a little late, so I missed the social part of the event, but I still went out to find the pseudo-caches, along with a few other real caches out there. Along the way I met up with some folks from Cincinnati and spent most of the afternoon chatting with them, and finding the caches. So it turned out to be a great afternoon.

The event started at 2pm, and I decided to get an early start to take a more "off the beaten path" route to Muncie. I wanted to Waymark a few Ohio Historic Markers, as well as have a more relaxed time getting there. I could have run Interstate 70 almost all the way from home to Muncie, but I just didn't want to do that. Between the Waymarking, and several bad thunderstorms which reduced visibility to about 20', literally, and produced some decent size hail, that's why I ended up getting to the event late.

One issue I'm constantly running in to with the Ohio Historic Markers is the lack of documentation about their location. All of Ohio's markers can be found at RemarkableOhio.com, but due to the nature of Ohio's marker program information can vary widely. Ohio is somewhat unique in that the Ohio Historic Society (OHS), who sponsors the program, doesn't actually come up with ideas for the markers. The markers are left up to the community, organization, or individual who wants a marker. Essentially someone submits and idea along with text for the marker to the OHS, and then the OHS decides if it's truly marker worthy, and then has the marker cast. So it's nice that the state isn't force feeding history down our throats, and they also recognize that someone who has lived all their lives in an area where a certain piece of history happened or exists would know more about it than they would. The issue comes from the fact that they didn't really keep much record of the markers in the early days (the first marker was placed in 1957). So now when you look at the markers you may get anything from exact coordinates for the newer signs, or vague descriptions for the older ones. Even if an exact address is given, it is still subject to being completely wrong information. The most vague description I've seen for a marker's location just state "Mt. Vernon." Granted Mt. Vernon, Ohio isn't exactly a metropolis, but it's a sizable town, and it's hard to tell where they may have tucked the marker away. I've still not come up with that one, although I have a much better idea where it may be based on some photos submitted by a user of the remarkableohio.com site. Along similar lines markers get listed on the website sometimes many months before the marker actually gets placed and dedicated. There was one in a nearby small town that I looked for 3 times because it was listed as 2006 for its date, but I later found out that it didn't get placed until sometime in May of 2007, which would be about a year after I first tried to find it. I ran into something similar today with one marker I tried to find, but I ended up finding some other interesting Waymarks near where the sign will be.

There were 3 of the markers that I couldn't find today. One hasn't been dedicated yet, and the other two I just simply didn't see now that I've looked more closely at the pictures and descriptions. Oh well, some other time. I did manage to get a few other marks that I wasn't intending, since I only meant to get the Historic Markers and anything in the immediate vicinity, but there were a could of things that I couldn't resist. I also grabbed a couple of visits while in Indian as well when I left the event.

I took the Interstate to get home, and it really reminded my why I like to stick more to the US and State routes instead of the interstates. It's much more relaxing, and I really enjoy going through all of the small towns along the way. Sure, it's usually much longer not taking the interstate, but I'm not so sure we're better off traveling the quickest route. I find when I do that I wait to leave until the very last minute, because I can, then I get frustrated with traffic that is going to "make me late," even though it was really my fault for not leaving earlier. Then you zip through the countryside never being aware of what the area really has to offer in terms of people, unique places to eat, interesting history, or whatever.

I didn't intend to do any Waymarking today, but an opportunity presented itself that I couldn't pass up. This morning at work I was listening to some local talk radio, and they mentioned a train derailment that happened to be about 5 miles north of where I live. I looked up some info online at the local news stations to get more of an idea as to what happened. When I saw that there were no injuries, I immediately though of Waymarking.

It happened about 4am this morning, where a little back country road crosses the local CSX rails. 24 cars filled with office equipment left the tracks, essentially creating a big mess. There were no vehicles at the crossing, and the engines were well past the crossing, so like I said, no one was hurt.

So for this I was able to mark it as a News Article Location since it already appeared online and in the local newspaper, it's not approved in that category yet. I also listed, and it was approved, in Railway Disaster Sites. Nothing like posting Waymarks only about 16 hours after they happen. :)