Geocaching is an international treasure hunt game. People hide a container with a log and mark the GPS coordinates. They upload those coordinates so others can find the container and sign the log. Often, the containers are big enough to contain trade items. I enjoy geocaching and one of my favorite things to find in a cache is a travel bug.
Travel bugs are not like other trade items; you don't have to leave something of equal value for them. But you do not keep them either. They can be in almost any form, but all have some kind of tracking number. Their owners assign them a goal or a mission which may just be to travel from cache to cache, or it may be something more specific, like visit all the states that start with the letter "A."
I enjoyed finding travel bugs and moving them along on their various quests so much that I soon decided to get my own. My first travel bug I made out of an old trophy and called it "Crown'em."
I gave it the goal to get to a cache in Palmdale, CA. And the following "About" section:
Along the way this bug would like to have its (and your) picture taken with appropriately kingly backgrounds, castles, suits of armor, the Queen of England, that sort of thing.
Experience geocachers had recommended giving it an interesting but not too difficult goal. They also advised making sure the travel bug didn't look like it was worth much and wasn't too cute. And they warned me to expect failure. So I was not sure it was ever going to get anywhere. The first person to find it posted a picture of it with her dog then did not visit another cache for months.
Thankfully, though she finally remembered the little hitchhiker, dropped it in another cache and started an interesting journey. The goal was to go west to Palmdale, California, so of course the first people to pick it up headed immediately east.
Once it was on it's way some neat things happened and people posted some cool pictures.
Then a cacher picked up Crown'em and asked if he could take it out of the country where it might have the opportunity to visit some real old world institutions.
I include this next picture with the qualifier that I don't actually believe the travel bug took two seperate trips to the southernmost point of South America. But that it how it was checked in, so it shows up in its map.
Now in Europe it continues to travel across borders, and cachers have been kind enough to send back pictures. Thankfully, it doesn't need a passport and as far as I know customs has had no problems clearing its passage.
As of March 13, 2015, with the different caches it has been checked into, the crown has traveled 18,841 miles.
Sadly, for every path of glory there is at least one tale of woe. Enter travel cat. Another bug we sent out into the wide world with what we thought was a satisfying and doable mission. "My goal for this one is to get to cache GC51T9E in Howard Florida. It would be great if you wanted to post pictures of your pet with this cat along the way." I also mentioned that it was made out of an old pair of pants.
It did make it to Florida in just 4 stops, but not quite to its destination. Then, it disappeared. We are pretty sure we traced the cacher who picked it up, but he did not log it and there is no sign he ever placed it again. If only our real cat could be disposed of so easily.
I've been a Royals fan for as long as I can remember. I was raised on the teams of the early 80's and remember their success, kind of. For most of my life, though, the Royals have been not so good. This year was special. The Royals made the playoffs for the for the first time in my adult life and went all the way to the World Series.
A few things contributed to my enjoyment of this season besides the team success. For the first time I was able to watch most of the games in high definition. I was able to attend playoff games. And I had Twitter which allowed myself and other proud Royals fans to celebrate the team in a very 21st century way.
I'm going to say this 160+ times this year: It's so great to watch Salvador Perez play baseball. #Royals
— aaronmash (@aaronmash) April 2, 2014
I didn't actually say that 160 times, but it's true. Salvador Perez is my favorite current Royal and I always feel like we can win when he is behind the plate.
I felt very positive about the season before it started. The main reasons being the success of last year and the additions of Aoki in RF and Infante at 2nd. Then Infante got nailed in the face and was wearing this to start the season.
I felt very fortunate to be able to watch the Royals from my home in El Dorado Springs and I wanted to share with others. Sometimes it came out weird, though.
@jimpurtle if you are not doing anything and want to see end of game. Come over. I'm alone.
— aaronmash (@aaronmash) April 5, 2014
I'm starting to think that if I'm going to remain a Royals fan, I'm going to have to stop watching them.
— aaronmash (@aaronmash) April 12, 2014
They didn't exactly get off to a hot start.
The team never answered this question.
@Royals What do you do with all of Gordon's broken bats? Is there a wait list I can get my name on?
— aaronmash (@aaronmash) April 26, 2014
Two more great things about this season were Ventura and Duffy.
I turned it on in the 5th. Saw Duffy had a shutout going. Didn't even look at the hits. I had no idea it was a perfect game until it wasn't.
— aaronmash (@aaronmash) May 18, 2014
Children are a great excuse to get baseball stuff. And if one doesn't have a man cave, a son's room is a fantastic place to display baseball things.
The season was full of ups and downs. The biggest down for me was this moment where Billy Butler was thrown out at first on a line drive to right field.
That was unbelievable. I'm done defending Butler. That can't happen.
— aaronmash (@aaronmash) May 30, 2014
We went on to win that game. Butler had a very interesting season.
I don't use this often, but LOL RT @mellinger: Billy Butler has three infield hits and one home run this season.
— aaronmash (@aaronmash) June 5, 2014
In early June we took the vacation I wrote about earlier. While we were away the Royals went on a terrific run.
Like I said, fellow fan friends made this season better.
@aaronmash And the last thing he said in top 8 after Wade's 2nd K: "The waiter says, 'Check, please!'" ...actually you say that TO waiters.
— Jim Purtle (@jimpurtle) June 28, 2014
As I understand it, if the Royals had won the World Series, Bruce Chen would have received a ring.
@jimpurtle Can you confirm that Chen just struck out Trout. I don't believe my TV.
— aaronmash (@aaronmash) June 28, 2014
I think it would have been deserved.
Having a Royal start the All-Star game was fantastic.
I'm a 36 year old man seriously considering buying this in hopes of getting a Royals All-star. pic.twitter.com/cK766hRM2v
— aaronmash (@aaronmash) July 7, 2014
As I said earlier, not a ton of people get the Royals games in El Dorado Springs. I liked having my friends over to watch with me. But every time we did it, KC lost. Until Aug 22. We were 71-56 at that point.
One of my oldest friends and die-hard Royals fan was not on Twitter to enjoy it with the rest of us. So I started a #GetTimOnTwitter campaign that consisted of Hunter Pence Sign type insults. I think this was my favorite of my own.
Tim Scott's favorite Simpson's character is Lisa. #GetTimOnTwitter
I had gotten in a bad habit of bad mouthing certain plays or a certain manager. I would occasionally get upset and turn off the game before it was over. On September 15 this caused me to almost miss a great comeback win. After that I stuck to the positive approach.
I still think they really do this.
Aoki should do that thing hitters do where they "fail" to get the bat on the ball until they have two strikes and manager takes off bunt.
The Royals made it to the postseason for the first time in my adult life. Tim got us tickets to the first home game of the AL Division series, if the Royals could get past the Wild Card game. For much of that game it didn't look like it was going to happen. I was worried at one point that fans would leave the stadium early. Which is why I put out this rather silly tweet.
I'll watch 'til the bitter end. I hope the fans at Kauffman do the same.
We won the Wild Card game and swept the Angels in LA. So my first playoff game to attend was to lock up the AL Division Series.Tim, who got the tickets, and Jim couldn't go. So that left me and Jeremy. It was a good time. No. It was unbelievably fantastic. Let's go to the video tape.
The party didn't stop. And the Royals were great about sharing it with the fans. Long after the game had ended, they were still celebrating. We moved down to field level, and got to share a moment with them.
I was able to attend one more game during the AL championship series. This time with Tim, Jim, and Delbert Scott. It wasn't a clinching game, but it was still and amazing experience, and it kept Sweptober alive.
For the world series, we could not get tickets. But that isn't to say we didn't try.
We watched game 7 in the parking lot outside Kauffman stadium. In the end, the team came up 2 runs short. When I think of that night, I see a vision of Salvy hitting a home run in that last at bat. What follows was my take at the time.
Spring training 2015 is underway. I am looking forward to another great season. Whatever happens remember: Baseball is a game; games are supposed to be fun.
