Drinking & Driving & Littering

My wife and I went out this morning to pick up garbage off the highway as part of the Adopt-A-Highway program. Aside from the numerous Timmy Ho's coffee cups that littered the highway, you would be amazed at how many beer bottles, beer cans, and other assorted alcoholic bottles we picked up along the shoulder of the highway. And we only did ~2km stretch of the highway. There are no houses anywhere in sight, so the only place that these could come from would be passing cars.

Of course, maybe not everyone who drank them was driving at the time -- they could have been a passenger -- but even if 1/10th of them were consumed by the drivers, that's pretty scary stuff.

Cache me if you can

Here's an interesting article about Geocaching in Stanford Magazine. I really like this quote from the article,

“[Caching] makes you more observant of your surroundings,” she says. “It brings me the joy of appreciating what’s around me.”

That's a big part of why I enjoy Geocaching.

Cycling and Geocaching

The team I'm cycling with for the RONA MS Bike Tour in August met last night at one of the members' apartments. We met to toss around fund raising ideas and to... well.. meet each other, since some of us had never met before. We had a great time.

We're all linked by our hobby -- Geocaching.

After the meeting, we all went looking for a micro geocache hidden about 500m away. It was pretty cold out too. Some of the members had already found it in the past and got a good laugh out of the rest of us searching this small traffic island for a tiny cache.

Sunday

I went geocaching this afternoon. I wore my snow shoes. I now have a blister on my right pinky toe. It hurts. I have to remember not to strap the snow shoes on so tight.

Despite that, it was a good hike along the river. The wind coming across the frozen river was damn cold though. I had to cross frozen bodies of water a few times during my hike. That was kinda cool, actually.

I'm tired now.

Geocaching Pub Night

Looks like I'll be able to attend a Geocaching meet/event tonight. There's usually one every month at a different location, but due to it being on a Tuesday and its starting time, there's no way I can make it there. This month's is on a Friday and starts at 7:00pm so I'll be there.

These meets are just get-togethers to meet other Geocachers, share stories and go for any geocache finds in the area after grabbing a bite to eat. The weather is supposed to be a bit warmer tonight than it has been lately, so it should be a good time.

No turning back now

Well, I did it. I am now registered for the RONA MS Bike Tour in August.

I'm anxious. Excited. Starting to feel motivated. And stunned. All at the same time. :)

If you'd care to sponsor me, you can follow this link. I haven't done any customizing to my personal page there yet. Or, if you'd prefer to sponsor the team that I'm a part of, go here. It doesn't look like the team page has had any customizations done yet either.

Paying for your mistakes

The Ottawa Sun ran a follow-up article to the licence plate theft article last weekend. Glad to see it all over and done with! I'm sure the students won' t be pulling any stunts like that again. Or at least not post pictures about it. :)

RONA MS Bike Tour

When I first heard of the RONA MS Bike Tour a few years ago, I thought it would be a pretty cool experience. I was riding my bicycle fairly regularly -- at least 20kms every weekend -- and was fairly sure I could do the entire 150km (75km per day) trip with more preparation.

A few local geocachers put together a team to make the trip this year and I'm seriously considering joining them. During the trip, they plan to find a few geocaches along the way, if there are any.

Granted, I didn't do nearly as much cycling this past summer, but I did do a fair bit of hiking while geocaching, and I've started snow shoeing this winter, so it's not like I've become a total couch potato.

My reason for wanting to do it is somewhat selfish, in a way. I mean, it is for a really good cause, but a good part of my reason for wanting to do it is to motivate me to get in better shape. This could give me something to work for during the 6 months of preparation for the trip. You'd think that just being healthier would be enough motivation!

I guess I need more. And this might be the answer.

I talked it over with my wife this evening and she's cool with it. Although, at first she kind gave me a "Yeh right.. you sure you can do this?" kind of look.

I'm giving it some serious thought anyway. I think I have a little doubt in the back of my mind that I can do it and that's what's keeping me from just going for it. I don't want to commit to anything if I'm not going to go through with it, you know?

Stay tuned.

There's no such thing as a smart thief

And these young folks prove that.

A few university thieves stole a licence plate as part of a frosh week scavenger hunt and the stupidly posted the picture in the internet. The original owner of the licence plate found the picture online just over a year later.

It may seem like a harmless prank, but replacing a licence plate costs money, regardless of how it disappears. I would imagine that his plate was not the only one stolen that night. He's lucky enough to have found who did it (although they have yet to be tracked down). Other victims of plate thefts that night aren't so fortunate.

"Geosquid" is a member of our local Geocaching community and broke this story a few days before it became public. Geosquid's blog and original post about this can be found here.

The Ottawa Sun ran an article about it in today's newspaper.

Update: The owner of the licence plate met with a few of the people responsible for taking the licence plate on Monday evening and they paid him the $100. Although I'm sure all the unwanted publicity played a large part in coming forward, it's nice to see a happy ending come to this story. :)