…and i’m nowhere to be found.
It’s been a hectic end of March, and I’ve been working hard to finish up some projects and clear my table for the NEXT big project – getting a film made this year.
Life can be complicated. But, as I remind other writers constantly, if you want to be an AUTHOR you have to WRITE. You have to write every day without fail. Even if it’s only a few thousand words, you have to write. Your passion for putting pixel to screen or ink to paper has to consume you completely.
Geocaching is a great family-friendly outdoor recreational activity that involves getting up off your butt and heading outside. Into the real world. Where life happens.
All is not lost for the technologically savvy, as participants don’t use olde tyme cartographic periodicals to find caches (although they kinda still can), they use Global Positioning System (GPS) receivers or GPS-enabled mobile devices and navigational skills and techniques to hide and seek geocaches (or “caches”) worldwide.
It’s the world’s biggest and most interactive treasure hunt!
A typical cache is a container that holds a logbook, maybe some trinkets, and a pencil so the finder can note the time and date they found it. Containers can be as small as a plastic film-roll container, or as large as a tupperware box or even a waterproof ammo box. The contains might contain trading items, and can even contain travel bugs or geocoins – items which are picked up and later deposited in different caches. Geocaching is a great ways to learn about GPS mapping, navigation, orienteering, treasure-hunting, and waymarking. Continue reading
Stephen Whitty of the Star-Ledger has posted an article over at NJ.com about one of my all-time favorite movie stars, Humphrey Bogart.
From the article:
Close your eyes and you can still see him.
The fedora, pulled low. The trench, belted tight. The shoulders hunched up, and the eyes squinting with suspicion. The right hand, with a bourbon in it, or a Chesterfield, or just pulling, ruminatively, at one ear.
Since I didn’t win the Mount Whitney Lottery this year, I’ve opted for a different goal. This goal is actually a series of goals, and will – in theory – help me to train better to get my fat ass into shape to conquer the formidable peak that Mount Whitney is.
There is a series of day hikes known as the SoCal Six Pack of Peaks.
The hikes are all day hikes, so – in theory – I should be able to drive out to the trailhead, throw on my Keens, grab my trekking poles, toss on my CamelBak, and go for a walk. In practice, these are all all-day hikes ranging in distance from 10.4 miles to 17.3 miles. Some have snow that sticks around ’til June, others are over exposed areas that you just don’t want to hike on during the hot summer months without bringing a water sherpa along with you.
I’ve done a bit of research, and think I can put the hikes in an order that will allow me to hike from ‘easiest’ (relatively speaking) to ‘hardest.’ None of the hikes is particularly easy (I’ve already done some of them; I’ve hiked San Jacinto several times, for example, which is supposed to be the most strenuous of the hikes – although only once up Marion Trail; I took the tram the rest of the time).
So. In order, here are the heavy-duty hikes I’m going to accomplish this year:
Thomas Leo “Tom” Clancy, Jr. (April 12, 1947 – October 1, 2013) was an American novelist and historian best known for his technically detailed espionage and military science storylines set during and in the aftermath of the Cold War, and for video games that bear his name for licensing and promotional purposes. Seventeen of his novels were bestsellers, and more than 100 million copies of his books are in print. His name was also a brand for similar movie scripts written by ghost writers and non-fiction books on military subjects. He was a part-owner of the Baltimore Orioles and Vice Chairman of their Community Activities and Public Affairs committees.
