In a move completely unrelated to the theme of this entry, HQ has released a new set of Treasures along with souvenirs for completing collections and bulk acquisition in general. I am already two souvenirs up today, having gained the ones for 100 Treasures and 10 complete collections. I should have the new collection complete next week if I stick to my regular one cache per day, or sooner if I decided to just dive in and cache cache cache ’til my daddy takes my T-Bird away. Of course, the latter is unlikely because everything I just said is wrong: my father is long gone, I don’t have a T-Bird, I’m a grown adult so he couldn’t take it from me even if he was around, and, most importantly, the weekend looks like there’s going to be snow and ice so I’m not likely to cache cache cache during any of that. But none of that is germane right now.
Yes, Groundspeak has managed to tap into the Pokemon gotta-catch-’em-all part of my brain. While I do not actively chase these little digital doodads, I have found myself occasionally choosing one cache over another based on their requirements. But there is also a dark, dare I say disappointing side to them that it took me a minute to figure out. Well, dark for me which is my ultimate criteria for the designation. You see I’ve got a bunch of Treasure collections that are not done. A couple of them are because I’m lazy and don’t feel like going after tougher ones at the moment and tend to avoid those out on the road. The rest are because I’m quite experienced with caching, especially in my area. I primarily do most of my caching in Travis and Williamson Counties, containing over 2300 and 4200 caches respectively, of which I have found 1700 and 2400. I am having trouble finding smalls with four favorites or micros with dogs allowed because I’ve already found them all. Sure, I could to out to some of the surrounding counties and look for some, but I’m avoiding that because (for some unfathomable reason) I’m saving caches to continue the streak that I claim not to care about. Even then, I’m not as likely to find those because there are far fewer caches out there than in my normal haunts (and Williamson has taken a HUGE leap forward since last I checked). The only reason I have a likely chance of finishing the one requiring EarthCaches soon is because someone has dropped a couple of new ones in the area recently. But usually I save local EarthCaches for International EarthCache Day so I don’t have to drive to the ends of creation just to ensure I get a souvenir (a totally different digital doodad to be discussed another day). My point here (and I do have one) is that I’m a victim of my own success here. So I doubt I’m going to be completing some of these for a while yet, if at all. I’m going to have to wait for more specific targets to pop up organically around here, and I’m less likely to find them on the road because I am more likely to avoid just those caches. With a few exceptions, I’m not looking for a scenic view when I’m picking up new counties.
On an even more unrelated side note, it has now been six years since I completed the Texas County Challenge. I feel like I had so much energy back then and could take on the world. Now I have far more knowledge and less energy. But that hasn’t stopped me yet! It’s strange to think there was a time when I couldn’t even imagine going to that many counties, and now I have more counties than that outside the holy borders of my home state. But that’s a discussion for an even further time. So excuse me while I go stock up for another possible Snowpocalypse.
Geocaching While Black 