Happy New Year 2009 January 1, 2009
Posted by lightourworld in budgeting, dreams, Family, geocaching, Goals.add a comment
It is hard to believe that I have had this blog since 2002. That is seven years of sharing stuff from the heart. I also can not believe that it is 2009. Time flies when you are having fun and as fast as time is flying by I must be having a huge party. New Years eve was spent at church with friends as we practiced songs for Sunday service. Wednesday nights are traditionally practice nights for church and then when we can afford it we go out with the gang and get a bite to eat. We did the same thing last night. Once practice was over we hopped in the Durango and took our daughter over to her friends house and then headed over to Texas Roadhouse for supper. Once that was done we headed home and spent the rest of 2009 watching the idiot box and camped out on the Internet.
I have spent some time in 2008 getting familiar with new social networking technologies by joining Facebook, LinkedIn, Plaxo, MySpace, Friendfeed, Twitter etc.
Once you join one social network you will find that it is very enticing to join them all. One of the things that I like to do on Facebook other than read what everyone else is doing is to play my favorite game “Bowling buddies”. This is a Java driven game where you can dress up your bowling avatar and pick out their clothes, shirts, pants, bowling ball colors etc. Just in the last 4 months I have played almost 400 games. My highest score is 209 and I will not stop until I reach the magical 300 mark. I hope that I do not get carpal tunnel syndrome over this but if I do at least I am having some fun. Last night Gizmo started playing it to see if she can beat my score. So far she is up to 168 so I do not feel too threatened. One of our church friends, Brie who is now living in Germany has a 220 score which means I am in 4th place while Brie is in 3rd place.
The year 2008 was the year that our family got really involved in a hobby called Geocaching. Geocaching is like being a modern day treasure hunter in which you use hand held GPS devices and go out and find a cache. Katy, Justin and I like doing it the most. Katy (Gizmo) has really gotten into the preparation part of this hobby which is to log on to the geocaching.com website and find the new caches and download the way points into the GPS. Once that is done you can also print out the logs and hints and history for each cache. We have a special plastic notebook that we keep all of our paperwork in when we hit the road. Geocaching is good for building teamwork and patience. Geocaching is cool because you can combine technology with the great outdoors and even get some exercise doing it. The harder the cache is to find the more exercise you get. There are two levels of difficulties by which a cache is graded by. One is the size of the cache 1-5 (nano, micro, large) and the difficulty in which the terrain is to get to the cache. That means that a 1-1 cache is going to be an ammo container sitting on the side of the road with a large red neon sign saying find me. Most of the time we stick with caches that are not nano or micro caches (very tiny and difficult to find) and we try to select caches that are 3 or lower in the terrain level because neither of us are physically able to climb trees or scale hills.
Team building and patience go hand in hand. Katy and I found out very quickly that it works better if I drive and she runs the GPS in the vehicle and the laptop computer. You do not have to have a laptop computer with a broadband card but it makes it much more convenient if you do have one. I do the driving and then when we get close enough I start to use the hand held GPS to get the vehicle as close as I can to the cache. Once that is done we get out of the vehicle and then we start looking for the cache. Using the GPS, hints and common sense goes a long way for finding the caches quickly. Same days are better than others when it comes to teamwork and patience. Let’s just say that it takes a lot of work from all of us. We have a good time getting out of the house and visiting the many different cache sites. We normally take some pictures along the way that we can share online as well.
Thanks to my new job and medical benefits Kristina and I have been able to upgrade our glasses for the first time in about 4 or 5 years. We are both very thankful that we can see much clearer now. Katy has been struggling with finding something more than doing substitute teacher openings here and there in Berkeley County which has forced us to make some hard decisions within our budget. Hopefully 2009 will not be as difficult on the economy as the experts are predicting but if it does we may have to make some more difficult changes in our life style. One of the things we are doing immediately is going back to being a one car family. That will reduce our car insurance bill, gasoline and vehicle taxes at the end of the year. That was a difficult decision because it is going to cause a lot of inconvenience with regards to getting around. Generally speaking we are going to have to figure out how to get by with less income and cut out all waste in our budget. We have struggled with that in the past but we are slowly but surely learning how to live within our means.
I am hoping that Katy can find a better job with more hours and I know Katy desires to pursue her Masters Degree and ultimately get her teacher certification which has been harder to do than she first imagined. We are hoping for more stability in these areas this year and we are determined to make the right choices and decisions to help that along.
We wish each and every one of you folks a very prosperous and safe new year in 2009. I hope that your dreams and aspirations are realized as you too work towards your goals and dreams this year.
God bless
James Moffitt
http://www.lightourworld.com
chiefpropellerhead@comcast.net
Geocaching for beginners March 2, 2008
Posted by lightourworld in geocaching.add a comment
Several weeks ago I began to develop an interest in Geocaching. A couple from church invited me to go with them to Walterboro to find several of these geocaches. Once I went with them and learned a little bit about it I was hooked. To learn more about the history of geocaching and to read some of the very informative faq’s go to this link. http://www.geocaching.com/faq/
I am brand new to the world of geocaching so I am writing this from the perspective of a newbie in this hobby. I am hoping that this will help you and/or peak your interest in this cool hobby.
It took me a little while to scrape up the extra coin to buy my own GPS but I found a good deal on Ebay for a used handheld Garmin GPS. My friend from church spent 3 hours with me last night at ABC off of 78 and we installed the waypoint software and usb drivers for the GPS so I could download the caches directly to my handheld gps.
One of the things I learned very quickly today as Justin and I headed out to do our first geocache expedition was that you have to be very patient with yourself and your equipment. I also learned that you cannot rely on the GPS 100%. It will get you pretty close but you will have to use your head, common sense and whatever hints that the cache owner might leave you online. It also helps to print out the “Google Maps” map that is also provided so you will have a general idea of where you are going. If you have any experience with using a GPS to find a street address then you will understand what I am saying here.
When you start learning about this GPS adventure game you will realize very quickly that this is an outdoor game that requires lots of walking and possibly jumping and climbing. Each geocache is rated 1-5 on complexity for location so the higher the number the more physically challenging it will be.
You will find yourself looking for these caches in parks, nature trails and even off the beaten path. It is a good idea to wear appropriate clothing when you go. I did not follow my own advice today but hey that is what learning is all about. If you have blue jeans, a long sleeve shirt and/or jacket and some outdoor shoes with sturdy souls then you will be in good shape. Wearing shorts, flip flops and tank tops will earn you lots of scrapes, cuts and possible bruises.
You will also want to go to a Dollar General or a local department store of some sort and get some inexpensive knick knacks that you can leave in the cache in case you find something you want. If you take something you like you have to leave something and make a note of it in the enclosed log. You will also want to equip yourself with a clipboard or covered clipboard you can carry your maps and geocache information sheets in so you can be organized.
One of the most important pieces of equipment that you will need other than your brain and a dependable vehicle is the GPS unit. You may already have a GPS in your automobile and that can help you find the general area where the cache is. That GPS probably won’t allow you to input necessary latitude and longitude coordinates which means you will need a hand held unit for out of vehicle use. Earlier in this article I gave you a URL which has that type of detailed information.
I wound up with a used Garmin c60 GPS which has built in memory and allows you to download the cache information directly into your GPS. You can spend around 100.00 for a GPS that you have to manually enter in the cache coordinates or you can spend between 160.00 to 1000.00 depending on the hardware and its bells and whistles and the corresponding mapping software.
Be aware that if you buy a used GPS and you get the install media from the previous owner you may not be able to unlock the software for that unit a second time. The mapping software is hard coded with the GPS serial number on the Garmin website registry. I am in the midst of trying to get the previous owner of the unit I purchased on EBay to send me the 25 character unlock code for the software that easily costs 100.00 t0 purchase new. The more updated the mapping software is on the GPS the easier it will make it to find the cache locations. Looking back I should have held off on leaving feedback for this seller until I got ALL of the necessary information from him.
I know this because I was in a new subdivision today and neither of my GPS units showed any of the streets. That means that the subdivision streets were newer than 2006 when my mapping software was written. Since then new updates have come out that will enable me to see the newer streets and points of interest. All in all today was a very educational day in the world of geocaching and I got to spend some quality time with my 12 year old son. Apparently Justin is a very good at physically tracking down the cache once we get on foot. He showed me how it was easier to use the electronic compass to find the caches vs trying to use the map with a purple line pointing to the cache instead.
There are also local geocache interest groups that meet on a regular basis where you live. I am thinking that someone in one of the forums on http://www.geocaching.com/ can probably lead you in the right direction to find meeting times in your area.
James Moffitt
http://www.lightourworld.com
james.moffitt@comcast.net
Beautiful weekend February 11, 2008
Posted by lightourworld in diet, exercise, geocaching, Weight Loss.add a comment
On Saturday a couple from church introduced me to a new hobby called Geocaching. I had heard them talk about it a couple of times but really did not have my interest peaked until I spoke to them again on Saturday morning when I was showing my friend some pointers on her new Blackberry Pearl.
One thing led to another and I told them that I needed to get out and walk and was going to try and get my wife to join me which caused my wife to roll her eyes and sigh. LOL… My friends said that I could get plenty of exercise by joining them on their geocaching expedition. Not onlly did I get some exercise but I also became very interested in a new hobby. I was out in nature enjoying a beautiful day and killing two birds with one stone.
Saturday was a good day as far as calories and exercise is concerned. Sunday I worked 11.5 hours trapped in my office doing server maintenance however around 4 pm while I was waiting on some processes to finish I escaped the five story building I was trapped in and walked down to the Aquarium and back. I remember how when I did this the last time I was worn out when I got to the water front and had to ride the bus back to the college. This time I had plenty of energy when I got there and was able to walk back without any problems. I was tired of course but not so physically tired that I did not think I could do it.
Slowly but surely I am making better decisions about what I eat and drink and I am trying to find better ways to get exercise plus have fun doing it. I think I will stick with that much longer than trying to force myself to go to the gym day in and day out. This week I want to lose one more pound. That means I will need to make sure and climb stairs here at work, get exercise on my non bowling days and eat the right things. I can do it!!
James Moffitt
http://www.lightourworld.com
james.moffitt@comcast.net
