28 November 2008 Oil Creek State Park







We wanted to go south to find a little less snow and we wanted to hunt our 300th multi find at one of the Oil Creek Caches. There was less snow, but still not enough to spot stage one of the AGT Wildcat Hollow Cache. We regrouped and headed out for a non-AGT multi that had serious elevation changes and a view over the park. The last 200 feet in the snow was really tough. It was up a rock slope with snow covering the rocks. We found the cache and an interesting old structure. After gathering information for a few waymarks, we found multi number 300 in a visit to Justus Lake.

27 November 2008 Happy Thanksgiving

24 November 2008 Leaves Under Ice

23 November 2008 Going Home

22 November 2008 English Muffins, Raspberry Jam, a Chicken Breast, Cheese, and Half an Onion





Someone's been here before me.








This week wasn't supposed to end this way. I drove separately to PA last weekend and left for New York on Monday. Two days in Canastota, days in Niagara Falls, and an evening back at our PA house would be my travel week. I hate driving in snow. I spent all week with weather.com open. Yesterday, I made my get-away a half hour earlier than usual. I was hoping to sneak south of the snow belt and get to our home. A funny thing happened on the way. There wasn't much snow anywhere. Still, we had tree damage from ice a few weeks ago, and I was tired so our house seemed like a great stopping point.

While I was in the grocery store in town getting items for dinner, the snow finally decided to arrive. I crept the company sport ute home and got it to our normal parking area. A few hours later, the snow had become a foot deep. Oh well, that's not too bad.

This morning a foot of snow had become 16" of snow. This was a little more serious. I decided that 4-wheel lo or not, I would shovel the steep curving area of our drive. I also warmed the truck. The truck moved back and went forward. All was well until I asked it to go backward again. It decided to scoot sideways. Hmmmm... that's a pretty steep incline with a three-feet stone wall at the bottom.

Two-hours later and a lot of anxious moments, our neighbor had saved the day. Another three hours to clear out the lower pull-off so I didn't need to try the hill again left me too tired to drive home. The snow's compacted a bit, but the tape measure says 18". I walked a bit of the property, but the snow is at least to my knees and in places to my waist. Without my snow shoes, it's tough going.

All this comes to the title of this post. We usually don't have much food in the fridge, and I was expecting to stay one night so there wasn't much in the bag when I left the grocery store. The title isn't all the food stuff in the house, but it's most of it. It will be a little mix and match this evening.

All-in-all it's been a strange day. I am not a homebody. I can't stand being in the same place, especially alone, for any length of time. I have now been at our house for 28 hours. I really can't remember not going somewhere for this long. I also really wish I were home with Ali. My new job is great and I really enjoy the challenges, but the time away from her is terrible. Losing a day together makes today joyless.

If you take away the snow in the driveway, the rest of the stuff is beautiful. It is that time of year when the snow appears to cast a blue hue on the photos. Hopefully, tomorrow morning will take me home.

15 November 2008 Woodcock Lake

Each year it takes awhile for me to face the reality of winter. I guess today was the day I could finally face wet, cold, little sunlight. We stopped at Woodcock Lake for a few caches. It had rained all day, but I was determined to go caching. The caches here were and out and back. Woodcock Lake is a really pleasant place to walk so even with the rain it was tolerable. We were very near the geomobile on the return walk when blue skies and sun popped out and made for a wonderful sunset.

8 November 2008 Lawn Bowling, Little Italy, and University Circle








Ali's lawn bowling club was closing down the club for the winter. Since we were in town, we stopped by and spent the morning working on the greens and putting away items for the winter. The club members are really nice people so it was a pleasant morning. After a short lunch, we headed off for a stop in Little Italy before caching. Our trip to Little Italy was to visit Corbo's for some great cookies. After Corbo's we made our way to University Circle for what was to be the first of a handful of caches. We were hunting a multi in the Case area when Ali tripped on a curb and fell. One broken finger later we decided to call it a day. She's doing better, but we were out of action the next day for a cemetery clean-up CITO.

5 November 2008 Charlotte to Cleveland

1 November 2008 Another Day in the Metroparks












Ali really wanted to finish the annual caches in Cleveland Metroparks this fall. Usually these are night caches for us during the winter when days are short, but we cache very little at night anymore. It seems like a good plan. The couple days we've been out for these caches have been pleasant memorable days. GG made the trip west and south with us today. We started off in Rocky River with a well-done earthcache and a trip to the nature center for a few waymarks. We found a large group of puffballs in the woods. GG did the honors while I snapped a photo. After Rocky River, a stop of Whipps Ledges gave a few last nice fall colors.

It was a good day with a nice stop in the middle at the Elm Dairy for some homemade ice cream. Ironically we ended the day in Medina with three night caches. As we came off the trail we spotted two more cars in the parking lot with those unquestionable signs of fellow cachers. We missed saying hello to our friends Rex C and the Girls.

31 October 2008 Halloween in the Park









I had to visit the hospital for blood work so I was out of work early. Amybe everyone was home already for Halloween, but there was no line and I was out of the hospital much quicker than usual. Ali and I celebrated by finding an earthcache at Buttermilk Falls and taking a long walk in North Chagrin. The tree colors were amazing. So were the two bucks we spotted in the woods. One was a six point near the park road. The other was a ten-point. Ali just happened to spot him standing quietly in the woods.

28 October 2008 Snow






What is that nasty stuff? We were headed home to Ohio and stopped for a few caches while we still had daylight savings time. Snow kept starting and stopping, but was really coming down when we stopped for our last cache of the afternoon. By the time we were back from the woods, it was all gone with a bit of sunshine showing through the trees on a country road.

27 October 2008 Caching in Elk








We drove to Elk to find a few more unfound AGT caches and a few others in the area. The day was bright and blue when we started and ended overcast. On our way to Elk, we both spotted a bald eagle in a tree along Route 6. I turned the geomobile around and we went back to watch this majestic bird until it moved on. We also had a long walk in a game lands for a couple pawinger caches. We were just beyond the final of a four-stage multi when Ali spotted a lot of cedar waxwings. They were feasting on the fruit of Hercule's Club. The photo posted on the AGT blog page has four of them. Before I cropped the photo, there were at least six in the photo. It was odd that there was Hercule's Club at many places along the trail, but the cedar waxwings were only at that area. I thought maybe they liked the hardwoods behind them for a quick retreat to safety. We also got to stop for an AGT cache at a sportsmen's club. While there we stopped for a few minutes to feed the trout. The bald eagle needs to find this place. ;-)

We ended our day with a stop at an ANF cross-country skiing area. I had hoped to waymark the location, but it was dark when we arrived and I couldn't coax one more flash from my weak camera batteries. One of the ANF caches was designed to be a night cache. We grabbed two others while we were out. It has been many months since we have night cached.