One Dark Christmas Night...

I mean, really. It is one dark night out there.

Ms. B. and I enjoyed a lovely Christmas day today. A lovely Christmas week, all things considered. I mean, over the past couple of years, the world has set itself on one hell of a new and different course, at least for me. Mom died in 2020. My brother died earlier this year. Brugger and I got married and moved in together. We have five cats. There's a pandemic. Even since this time last year, the world feels like a wildly different — and oftentimes tougher — place to live.

This was the first Christmas that Brugger and I have spent together as a married couple, and the first I've ever spent in my own home in Greensboro. As a youngster, the family always spent the holidays with my grandparents in Georgia. Even when I moved to Chicago in the 1980s, I always came south for Christmas. After the grandparents all passed away, the family spent Christmases together at the old homestead in Martinsville. And so it has been even up to last year, when Kimberly and I celebrated Christmas at Pleasant Hill, just the two of us.

Christmas Eve sunset from The Vino Shoppe in High Point

This past week, we had several little celebrations to lead up to the big day. Wednesday, we went to dinner at GIA - Eat. Drink. Listen, which we hadn't visited since before the pandemic set in. Yesterday, for Christmas Eve, we drove over to High Point for an open house hosted by our friend Kelly, who used to work with us at the old office. Then, following longstanding tradition, Ms. B. and I went out for wine. Typically, we've gone to the Grove Winery on Christmas Eve, though this year, the Grove was closed. Since we were in High Point for the open house, we opted for The Vino Shoppe, which we hit on Christmas Eve a couple of years ago. The decent wine and all-around nice atmosphere made us smile real big. As a rule, for Christmas Eve dinner, I make either vegetable beef soup or beef chili. This year, we opted for the soup. I done good; it was much better than being slapped in the belly with a wet trout.

I made several outings to the Greensboro watershed trails this week to set up a new night cache, which I submitted to geocaching.com yesterday. As with many of my caches, this one is inspired by dark literature, in this case The King in Yellow by Robert W. Chambers. A night cache is specifically set up to be hunted after dark, with trails of reflective fire tacks to lead cache hunters to their destination. I put in some serious time and energy setting this one up, so I hope it will work out as well as I believe it will. Ought to be fun for the local geocaching contingent, I do believe. The cache is called "Have You Seen the Yellow Sign?"

Sunset from the Laurel Bluff Trail, overlooking the Lake of Hali... er, uh... Lake Townsend

For the past few years, our Christmas movie repertoire has steadily grown. For some time, we satisfied ourselves watching Merry Christmas, Charlie Brown! and A Christmas Story. A while back, we added National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation. A year or so ago, we added Die Hard. This year, we also watched Die Hard 2 and Die Hard with a Vengeance, not that these were actually Christmas movies; we just kinda felt like watching them. Die Hard with a Vengeance turned out to be particularly fun, thanks mostly to Samuel L. Jackson. We also fit in Rudolph, the Red-Nosed Reindeer, which was one of my staples when I was a little kid. I don't know that it's going to become a staple in the adult years.

This morning, I cooked slapjacks for our breakfast. Then we opened presents. There were many good ones, for Ms. B. does tend to spoil me. The highlight for me, perhaps, was an S. H. Monster Arts Godzilla figure (from 1989's Godzilla vs. Biollante). Unfortunately, one of her gifts has not arrived. I just hope there's no problem with it at the source or with shipping. But all in all, we both made out rather splendidly. For our big dinner, I made Chicken Marsala, as I have on at least a previous Christmas or two. Happily, I didn't fuck it up.

After things settled, I set out for the trails again, this time to see if I might recover some very old cache containers from a long-archived cache I had adopted many years ago (see "Darkness Falls Restored," February 24 2014). I found one of the containers; the other, I did not. Then, I set out for Martinsville, figuring I'd put in a little holiday time (and some geocaching) at the old homestead. Just before I left Greensboro, I received notification of a new cache up at Fairy Stone Park, a few miles out of Martinsville. I knew it would be after dark before I could get to it, but the mood was upon me, and I figured I might be able to snag first-to-find if I didn't dilly-dally. Well, I didn't dilly-dally, and I did get first to find. I tell you — as I mentioned way up yonder in this blog — it was one dark night out there. The sun had been down for a little while before I arrived at the trail, so it's a good thing I had a very bright flashlight with me. It wasn't a long hike — maybe a half-mile round trip. But it was dark. Very, very dark. Even once I arrived back in Martinsville, it was very dark. Still is.

One dark Christmas night.

If you celebrate Christmas, I hope yours was as satisfying as mine. If you don't, then I don't reckon it was. But whatever, I hope your day didn't involve any wet trout and belly-slapping.

Au revoir.

No, there are NOT any toasted folks here. Not yet, anyway.

Uh-Oh!

I’ve not drunk a Manhattan since sometime in the Cretaceous period, but while I was in Martinsville on Friday evening, on a whim, I decided to pick up the fixins and make one. Damn, it was good! And it made for excellent company while I went digging through some entertaining memorabilia in the attic and elsewhere at Pleasant Hill. I dunno that it will become a new staple, but something tells me it won’t be nearly so long until I make the next such cocktail. It sure helped sand the edges of what had been a fairly rough week.

I’m pretty sure it had nothing to do with the Manhattan — more the need to get the stagnant blood moving — but there is a good-size dogwood tree in the front yard I have never climbed, and I decided it was as good a time as any. Yep. I climbed the tree and spent an enjoyable while up there taking in the view at sunset. It seemed the place to be at the time.

Bright and early Saturday morning, I rode up Fairy Stone State Park to hunt a new geocache (“A Bench with a View #2” GC9BMGC), which I managed to find readily. At that hour, there wasn’t much activity going on, although the beach was open for swimming. A few folks were already wet. As a youngster, I made many trips to the beach at Fairy Stone, but I don’t think I’ve been there for swimming (or paddle boating) for almost a decade, when Ms. B. and I spent a pleasant day on the lake. But for geocaching, Fairy Stone is a favorite and relatively frequent destination. Despite mounting heat and a brutal mosquito attack, I quite enjoyed the brief excursion. As I was going back to my car, I heard what I at first thought was a kid hollering “Uh-oh!” somewhere nearby. But then I realized it wasn’t a kid but a bird. My best information is that it’s a fishing crow, a critter I am fairly certain I’ve never heard before. Play the video below to give the amusing little fellow a listen.

After that, it was back home to get to work on the home renovation — this time, removing, cleaning, and sanding the kitchen cabinets (at least a few of them this time around) in preparation to paint them. We had the new countertops installed last week, and they look quite lovely. Next step is the new flooring, which we ordered yesterday afternoon. What a job this is turning out to be, not that I ever had any illusions it would be anything else.

For dinner, friends Joe & Suzy came over, and we ordered pizza from Marco’s, which is, in my considered opinion, the best pizza in town. Needless to say, there was a wine aplenty, all good, both white and red. We took advantage of a reasonably comfortable evening to eat dinner and hang out on the front porch for a while before the mosquitos finally drove us indoors.

The lighting from our phones provided a weird, somewhat intriguing image of the gang

Hallo, how are you, nice day

Naturally, this morning saw the No-Dead-Weight Irregulars — Diefenbaker (a.k.a. Scott), Fishdownthestair (a.k.a. Natalie), Old Rob (a.k.a. Old Rob), and Old Rodan (a.k.a. me) — getting together for a geocaching outing in Cary, over near Raleigh. We hiked the Hatcher Creek Greenway for several miles, picked up a few caches in other random, nearby areas, and had a dynamite Mexican lunch at Mi Cancun restaurant — literally, some of the best Mexican food I’ve had in ages (street tacos with very hot & spicy chicken for me). There are plenty of caches left in the area to bring us back, so I suspect we will venture to Cary again in the near future for, hopefully, an equally enjoyable encore.

I anticipate the usual work week coming up, but potential stumbling blocks with Mom’s estate loom large, all the more frustrating because they’re neither of my making nor under my control. But if the worst happens, it’s going to add yet more complications to this endlessly complicated ordeal. It is altogether frustrating and unpleasant. I really, truly, cannot wait for this mess to end. To add insult to injury, I have been summoned for jury duty next month. What a fooking treat.

Otherwise, life is.

The No-Dead-Weight Irregulars meet an angel in a graveyard in Cary

Long, elevated boardwalk on the Hatcher Creek Greenway in Cary

I Axed for It!

Many days of nasty weather has about had me going stir crazy, so it was nice to have a beautiful, if cold, Saturday morning. It was just right for heading up to Fairy Stone Park to hunt a relatively new geocache. After so much rainfall, I was surprised to find the trail as dry as it was. In a few low-lying areas, it was waterlogged — or, in many places, ice-logged. The temperature hovered right at freezing, so the wind made for a very brisk walk, but I needed to get back out on the trail. The cache lurks at one of the familiar overlooks above the lake, so I didn’t need to pull out the GPS. A quick look around, and I had the cache in hand. After a helluva week, an enjoyable morning on the trail was just the ticket.

Not just the ticket was another of those annoying first-world problems that have been hitting me non-stop over the past couple of weeks. I needed to head to the old homestead in Martinsville last night, so I figured I’d just order dinner from one of the nice local restaurants and have Doordash deliver it. In most cases, in recent days, Doordash has been a godsend; I have had very few problems and some excellent experiences. Not so much last night. I placed an order, the delivery person picked it up, and the GPS map showed him approaching my (very well lit) house. So the dude drives slowly by, clearly not sure where he is. Drives past the house, turns around, comes back, drives slowly past the house again, goes down to end of road, comes back yet again. By now I’m out in the yard waving at the driver, who passes slowly by, starts checking out other houses, eventually gives up, and drives away. Pleasant Hill is not a goddamn difficult place to find — particularly when it’s lit up like a fucking Christmas tree — and if you’re working for Doordash, you hopefully have a GPS, and/or a phone by which one can communicate. Nope; this chap provided no contact info. Above and beyond my personal inconvenience, this kind of stupidity hurts Doordash, since I’m less likely to use them in the future. Pity they can’t really give the drivers a test to determine whether they are morons. Fortunately, Doordash does give immediate cash credit, which I’ve received, but for the love of god... this particular driver clearly ought not be working as a driver.

I ended up ordering dinner — an excellent ribeye steak — from The Third Bay up the street and picked it up. At least it proved fantastic. And there was enough left for me to have a trail snack this morning. Better than the typical beef jerky, I must say!

Cin-cin.

After so much rainfall, I was surprised to find the trail mostly dry. I did encounter icy patches here and there. 

One of my favorite and most familiar views of Fairy Stone Lake from the trail overlook

First-to-Find in Goblintown

Yesterday after work, I headed up to Martinsville to deal with some pressing affairs following Mom’s passing. Nothing too taxing at this point, at least. And afterward, friends Stephen & Samaire Provost came over to have a few drinks and some stimulating discussion — everything from writing, publishing, memorable days from the past, and current events. We were very conscientious about social distancing — we sat outside on the front porch, about ten feet apart, each with our personal supplies of hand sanitizer. Stephen even wrote an excellent blog that grew out of the event — “What If We All Drove Drunk?” No, none of us drove drunk. And we didn’t behave carelessly, even after a few drinks.

This morning, I awoke to notification of a brand-new cache having been published — just up the road from Martinsville at Fairy Stone Park. The timing was propitious. Fairy Stone is one of my favorite places to hike and hunt caches, and the morning turned out to be just right for it. Well, except for the extraordinarily high humidity, which made me feel like I was breathing mayonnaise on the hike. It wasn’t too far (just under two miles round trip) or too rugged, but it made for some good morning exercise. And I got to see a section of trail I’d never been on before: the dam on Goblintown Creek, which is one of the tributaries of Philpott Lake, where Fairy Stone is located. There is a huge, carved granite Fairy Stone on the lake bank there, which can be seen from some distance. It makes for an unusual and striking landmark.

At ground zero, I struck gold quickly — a little too quickly, as the cache container was sitting out exposed and very close to the water’s edge. I think all our recent rain helped the cache migrate somewhat from its hiding place. I put it back so it will hopefully remain both in place and out of sight. I did, in fact, dirty up the pristine logbook with a most gratifying FTF (first-to-find) signature. First-to-finds don’t really mean much, as it’s not like you earn anything extra for the effort, but they’re fun enough to snag when I can get ’em.

A while back, writer/editor Holly Kozelski at The Martinsville Bulletin had reached out to me because she was putting together some stories about the personal impacts of COVID-19. She asked if I might contribute an editorial since Mom passed away due to complications from the virus. So, I performed some serious surgery on my blog entry titled “Wildfire” from some weeks ago and submitted it to her. The piece just came out in the Bulletin. (You can generally snag a freebie or two before they ask you to subscribe.) ’Tis here: “My Mother Is Gone...”

Together with Stephen’s blog linked above, the two form a pair of interesting companion pieces. Makes me think we might be onto something.

A lovely morning on the trail — except for trying to breathe in that freaking monstrous humidity.

Dark clouds over Goblintown. They didn’t hang around long.

A big honking fairy stone

The Terrible Old Man

Water Under the Bridge

Old Rodan at Ferrum College with Vaughan Chapel in the background

These days, I spend a great deal of time in Martinsville, where I grew up, helping to look after my aging mom. When I'm there, it's a real treat for me to be able to get out and about on a geocache hunt, especially in the rural areas of Patrick, Henry, Floyd, and Franklin Counties. A month back, there was a nice caching event at nearby Philpott Lake (see "Cachin' Passion in the Parks"), and 20-some caches came out in conjunction with it. I've claimed most of them over the past few weeks, but I still had one of those left to find as well as a relatively new one at Ferrum College, where I went to school somewhere back in the dawn of man.

So this morning, I drove my favorite back roads up to Ferrum to seek "Water Under the Bridge" (GC82ZH8), located under a nice little footbridge on a walking path around the campus. Upon my arrival, I discovered a major to-do happening at Vaughan Chapel, not far from ground zero, so I ended up parking some distance away. However, as it was a perfectly beautiful morning, I enjoyed the opportunity to get in a little extra walking. The campus has always been scenic, but it's far more so now than it was in those dim, distant days, thanks to numerous renovations over the years. Entertainingly, on my drive up, Sirius XM radio was playing a trove of the songs that were popular during my interment. Stuff like Led Zeppelin's "Trampled Under Foot," Pink Floyd's "Time," and the Steve Miller Band's "Fly Like an Eagle." Man, talk about getting into the mood. Upon seeing Garber Hall, where I had several science and history courses, a rush of memories swept over me, for Garber Hall was also used for the student cinema, and it was there that I saw The Texas Chainsaw Massacre for the first time... an experience that culminated in the worst drunk of my entire life (see "Why I Don't Drink White Wine" for whole sordid story).

Not exactly a traditional signature, but in the
absence of a working pen, one must
sometimes improvise.

Once at ground zero, I dove down deep and commenced to hunting. I hadn't been there long, though, when a nice lady on a morning run noticed me playing troll, and asked if I was hunting for something. My response of "a geocache" drew an enthusiastic response. Turns out she works for the college, and we ended up having a lengthy conversation about caches, college, my writing career, dark lit in general, and folks we both knew or had known. Eventually, I found my quarry, only to realize I had discarded my non-working pen and failed to grab a new one. Since signing the log sheet is kind of a prerequisite for claiming a cache, I poked three holes in the log and took a photo of it to verify my find. Fortunately, I had a spare pen in the car for any further cache finds.

On the way out of Ferrum, I stopped off at the site of the old House Restaurant, where, back in the day, I frequently consumed massive quantities of pizzas, turkey subs, and cheap beer. There's very little left of the place, as it caught fire some decades back. A number of years ago, on one geocaching visit or another to Ferrum, I had managed to get inside and explore the ruins, although it's currently so overgrown and hazardous that I wouldn't even consider making such an attempt.

From Ferrum, it's not very far to Philpott Lake. In fact, during my college days, bunches of us spent considerable time at Horseshoe Point, Mines Branch, Ryan's Branch, Jamison Mill, and other recreation areas around Philpott Lake. My destination today was "The Guardian of Ryan's Cache" (GC86WN6), which I managed to find quickly.

Then it was back to Martinsville to run another few errands for Mom. I returned to Greensboro by way of Eden, where I was able to pick up a couple of newer caches. For tomorrow, there's a wee bit of additional caching planned with friends Suntigres (a.k.a. Bridget) and BigG7777 (a.k.a. Gerry). "I just can't get enough," as the song goes....

A frequent view during my Ferrum days. I lived in Riddick Hall (the left-hand building) during my
freshman year; Chapman Hall (the center building) during my sophomore year; and got kicked out of
Susannah Wesley Hall, the girls' dorm (the right-hand building), on numerous occasions.

Garber Hall, where I had several classes. The student cinema was also there, where I first saw
The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Gross events followed.

All that remains of The House restaurant, where I once consumed massive quantities of pizzas,
turkey subs, and cheap beer. A few years ago, I went in and explored the ruins, but it's now
overgrown and too-near-collapsing to warrant any further such exploration.

Cachin' Passion in the Parks

Team Deadly Serious at old graveyard near my Lair of the Mothman (GC855TA) geocache,
placed for the Cachin' Passion in the Parks event

Several weeks ago, longtime geocacher and (retired) forest ranger of my acquaintance, Ranger TracksAll (a.k.a. Susan), contacted me about a big geocaching event she and her husband, Ranger WillKetchum (a.k.a. Danny) wanted to put together. It would take place at Philpott Lake and Fairy Stone State Parks in Virginia, near Martinsville, and include a considerable number of geocaches placed around Philpott Lake. I thought this was a grand idea. So, a few weeks back, I put out three new caches on the Dogwood Glen Trail near Philpott Dam in preparation for the event, which took place yesterday, April 27, 2019.

The event, Cachin' Passion in the Parks, drew about 25 attendees, mostly from Virginia and North Carolina. On the way up, I snagged three individual first-to-finds, and several more with a big group over the course of the day. The event proper opened with nice introductory remarks by Rangers TracksAll and WillKetchum and Fairy Stone Park manager John Grooms. There were prizes aplenty handed out to attendees, including an autographed copy of West Virginia: Lair of the Mothman, won by Honeychile (a.k.a. Vickie), who—quite coincidentally—had been kind enough to host a Fugue Devil–themed event in Winston-Salem back in 2015 (see "Equinox Devil, Part Deux).

The rest of the day, I hiked along with a sizable bunch of geocachers, all quite nerdy yet rugged. We snagged a fair of number of caches here and there, and we finally headed up the Dogwood Glen Trail, where my three hides in wait for the unsuspecting hunters. Me, I wanted to check the accuracy of my coordinates, which, happily, proved quite good. And our old friend Robgso became the lucky recipient of a copy of West Virginia: Lair of the Mothman, inclued as the first-to-find prize in my cache called (not coincidentally) "Lair of the Mothman."

View of Philpott Dam from overlook

View of Philpott Lake from overlook, facing west

View of Philpott Dam from near the Dogwood Glen Trailhead

Today, I was up bright and early for another caching outing, this time to Salem Lake, on the near side of Winston-Salem. Team No Dead Weight, consisting of Diefenbaker (a.k.a. Scott), Fishdownthestair (a.k.a. Natalie), Robgso (a.k.a. Bloody Rob), and Old Rodan (a.k.a. me), set out primarily to pick up seven new Paul Bunyan–themed hides, placed by the ever-creative Honeychile, mentioned above. Diefenbaker, Ms. Fish, and Old Rob went after a few additional caches that I had already found on previous excursions. At the end of the day, we had put in around six miles of occasionally rugged hiking. On our way back to Greensboro, the team stopped at my office so they might snag first-to-find accolades on my newest hide—"Rodan's Roost Redux"—which I had placed some distance up a tree beside the parking lot on Friday. It was published yesterday, but to our surprise, no one else had yet claimed the FTF honors. Team No Dead Weight dirtied up the log real good, so they are number one, and everyone else is number two, or lower.

Now there be tired. I tired now. You come again some other time.

Team No Dead Weight at Salem Lake

A loverly little stream at Salem Lake.

A Great Honking Blue Bird who remained in place just long enough to pose for a photo.
Shortly afterward, a speeding bicyclist on the trail scared him off.

2018 Fairy Stone Finale

There's been a relatively new geocache at Fairy Stone Park just about long enough for it no longer be relatively new (October 15). Since I'm at Mum's in Martinsville so frequently, when there's a new cache at Fairy Stone, I'm usually right on it. But circumstances and severe weather—including major snowfall—have prevented me heading to it in timely fashion. At last, the workings of the world came together such that I might get up there this morning. It was my regular weekend to be at Mum's anyway, but I had to get to the bank in Martinsville early yesterday after she was scammed out of sizable amount of money—for the umpteenth time. I took care of as much as I could take care of under the circumstances. The highlight of the evening was an excellent sushi/sashimi dinner at Yamato.

After tackling all of the usual Martinsville business this morning, at long last, I ventured forth to Fairy Stone Park; parked in a beautifully wooded, low-lying picnic area at the base of the campground road; and proceeded to hoof it a half mile or so up the steep Fairy Stone Park landscape. Thanks to perfect coordinates and an explicit hint, I turned up the cache, called Fairy Stone State Park Manager, Mr. John Grooms (GC7Z392), almost immediately. A nicely done hide. At any rate, that'll be my last jaunt to Fairy Stone of 2018. I just hope there will be plenty more opportunities coming up in 2019.

Then I had to debate with myself whether to return to Greensboro via Reidsville, have some fish & chips (the world's best) and perhaps a drink at The Celtic Fringe, and thus settle for boring soup at dinnertime—or—head on home, have a bowl of boring soup for lunch, and then order something a bit more entertaining come suppertime. It was a very short debate. The fish & chips won out easily, and the drink—a refreshing concoction of secret ingredients (including gin, vodka, bitters, mango, sugar, and basil) called "The Fringe"—managed to lift my spirits considerably.

This evening, I have writing, writing, and more writing on the menu. I must—must—make much more forward progress in Michigan: The Dragon of Lake Superior, my forthcoming novel in Elizabeth Massie's Ameri-Scares series. Circumstances have held me up far more than with my previous entry (West Virginia: Lair of the Mothman). Still, I'm also feeling inclined to put on one of those wonderful Hitchcock films that Santa Claus left under the tree for me at Christmas. Perhaps Rear Window or North by Northwest. That'll work up some spirit.

Over and out.

An unseasonably warm, pleasant if rather damp morning at Fairy Stone Park

High, fast-moving water after all the recent precipitation

Don't go over that edge!

From Ferrum to Saxapahaw

Some nice Geocaching buddies near Ferrum, VA

Closing in on 10,000 geocache finds, I am. Picked up an even dozen this weekend, bringing my total find count to 9,921. I am hoping to make the 10K find... whenever and whatever it might be... something memorable, so I need to start doing my research. It would be great if it involves kayaking and is close to a winery, in which case Ms. Brugger would be inclined to join the fun.

After spending Friday and Saturday looking after my mom in Martinsville, I set out after a few caches before heading home. Three new ones had come out around Ferrum, VA, where I went to college back in the darkest of dark ages, so I decided to target them. They had been published several days earlier, but, surprisingly, no one had logged finds on them. Fortuitously, I managed to claim FTF on all three by an hour or so, as longtime geocachers (and forest rangers) TracksAll & Will Ketchum apparently came along soon after me. I almost feel bad for beating them to the punch, since they don't get to cache nearly as much as they used to. But hey, a smiley is a smiley, and an FTF is a damn near empty honorific, at best.

From there, the Rodan Mobile conveyed me to Fairy Stone Park, where I have spent many happy times and found numerous caches over the years. There was a relatively new one there, which did not appear to involve significant hiking... until I opted to depart the trail and make a beeline for the cache. Making a beeline for the cache turned out to be more like hauling one's self up and over one majestic incline after another, and reaching the cache involved a rather precarious change in elevation just above a creek. On my egress, I decided to keep to the trail, which proved less rigorous but also involved no little altering of altitude.

Hanging out with funky little Tiki Dude

Then it was on to Eden, NC. Here, there were several more to find (two of which I sadly did not), including a wondrous, beastly little hide amid a massive network of roots in a deep, dank ravine, which I found to be a pure joy in the driving rain that had begun to fall. You may think I speak facetiously, but I do not speak facetiously, for I had a grand time of it making this find (admittedly with a modicum of help from friend Night-Hawk (a.k.a. Tom).

Drenched and exhausted, I eventually made it home. Then, this morning, friend Robgso (a.k.a. Rob) and I made another fine day of it, first at Hagan Stone Park in southern Guilford County, then at Cedar Rock Park in Alamance County, and then in Saxapahaw, on a scenic trail along the Haw River. Lunch at the Saxapahaw General Store was, hardly unexpectedly, among the day's highlights. Ms. B. and I have had some mighty good meals at this place over the years, and today the goat burger was the item of choice, and a fine one at that. Caching-wise, we found a couple of particularly enjoyable hides, including a rat in a tree and a funky little coconut Tiki dude. We finished our hunt—successfully—at the edge of the Buckhorn Gamelands, where we have cached on many previous occasions, and then we came home, where I fell over and went boom.

Rodan's Roots?

View of Philpott Lake from the Lake Shore Trail

View of the Haw River

Found along the Haw River Trail

Old, crumbling dam on a Haw River tributary

Heavens, What a Noise! and Others

Photo by Sarah Smith

An unexpectedly long weekend, the company of a nice lady, first-to-finds on a couple of geocaches, lots of wine, an old dude making a bunch of racket, too many hamburgers, a migraine, a 40th high school reunion, and worn-out feet.

I knew it was going to be a whirlwind weekend before it started, but it ended up one of the most special weekends I've had in a long time.

Mum's automatic garage door had broken a couple of weeks ago, and I ended up having to take Friday off work to go to Martinsville and be there when the repairman came. I'd had trouble working with a company there in Martinsville, so a special hats off to Overhead Door Company of Greensboro, NC, who came promptly and fixed the door with no problem—a great relief to me after the ordeal I'd been through trying to get the work done.

A couple of weeks back, I had attempted to find a puzzle cache at Fairy Stone Park—"GinGin Learns About Fairy Stone State Park" (GC7CB40)—but the container had gone missing even before the listing was published. The cache owner disabled it and promised to have the cache back up and running in a few days. After the garage work was done on Friday morning, I decided to take a chance that the container was back in place and rode up to Fairy Stone again. This time, I was rewarded with a quick first-to-find, which was especially satisfying since I had devoted such a long time searching in vain on my previous trip there.

And Friday evening, it was off to the Songwriters' Showcase event at the Daily Grind in uptown Martinsville. Ms. Brugger came up after work from Greensboro and met me there, just in time to tear into a couple of DG's cheddar & bacon burgers, which, I swearz, may be the most fantastic burgers anywhere, certainly better than the burgers of highest repute here in Greensboro. There weren't many musicians on hand this time, so that meant we select few got to play more than the usual number of sets. Since the Martinsville High School Class of 1977 was having its 40th reunion this weekend, a number of old classmates were in town, and a couple stopped by to hear the racket (and as near as I can tell, they're still talking to me—thank you, Sarah Smith and Marcus Hall!). I was informed that a couple of other classmates of some musical renown—Mssrs. Rick Godbee and Rich Lawrence—would be playing guitar at Forest Park Country Club, where I spent much of my checkered youth. The hosts were kind enough to permit me to crash the party, and once again the old guitar came out and assaulted the sensibilities of quite a few classmates as well as some other innocent bystanders. I'm not sure this could have been any more fun.

Over the course of the evening, Ms. B. and I had enjoyed a spot of wine, but as we had eaten an early supper, by near midnight, we were feeling uncharacteristically ravenous. So, casting aside all feelings of guilt and/or good sense, we hauled ourselves up to the Burger King drive-thru and snagged a couple more burgers...plus french fries. And just for good measure, we went the short distance to the nearest trailhead of The Dick & Willie Rail Trail, on which I frequently hike/bike/geocache, to tear into these goodies whilst parked in our vehicle. Yes, for a couple of damn near elderly souls who are trying to make at least token efforts in the healthy eating department, this was evil and decadent and probably overkill in the burger department, but by Yog, it was good. Take that, heart health!

Furthering our decadent adventure, on Saturday morning, we returned to The Daily Grind for breakfast, where we ordered the much-needed coffee and a couple of egg & cheese breakfast croissants (mine featuring a guest appearance by sausage). To our surprise, these bastards were bigger than our heads, and we marveled at the horror of them, but we ate them, every bit of them, and they were good. Dammit.

And I'd do it again.

The next phase of our day's plan, however, was a bit more cardiac-friendly. After breakfast, we drove—by the most scenic and circuitous route possible—up to Smith Mountain Lake State Park, for some hiking and geocaching, where we put in several miles in everything from moderate to rugged terrain over the course of the day. I made an unexpected first-to-find at a relatively new cache—"The Turtle of Turtle Island" (GC7D0M7)—and found a number of well-conceived, entertaining hides, featuring props such as a deer skull hanging in a tree, a giant wolf spider, a snake, and a turtle. We also found a very old, charming little graveyard out in the woods, which especially caught Ms. B.'s fancy, since she goes for that kind of thing.

On the drive home, I had a horrified moment as a portion of my vision dropped out of existence—the telltale evidence of migraine setting in. Of all times, of all nights! Rather surprisingly, and much to my relief, no prismatic aura set in, and when the headache hit a short time later, it was so mild I barely noticed it. Thankfully, it did not affect the events of the evening, and by eight-ish in the PM, all traces of the migraine had passed.

Old Rodan on Turtle Island at Smith Mountain Lake State Park

Ms. B. hanging out with some dead folk

My love is in league with the freeway.

Big old cache guardian

The McCray sisters and Rick Godbee
(photo by Sarah Smith)

The next phase of the weekend: The Martinsville High School Class of 1977 Reunion. The event took place at Chatmoss Country Club, where I also spent a respectable portion of my checkered youth, not to mention some time as a scarcely less-checkered adult. Classmates Timmy Pharr, Pam Mann Wren, Karen McCray & Sharon McCray Godbee, and several others put together the event and managed the music programming, for which I, and no doubt the rest of our class, are most grateful. We had a good turnout, though some number of old friends were unable to attend for various reasons, the saddest of them being health issues. And over the years, we've lost more than what seems our share of classmates, so there's a certain sense of the bittersweet in these gatherings. Regardless, those who came seemed genuinely pleased to have made this pilgrimage, as I certainly was. And how pleasing to see so many people looking so well, so healthy—and so goddamn suave!

Who do you think this is there?

Once again, my guitar and I made an appearance, this time for three songs—two originals ("My Loves Goes On," "Today Is for You") and one cover ("Hold On" by Ian Gomm)—and lord knows how, I once again escaped without suffering retribution from an aggrieved audience. This may be due, at least in part, to the fact the sound didn't carry all that well to the far corners of the sizable room, and thus those who weren't directly in the line of fire escaped the full impact of the assault. My performance, such as it was, opened for a beautiful set of songs by the ever-talented McCray sisters and Rick Godbee. And then there was joyous dancing (at least from some, not necessarily the old dude) and general merry-making with tunes blasting from DJ Tim Pharr's sound system.

I've not missed any of our class reunions, and I don't know if anyone else felt the same, but there seemed a stronger sense of camaraderie among all our classmates this time around—I suppose because we are getting older and have a deeper understanding of true friendship, and a deepening appreciation of our times here, accentuated by the sadness of seeing the images of so many of our friends who have passed away, some quite recently.

I loved, loved the event last night.

And while there, Ms. B. and I, as on the previous evening, enjoyed a number of nice drinks, but still fell short in the nutritious food department, so after we warmly parted ways with my old friends and classmates, we sought out something to fill the empty crevices in our respective physiques. This time, it turned out to be Applebees, one of the very few establishments open until the slightly later hours of the evening. We polished off some surprisingly good quesadillas and dead little shrimps—not burgers this time—and then, finally, returned to Mum's to retire for the night.

And now we are back to our respective homes, among our respective cats, all irate about humans who have the audacity to not be at their beck and call day in and day out.

To every member of the Martinsville High School Class of 1977, my love goes on.