February is very hit or miss when it comes to weather. Is it gonna be February or Febuly? (I stole that from Rock_Rat who stole it from someone else.)
(Look closely at the name tag)
Originally MAGPI thought a sledding event would be sweet. Of course, for that to work we’d need snow on the ground and that was not in the cards. Since the weatherman & Mother Nature both hate me with an undying passion, I figured any event required a fail safe backup – you know, a nice toasty warm building where cachers could hang out, play games, gossip and generally enjoy themselves no matter what Mother Nature threw our way. And so, Cabin Fever Cure was born. If it snowed, we’d have a snowman building contest & games. If it didn’t snow, we’d have games. Take THAT Mother Nature!
As it turned out, we did not have any snow. But we had plenty of games. And the park had plenty of caches – especially for those folks who were not from the area, and we had quite a few newcomers.
Nerd (of Nerd and Jock) – she’s the one cracking her knuckles & smiling cautiously - got the full MAGPI welcome as soon as the gang found out she was “not from ’round here”. (Perfectly legitimate response to one’s first MAGPI encounter.) We like new people….we get to tell them all our old stories and they don’t (normally) doze off!
While some of the new-to-us folks were relatively new cachers, the MAGPI gang was thrilled to finally get to meet the youngest MAGPI – Screaming_Kid! We were honored that he (and his mom and dad) decided that this would be his first ever event and cache!We were a bit confused though, because he surely didn’t live up to his name.
There was a prerequisite amount of geekery, which is no big surprise considering that A) a goodly portion of MAGPI get paid to do computer related things at work and B) MAGPI loves them some bright and shiny gadgetry – not to mention the showing off of said gadgetry. Plus, really, if you’re gonna ask a question about how to….you’ve got a half decent answer (after all the smart arse responses) of getting some good information. It’s not that we’ve been around the block, but yeah, we’ve been around the block when it comes to technology (it hates me, no one come to me – I recommend pbump).
We had plenty of games going on through the day. Easy stuff that you could do as you pleased. Also, stuff that made you look ridiculous. Smash that backpack! Shake that ammo can!
What’s in the Ammo Can? – No one ever guesses this one. But man the answers are AWESOME! My favorite from this round was “A Thing that Goes THUNK!” Accurate, but vague. So we did what we always do and drew a name from all the entries. Wolfpack–6 lucked out and sent one of the little ones up to claim their prize.
What’s in the Backpack? – I love to watch people play this game. It’s super easy to set up. I just dump out my backpack and then jam 10 things that I figure are essential back in. Secure the zipper and VOILA! Also, it’s a darn good thing that I don’t mind mauled food bars. We had some great answers on this one as well…some outlandish, some accurate, some that had me thinking “What in the world did I leave in there?” A few folks all managed to guess 5 items correctly so once again we had to resort to the ol’ draw a name method. Klutzy Kats scored the win which was NOT my backpack, but rather a small cache ready to be placed.
How Many Things in the Thing – Er…Container – So my bestfriend Purple Monkey Dishwasher constantly sends me endless supplies of swag. She does this because she loves me. Also because she has 3 small children who end up with an awful lot of duplicate toys. That’s why I LOVE this game. I get to clean out my giant box o’ (quality) swag. The total number of items in that small locking container was 59. Wolfpack–6 guessed 60!
Find the X – This, along with the ammo can toss which we did NOT play for various logistical reasons, has really become a signature MAGPI game. Only usually we have an honest to goodness real live surveyor who goes out and gets us spot on coords. Not this time. This time I, SSPG, took sidekick’s trusty Garmin 60CSx (no I still have not located my Garmin, thanks for asking) and took a reading of ground zero. I averaged 200 waypoints. Needless to say, I was interested to see how well this little game turned out. First to go to the field (because I told him he had to) was my dad, Foxtrot Bravo. He didn’t have his own GPSr with him so I loaned him the 60CSx.
Using the same GPSr as I had used to take coords, even with fresh batteries, didn’t help much. Troopbiz was also having a difficult time getting their GPSr to pick one spot and stick with it. And the artic wind wasn’t doing much to encourage them to give it time!
There was some definite drift visible as we marched out to see who had gotten the closest. I’d been out 30 minutes earlier to do some preliminary measuring and the closest flag at that time was about 10 feet (or rather 10 Doc Martens, size 10) away.
I was about to declare that flag a winner when someone pointed out a flag that was much closer – only four Doc Martens size 10! We were shocked (and stunned, trust me!) to hear that pajamashark had used his iPhone.
I may have heard The Mad Cow sobbing since he recently gave up his iPhone and went back to Android. (I have an Android and before anyone asks, I love it.)
Re-Gift – Every New Year’s Day in the Waterloo, Ontario area there is an event called Re-Gift O’Rama. It sounded hilarious, however New Year’s Day is not always the best day for me (and Purple Monkey Dishwasher) to attend an event. The day before Knight Who Says Ni and I headed down to the park with some numbered tags. We hung them (usually in pretty obvious places) and took coords. The idea was for each person to bring some tacky gift in ridiculous wrapping paper (duct tape, baby shower, paper bags, christmas paper, garbage bags). Each of those gifts was tagged with a number.
At a designated time I handed out a list that had all the coords for the numbered tags. First come, first serve! And yes, we were nice and did not put them WAY FAR AWAY. I have a little niceness buried in me somewhere. (Thanks to yours truly not knowing how to work a GPSr there was some confusion regarding a set of coords. Knight Who Says Ni was kind enough to run out before the event started and re-check. You’d think after all this time I’d know what I was doing, you know? )
Dad took charge of the Tag Desk so we’d know what numbers had come in and if anyone had somehow become lost or confused (I refer you to the photo of Rock_Rat from earlier).
Dolphy was back in the door pretty fast and brought not only her tag, but the bit of stick to which it was attached. Such an overachiever.
We had some ridiculously awesome gifts once the paper (duct tape, garbage bags) started getting shredded.
I understand the intended target of that monkey was me…too bad I couldn’t play!
Windphish clearly cleaned up!
pbump was right to be suspicious when he claimed the bag I had brought.
Poor Troopbiz. The last gift to be gotten and an awful reminder that Bigger is Not Better. Yes…someone may have insisted that Aquacache bring that as his exchange gift after he jokingly mentioned it. I won’t name names.
RandomRansom is totally ready for a hard day at the office tomorrow!
Oh wvhunter….what happens at MAGPI stays at MAGPI….but you do look Fabulous Dah-ling!
Many thanks to everyone who showed up, brought delicious food and had fun! And a huge shout out to the folks that helped set up and then clean up! Come early, stay late and we’ll put you to work! As always, this was a fine MAGPI production!
