Who are the friendliest people you know?

I had an experience the other night that got me thinking about friendly people. I have come up with a list of 3.
1. Disc Golfers.
2. Geocachers.
3. People in a bar.

The other night I went out with a few friends and we had been talking about finding a good place to play horseshoes. Brian had seen that there was a horseshoe tournament at a looking watering hole. We were not able to do that, but they have $1 cheeseburger nights on Tuesdays. So we made a plan. We were going to get cheap burgers and play horseshoes.

 We showed up and there were a few people there and sure enough it was $1 cheeseburger Tuesday! We found a spot outside on a picnic table and made our order. We were still missing our fourth so we just waited for our food and would play after we ate. Then two guys come out and asked if we wanted to play. Steve and Brian started. These guys were super nice. It may have something to do with the liquid content of their glasses, I don't know. But we played. I subbed in half way through for Brian and we beat them pretty badly. Our food came, but they wanted a rematch after we ate.

Good food was consumed and we joined back to our game. We beat them again and Jeff quit. Rob still wanted to play. I said Brian could be his teammate but he had other plans. A ringer! The guy was pretty good. Steve played and Craig jumped in (about time he showed up) and it was back and forth. They had the lead on us 16-13 or something like that. I jumped in and hit a ringer and I think we were up at 19-18 (although in all three games there was a lot of adding one to their score and subtracting one from ours...haha) but then Billy, the new guy, hit a ringer to end it. All in all it was a really good time.

After the final game Brian, Steve, Craig and I sat down as Craig finished his dinner and just chatted. Billy sat at the table behind us with his wife. His wife asked us if this is what normal guys do. We wondered what she meant. She said, "Sit down, eat, play together and talk?" We said, "Yes." She couldn't figure it out. She asked us if we had girls or if we were together (not sure what she meant) and we laughed and told her we were happily married and all had kids. She couldn't understand. "So you aren't here to find a girl?" "NO! We are very, very happy with our wives!" She said, "You guys are the perfect guys! I can't believe you exist." That made me a bit sad, but was also thankful we could be "different" in an out of place spot for us and still not be a bad different.

It was a fun experience and these people were super nice. It made me wonder about church. Do those of us who go to church extend a friendly hand and start up conversations with people or are we too comfortable in our pew seats to say anything? Hmmmm. I think we may have something to learn from our friends at the bar. I think I will have to share my disc golfing experience here n the next few posts too. It's pretty good.

Oh, back to the game for a second. These guys who were so nice and friendly, had "an agenda." We laughed with them a lot, and Rob tried to get us to sign up for the Elks club! He said there are so many old guys that are dieing that they need young guys in there. I said, "What do you have to do to be an Elk, what does that mean?" He said, "Do you believe in God?", "Yes I do!", "Do you believe in the American flag?" "Yes I do." "That's pretty much it. You need a proposer (sponsor). I don't know you guys that well, but I will be your proposer." He had applications in his car for us!

Haha...I am not sure the "cheap drinks, food, great horse shoe pits and shuffle board" are enough to draw me in. Wait, great horse shoe pits?

Cops Stopped Me...Geocaching Premium Style

As you may have read I got a GPS unit for my birthday and a premium membership to geocaching.com. One of the coolest things about it is that I can get an email alert as soon as a new cache is posted. The other night I went out and got my first one. I was super excited. (I know I am geeking out on you, especially if you don't get geocaching). It was placed less than a mile from where I live. It was part of a 4 cache find that gives you clues to a final destination. I have found 3 of 4. These guys are super clever with how they hide their caches. The last one I have been back to 7 times now. It's killing me.

What is really funny is that someone called the cops on me. I saw the cop coming down the road and I thought, "I bet he is going to stop and talk to me." He did. I told him what I was doing and he said that he got a call that I was using a screwdriver to open an electrical box on a telephone pole. A) it is a non-functioning pole, B) I was using my iPhone to upload live video for my dad (who is a veteran geocacher) to help me try and figure this one out. I actually got the cop on video too. Pretty funny. That's what the fist video below is. I didn't want to be super obvious and point the phone at his face the whole time, but I got a few shots in. The rest is just searching at the pole, so after 2 minutes or so it's pretty boring.



If you have an iPhone, Android or Windows mobile or pretty much any smart phone yu can get an app for about $10, It's super easy and VERY cheap when you consider it's not an actual GPS unit. Below is a video that explains all about geocaching. Let me know if you decide you want to jump into the geocaching world. A fun little worldwide treasure hunt!

Birthday Wishes...Just in Case You Were Curious

Here is a list:

It's the iBend, which acts as a holder for your iPhone so you can watch movies, etc.
More info here.

A Batman belt buckle. This is my favorite, but any version would be cool except the one with the yellow surrounding it. One place you can find it is here, but you can google it to find it in lots of places.

The Oregon Garmin 300 is WAY cool. I am a bi fan of geocaching and would love to have a unit like this. I do use my iPhone, but it can sometimes be a hassle if I am in the woods where there is no coverage. This is pricey, but if you have the $$$ and want to hook me up. :) You can find it here or other places too.

A premium membership to geocaching.com would be way cool. It enables me to find some caches that I normally wouldn't be able to and I get alerts when a new cache is put out and have a better chance to be "the first to find." (which is a "big" deal in the geocaching world)

I know what you are saying, "Isn't this really an iPhone minus the phone and the camera, just bigger?" Yes? But I don't care. I want one!

A remote controlled airplane. Just cuz it would be fun. 

Some sort of great zoom lens for my Canon Rebel.

Any gifts towards helping to bring home my son and daughter from Ethiopia would be amazing!
Just click on the Paypal donate button on the side of this blog or on the how can you help section of erikwithak.com.