SERENDIPITY 
...A Terrific Benefit of Geocaching

One definition of being serendipitous is:  "Enjoying the occurrence and development of events by chance in a happy or beneficial way."

We headed south one recent day with our friends the Meinzers for a fairly unfocused outing of geocaching.  Nancy had seen some things she liked in the Deleware area and several metroparks in the neighborhood, and there certainly were plenty of caches available for us to find as we meandered into our adventure.

Just finding a small container, sometimes the size of one digit of your pinkie, being guided by electronic signals from space and located somewhere in the middle of 1,000 acres of woodland, remains an amazing enough event to make the effort enjoyable for me.

In geocaching's simplest form we open the container, sign the log as proof of our being there, put it back exactly as found and go merrily on our way.  Serendipity begins to happen when you discover something as delightful as the area's Highbanks Metro Park--a place never visited before and one discovered only because of this marvelous sport.

That's Mark above on a high overlook in the vast park with the Olentangy River flowing far below and between the light green, foreground foliage and the darker blue terrain in the distance.

On the right, just above Mark's cap you can see the slope of an earthworks that formed a big, segmented semi-circle across our trail.

The Cole Culture built this 1,500 foot, horseshoe-shaped earthwork between 800 and 1,200 years ago.

Imagine wandering casually through an earthen structure built about a thousand years before our country was born.  Serendipitous for sure.

The park is an oasis smack in the middle of the Columbus area's northern sprawl.  In fact, the Pool family gravestones below were relocated into the park in 1981 sometime after their actual graves were obliterated in that sprawl.  They were some of the area's earliest settlers and farmed land that is now part of this placidly, quiet park.  No one knows the location of the real burial site.

Mr. Pool died in 1820 at the age of 53.  That means he was born in 1767, nine years before our country declared its independence.  George Washington was 35 at the time

Another dose of serendipity happened for me when we were logging a cache entitled "Sore Buns".  This cache was located in front of the beautifully restored Gooding House and Tavern, in its day a stagecoach stop, built in 1827 on the Columbus and Sandusky Turnpike--where a good day's travel would cover 10 miles.

While we were leaving the parking area I noticed a sign reserving a prime spot for Rex Elsas.  He was a dynamic go-getter during my active political days in the 1980s and went on to build a very successful consulting business--evidently located in this historic tavern.

I haven't seen him since he was just out of high school but am aware of his achievements through other aging friends and ole time GOP political stalwarts, Dave and Dottie Dalton of Mansfield where Dave was a long-time school teacher and city councilman.

Still curious?  Click here for the tavern's historical marker.

I am not aware if they have dedicated an historical marker to Dottie's hugely dynamic political work in her day and it certainly will not be serendipitous for me if she ever reads this conclusion.

  

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Be sure to tune in next week when I hop on my motorcycle for a 55-mile caching romp through Fredericktown and Chesterville; sometimes known as fly-over towns by the abundant loonies on the right and left coasts of the rest of the good ole US of A.

THE OHIO STATE REFORMATORY

 1896-1910
A Visual Tour

Thank you for joining us on a recent self-guided tour of what remains of this historic structure, long famous for the murder and mayhem of its incarcerated residents and most recently for its prominent role in the popular movie, Shawshank Redemption.

Sue (right) is contemplating the "Parole Board Room" of the Shawshank movie which in real life was part of the assistant warden's living quarters.

These enactors were sharing the history of the period involving embalming and display of a recently deceased family member as it likely happened in the warden's family living quarters.  The display of flowers served the "very useful" purpose of masking any offensive odors.

This area was for VIP housing.  We were reminded travel took longer in the early days of the prison's history and accommodations for guests were few and far between, hence their inclusion in the building.  The platform was used for entertaining productions.

 The prison chapel.

 

Sue crouches to ponder all five tiers of the East range of cells, the world's largest indoor steel cell block.

This is the view along the opposite side of the East range.  The device in her left hand allows visitors to listen to explanations of tour features.

An inmate's view; not likely to be a lady however.

The library.

A segment of the solitary confinement range.

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We tip our hat to Becky McKinnell, vice president of the Mansfield Reformatory Preservation Society, for her gracious help in cutline information.  Any errors most assuredly are mine.  Thanks also to Google for the night, file photo of the main entrance which led our presentation.

Click Here  for earlier stories on the OSR in Fogeyisms.
Click Here  for the preservation society's web page.

HERE WE GO AGAIN!

Every year about this time when testosterone is on the rampage with the local Canada Goose population, one of them manages to perch on the roof of my hopper, bird feeder.  I need to train it to go to the local ATM machine then stop by the grain elevator to replenish my supply of bird seed.

I have either two, three or four families of geese with chicks now polluting my pond and surrounding area with copious quantities of their--to speak politely--manure.  My nesting pair on the island incubated a family of 5 and the other pairs are noisy trespassers. 

I've counted 18 chicks and have seen 10 adults here at one time.

Good grief!  It tempts me to put a sign along the road saying "Coyotes Welcome".

Of course, that would make my friend Nancy think unkindly of me.

She's the lady who frowns at the thought of someone swatting a pesky fly.

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Then there is this stray critter shown stalking across my upper deck.  From my vantage point I couldn't see what had attracted it's attention but I doubted the outcome would be pleasant.

 
I called Sue and told her I had a cat for her.  Free!

Even though she shivers in shopper's ecstasy at the mere thought of a bargain her sputtering was unintelligible at the temerity of my offer.  She is waiting on her newly purchased kitten to graduate from maternity care at the Rag Doll Cattery up the road a ways.

That little critter cost the equivalent of 1 and 1/2 Glocks. 

Hard for me to understand her rejection of my whoppingly generous offer.

CORPORATE CHICANERY--

Have you looked closely at the size of a "half gallon" ice cream container recently?

Yup, with just a casual glance it appears normal but it certainly is not.  It's shrinking; first recently to 1.7 quarts and often now to 1.5 quarts.

Do these marketing gurus think they are fooling the public with their shenanigans?

If they leave the price the same and shrink the product 25% in size that's a whopping increase in their profit while they spew the usual line about holding their retail prices in check to benefit the consumer.

Yeah, right!

Next they will come out with a giant, economy-size package of a full half gallon with only a "slight" increase in price while the corporate big-shot, bean counters chuckle behind the boardroom doors about how easy it is to to dupe the hapless consumers.

A couple of my favorite candy bars were Reese's Peanut Butter Cups and York Peppermint Patties.  Today's versions are dwarfs at best.  You could wrap the York product in aluminum foil and pass it off as one of those silly dollar coins.

Here's one I'm really keeping my eyes on.  Compare the width of your toilet paper roll to the width of your bathroom fixture in which it rotates.  Around Fogeyland it appears the roll has shrunk easily 1/2 inch, maybe more.

I'll leave it to your imagination what could result if this shrinkage is carried to its potential extreme.

In the interest of good journalism--at least today's version--I did a small marketing survey.  I asked Sue if she could think of any product that has NOT undergone this shrinking process.

After a thoughtful moment she concluded, "Nope."

And, so it goes.

LEFTOVERS--

The cruise ship's atrium elevators (right) were like an arterial highway, whizzing between the vessel's 10 decks, 24 hours per day. Other elevators were scattered through the ship.

This photo and those that follow didn't make the first cut but have something to offer as this story of our recent cruise concludes.

Our cabin was on the second of those ten decks and this passageway appeared to continue to infinity.  It traveled a similar distance in the opposite direction, and, there was an identical passageway on the port side of the vessel as well.

The topmost public deck was the center of nearly constant daylight activity for the passengers with either boisterous tendencies (below) or those just seeking serious exposure to the sub-tropical sun.

It took two decks for formal dining activities and still required appointed seating in either of the two dinner schedules to handle those of the nearly 2,800 passengers who preferred this level of elegance. Once the question of timing was settled, passengers were assigned a table where each evening meal was enjoyed.

Here's a view of our modest and modestly priced cabin.  We booked this cruise just a week or so prior to the departure date and were rewarded with a price of just over $300 each for this 4 night/5 day cruise.  That's for sumptuous food, quarters, international travel, and all manner of entertainment--truly one of life's bargains.

I liked the Grouper photo which led the segment on Atlantis but this pal of his in that attraction's huge aquarium was a close second.

Other vessels were a common sight in these busy sea lanes off the southeast coast of Florida.  It is a nautical thoroughfare serving ships originating in the south of Florida as well as all over the Caribbean enroute Europe, northern Africa and who knows where else.

I liked the geometry of this tightly cropped piece of the ship's grand atrium and enjoyed the passage of the silken sea reflected in the lower pane.  I squeezed the aperture to its smallest size and did this exposure for 4 seconds.  Squishing the camera against a support kept the structure in sharp focus but allowed the sea to flow smoothly by.

No matter how many times I wandered by the stern's superstructure, the sight of Old Glory stirred patriotic feelings in this brief experience of pampered life on the high seas.  Long may she wave!

EVENING AT SEA--

The captain prepares to introduce his staff followed by a moving presentation of flags representing the countries of the officers and crew. The captain is Canadian.

The ship:  Enchantment of the Seas,  Royal Caribbean International

Port Canaveral, FL - Nassau, Bahamas, April 7-11, 2014

...AND A CASINO OR THREE--

We joke about it; Sue enjoying spending the kid's inheritance.  Here she is crossing a floor showcase of "gold" artifacts in an entrance to our cruise ship's casino.

And here at another time in the same playground:

And here headed for the Atlantis emporium of similar purpose:

And me after a prolonged tour of duty as a spectator:

Without the benefit of specific accounting it appears the house wins more than the customer.  However, the "kid's" might take comfort in the fact their inheritance is likely not damaged much more than the cost of a dinner in one of those fancy eateries where it is impossible to read the menu.

Damn the torpedoes my dear.  You've earned it.