Happy Anniversary Baby!

"When you like someone, you like them in spite of their faults. When you love someone, you love them with their faults." Elizabeth Cameron

WOW!! That's the word that keeps coming to mind and I think it fits. We had our one year anniversary for the Jackson Area Geocachers yesterday and man what an event it was. As the JAG Nation gathered in Jackson at The Catfish Cabin, I was impressed at the turnout, but I was most impressed at how much of a family feel we have when we get together.
I think that's one of the special things about our group, we have a genuine concern for one another above what you will see in most "hobby" groups. It's a good thing!
As I pulled in to "The Cabin" I saw a few of our members on the front porch in the rocking chairs talking and it wasn't long before there were JAG members everywhere! Though I wasn't really happy about the eating arrangements in the big room, (one long 1/2 mile stretch of tables does make it difficult to talk to everyone), it still worked out fine and seemed before long everyone was talking and catching up with one another without problems.
Another thing I like about our group is that we have so many members who bring their children to our events. They have become a big part of our group too and I miss them if they aren't at our events.
People talked, swapped TB numbers, discovered geocoins, etc and then the meal came. That's another thing I enjoy about this group, we all know how to put down some food!!
After the meal it was time to award a few JAGGY AWARDS for some of our members and let them know we appreciate what they have done for caching in the area. Then we handed out tons of door prizes from nano containers to hiking sticks.
B@shful and JimmyLogan had brought us a great cake for our anniversary so we finished off the event with a little cake before going outside and taking the group picture. People then continued to gather and talk for a while and then it was on to our separate ways.

Our group has grown over this last year, not only in the number of our members, but we've grown in our friendships and we've grown in our respect across the area as being a group that is concerned about caching and having fun!! Thanks to everyone who came and I'm looking forward to our next event already!!

Good Friends

"Your friend is the man who knows all about you, and still likes you."
-- Elbert Hubbard

I consider JoGPS a good friend. He was very helpful to us when we started caching and has continued to be supportive as we decided to form our Jackson Area Geocachers group.
Today I received the sad news that he has decided to step down from his responsibilities with GC.com as a Volunteer Reviewer.
Though I don't know all the reasons behind his decision, I do respect it. I have a few ideas, but I'll keep them to myself.
I can't begin to name all of the things Joe has done for our hobby of geocaching, but besides his role as a Volunteer Reviewer, a few of his other contributions are serving as a Moderator on the GC.com forums, liason for geocachers with the Nashville Parks and Recreation department, formation of the second oldest geocaching organization in the world where he has served as officer many times, worked as a liason with the Tennessee State Parks and many other agencies to help make them friendly to geocachers.
He has hidden more caches and hosted more events than I care to count, and was instrumental in the formation of what has become the biggest geocaching event, the first Mega Event, GeoWoodstock. I was glad to be there with him when it was announced in Texas that GeoWoodstock would be the worlds first Mega Event
Joe says he is ready to be able to enjoy caching again and I'm glad for him on that, but will sure miss him as a Tennessee reviewer.

Good luck to you Joe//JoGPS//MaxCacher

VOLNUT PASSES THE 1K MILESTONE

It's when ordinary people rise above the expectations and seize the opportunity that milestones truly are reached.
Mike Huckabee

We celebrated volnut's 1K milestone event recently with a HUGE turnout of cachers in attendance. Seems like almost every table was full of cachers ready to tell a good story on my friend Greg.
I've known Greg a long time, worked with him at the hospital, cached with him several times, and am happy to call him a friend. Greg is a great guy and is always fun to be around, he is always one to make you laugh cause when he is around, something funny is just bound to happen.
I was happy to finally be able to celebrate this milestone, we have been trying to get a date together for months now. Dallas was able to get things together finally, we just decided to have the event even if volnut couldn't be there!!! But everyone came from near and far to show our support for another one of the Bluff Boys reaching this great milestone. The JAG Nation was out in full force and I know everyone had a great time.
We held the event at Snappy Tomato Pizza in south Jackson and things couldn't have been better. The location was great and the food was even better. I know this was the first of many more JAG events to be held here.
Of course volnut received the customary 1K coin as well as the Golden Ammo Can full of SWAG, but I left with a prize myself. The feeling of a great time with friends, really more like my family, my JAG family.

JAG Christmas Event

Christmas is forever, not for just one day, for loving, sharing, giving, are not to put away like bells and lights and tinsel in some box upon a shelf. The good you do for others is good you do yourself...~Norman Wesley Brooks, "Let Every Day Be Christmas,"

Man what a party!!

We just want to thank all of the JAG Nation for helping to kick off the Christmas season for us with a bang. Our home was filled with friends, laughter and great times till the early morning hours. I think we hit the sack at about 3am.

Leavearock arrived early and helped me fry the turkey in the rain, well we were under a tent but the wind was really strong and he helped me keep the tent from blowing away while the turkey did it's thing. Soon folks started arriving by the carloads and our home was packed with the JAG Faithful.

The food was overflowing and it was awesome. Jessica, Teresa and I had worked pretty hard preparing lots of Christmas candy and cookies earlier in the day and the food brought by everyone had filled the kitchen counters from one side to the other. We have a few really great cooks in our group.

After the meal, we spent time talking with one another, playing games and watching Jimmy Logan show us all card tricks, some of which I still can't understand. Salamander60 handed out our new JAG shirts and caps which look really awesome!!

Soon it was time for our gift exchange and I saw a side of a few in our group I didn't know existed. People stealing gifts left and right. It was really kind of scary!! I appreciate the gifts, especially the Streamlight headlamp!! Nice!

After the gift exchange it was time for our customary sing-a-long and Jimmy Logan and Little Slugger broke out the guitars so we could sing a few Christmas songs.

We decided to play a board game for a while and several of us sat around talking and playing games till we were about to drop. I think we even caught Leah snoring a couple of times.

The night was incredible, I really enjoyed seeing everyone in the Jackson Area Geocachers and their families smiling, laughing and having fun. I think we have something special here folks. An extended family that truly cares for one another. Thank you all for making this night something special to remember. May the true meaning of Christmas dwell in your heart all through the year!

There's a Change Coming!!

"A competent leader can get efficient service from poor troops, while on the contrary an incapable leader can demoralize the best of troops." -- Gen. John J. Pershing

I saw that quote this week and it really made a lot of sense to me. I looked up a few definitions of the word "demoralize" and found it to be quite interesting.

To demoralize someone is when you make someone feel less hopeful or less enthusiastic. It's also when you cause others to feel discouraged by the magnitude of the problem; to feel dispirited, unnerved, shaken, weakened.

Believe me, this is not the type of leader I would choose to be and I can tell you honestly, it's not the type of leader I would choose to follow.

That is another one of the things I really enjoy about JAG, we all "lead" this group together. We actually talk about our decisions as a group and we are very "like-minded." We almost always see things the same way, but when we don't agree, we work together to find a general concensus that suits the group and keeps us going in the right direction.

As JAG continues to grow, we must keep ourself grounded and keep our primary goal just that, primary. You see, we in the JAG Nation are just a group of cachers that like to spend time together and have FUN!! That's right, I said it, we like to have fun.

As far as changes are concerned, there are some new changes coming in our near future. We are moving very soon to a new website and new forums. I am very excited about our opportunities with the resources that will be at our disposal after the switch. If you are a JAG member, be looking for a private email about the change soon.

Another change in the works are some awesome new JAG signature items. Salamander60 has been working hard on providing us with a quality JAG logo that we can now have placed on virtually anything. I'm sure he will have samples at the JAG Turkey Fry event this weekend, don't miss it!! Also, don't forget about the JAG Christmas Extravaganza to be held on December 15th. Location to be announced soon.

We do have lots of things going on in the JAG Nation!! It's a good time to be a geocacher in the Jackson area for sure!! Do we have any reasons to lack enthusiasm here? Any reason whatsoever to be discouraged? I think not! Keep on cachin' and keep having FUN, that's what it's all about!!!

Cat Scratch Fever?

“It is good to realize that if love and peace can prevail on earth, and if we can teach our children to honour nature's gifts, the joys and beauties of the outdoors will be here forever.” Jimmy Carter

I saw this post on River Valley Geocachers site and decided to post it here.....Ted Nugent at his best!!


Teditorial: Today's parents raising wimps & zombies
Ted Nugent: Today's parents are raising wimps and zombies

Why imprison kids in bubble wrap? By Ted Nugent Sergeant York worked the bolt on his 1903 Springfield rifle like a shooting ballerina. Germans fell like so many jellyheads on a Tennessee turkey shoot, his bullets hitting the mark, round after round after round. Like so many heroes of our U.S. military warriors, the good Sergeant was raised in rural America, hunting, fishing, trapping, shooting and basically rough-housing his adventurous youth to become a rugged, independent, Johnny-on-the-spot, thinking individual. He was more than capable of improvising, adapting and overcoming. From WWI dogfighting aces through infantrymen who set the bar for courage and effectiveness in combat, they proved and continue to prove that the American Way is the best way to hone a real man's instincts to perform under pressure through the physical regimentation of a rough-and-tumble, outdoor upbringing.
Compare that to the ever-increasing tendency of citified families to avoid skinned knees, bashed heads, scrapes and bruises and other badges of honor of a naturally adventurous youth. They are captives of and contributors to a hyper-litigious society scared to death of kids being kids. Today's often disconnected "living room" youth can thumb a video game all day long, destroying the planet and blowing up everything and everybody in sight, without any danger whatsoever of ripping a fingernail. Wimps and zombies, they are. Poor, underdeveloped, soft, thumbnuts, incapable of manhandling a wrench, changing a tire on a bicycle or skinning a rabbit. Pathetic. When I was growing up in the shadow of the Greatest Generation, following our victory over the evil Japanese Empire and the Nazis, boys didn't sit around twiddling their thumbs and zombying out in front of the TV. We exuberantly sought that road less traveled, our own fascinating passage to manhood.
We built improvisational forts in the woods, dug tunnels, climbed trees, constructed tree forts out of scraps, competed with our Daisy Red Ryder BB guns, hunted rabbits and squirrels, threw rocks and skipped stones. Sometimes at each other. We were all fascinated by guns, knives, wrenches, hammers, nails, saws, crowbars, campfires and the fine art of cutting marshmallow-roasting branches just right. We were all enrolled and studying hard at the Motorskill Manly Coordination University of America. And we studied hard.
Sure, there were plenty of scary trips to the emergency ward - blood and tears flowing all around. But I am convinced that these are the trials, tribulations and essential rituals necessary for boys to pursue in order to become productive, capable men, leaders of households and protectors of family and society. Taking care of business What good is a man who cannot take care of mechanical business? The very act of climbing a tree and tying a rope to a limb for swinging over a water hole teaches much about improvisational creativity, physics and teamwork. It's brainpower coordinated with physical muscle development. That it presents the real, tangible danger of falling and getting hurt is critical in the forming of survival skills and real-world cause-and-effect lessons. Walking and exploring together with buddies. Investigating a rocky hill, a gravel bar on the river. Cutting and sharpening a sapling to form a makeshift spear, and then learning to stalk and stab a fish. These are skills critical to every imaginable scenario that we will all encounter at some point in life.
That kids can't even carry a pocketknife to school anymore is an indictment to a societal negativity and denial that does much more harm than good. Hell, in my youth, millions of kids brought guns to school for ROTC marksmanship drills and during the hunting season, and nobody was getting shot. Discipline at home and at school was the guiding force then. Today, we're worried about "feelings" and arresting kids for carrying butter knives and aspirin. God help us all. So drag that kid away from the TV set. Get them a bow and arrow. Take them to the woods. Teach them how to make a campsite and make a fire. Turn them on with the healing powers of nature and the soulful joys of challenge and independence. It will cleanse their souls and strengthen their bodies and minds.

The Caching Game

"When dealing with people, let us remember we are not dealing with creatures of logic. We are dealing with creatures of emotion, creatures bustling with prejudices and motivated by pride and vanity."
Dale Carnegie

I really do enjoy the game of geocaching. It has provided a great source of fun and enjoyement for me for several years now. We have found out that the way we cache as well as our personal goals associated with this game have changed over the years.

When we first started geocaching, we were really obsessed with numbers and first to finds. At the time, we thought it was cool to grab a new cache before anyone else, and I must say, we still enjoy a good FTF every now and then. But now, I am just as happy to see caches being placed throughout the Jackson area for us to find when we have the chance. We don't have the chance to cache quite as often anymore, but that just makes it more special when we go.

My goals associated with this game are now just to find time to go out and have fun with my wife and my friends. Numbers no longer hold any big interest. Now, event caches have now became our favorite caches!! We absolutely love going to events and we make every effort to attend all the events in our area.

The picture above is from Monkeybrad's Amazing Georace. What a great weekend! I'll never forget the fun we had and all the friends we made.

To me, that's what this game is about, making friends and having fun!