Uncle John's Bathroom Reader Golden Plunger Awards Read online

  • People usually write down who they are, what the weather was like when they found the cache, how easy or hard it was to find, and other pertinent details. Geocaching devotees also bring their own special signature stamps and leave that “mark” in the log book.

  TRACKABLE TREASURES

  Some types of geocaching treasures are themselves trackable. Travel Bugs and GeoCoins are among the most popular. Travel Bugs are tags (they look like dog tags) with an embedded electronic chip, and they’re usually attached to a “treasure” (a plastic doll, for example).

  GeoCoins are silver-dollar-sized disks with embedded chips that have become collector’s items in their own right and often include some kind of logo or insignia.

  Travel Bugs and GeoCoins aren’t meant to be kept; they’re meant to be found and moved to another cache. That way, geocache enthusiasts can track them online and see where the items have been, where they’re heading, and sometimes even some information about the finders.

  COLLABORATE AND NAVIGATE

  Just as there are lots of different kinds of “treasure,” there are lots of different hiding places for caches. Some are easy to track, others are more hidden. Some are even meant to be located at night, with the help of flashlights to find reflectors.

  One “cool cache” identified by Today’s Cacher magazine is North Carolina’s “Tube Torcher.” Hunters of this geocache are encouraged to bring “flashlights, climbing harness with carabiner and safety rope, gloves, and kneepads”—whew! This requires a lot more energy than combing a beach, but it’s also a lot more fun.

  There are different kinds of caches, too:

  Traditional: There’s always at least a container (usually waterproof) and a log book. Some “microcaches” are tiny plastic bags or tubes that have just a log sheet inside of them.

  Multi-Cache (or Offset Cache): These can have two sites or more. The first cache contains clues to the one with the log book and treasure.

  Mystery or Puzzle Cache: A mystery cache includes some clues that a participant must solve in order to find the cache’s location.

  Letterbox Hybrid: To find these, seekers use clues (like the old art of letterboxing) instead of GPS coordinates.

  Event Cache: Local geocachers often get together to discuss the sport and go on group hunts.

  Mega-Event Cache: An event cache with 500 or more people.

  Cache In, Trash Out: A type of Event Cache that includes cleaning up trails and areas while caching.

  EarthCache: Instead of finding treasure, cachers find information about geosciences, the earth, or the area where the cache is located.

  GPS Adventures Maze Exhibit: A traveling exhibit that helps teach people about geocaching.

  HIGH-TECH HUNTING

  Geocaching hasn’t even been around for a decade, but the technology that has made it possible has increased the community of geocaching fans. Because it would be easy for a cache to be stolen or vandalized, most geocachers abide by a code of ethics involving being safe, considerate, and honest. At sites like GeoCaching. com, players can find cache lists, discuss the activity, and download coordinates so they can engage in completely paperless geocaching.

  Ready, set . . . search!

  THE NUTS TO YOU AWARD

  Colorful Squirrel Towns

  Black squirrels, white squirrels—who’s got the right squirrels? Lots of

  people try to get rid of squirrels, but these five communities deserve

  kudos for putting out the welcome mat for the frolicsome rodents.

  EVERY SQUIRREL FOR HIMSELF

  Most unusual subject of regional competition in the United States? Squirrels . . . Yes, squirrels. The bushy-tailed rodents have inspired fierce competition in quite a few towns, based not on usefulness (most people regard them as vermin) or rarity (every suburban yard has a few), but on color. Brown and grey squirrels need not apply.

  WHITEST WHITES

  Squirrels adapted to their habitats by turning brown and grey to camouflage themselves from predators or their prey (squirrels are omnivores). But in several towns around the country, white squirrels flourish. The Albino Squirrel Preservation Society (ASPS) has nine campus chapters, including its founding group at the University of Texas at Austin. And although the ASPS chapters vary in their amount and constancy of activity, their mission—to help save and foster albino squirrel populations—is shared by the towns that proudly claim white squirrels as their mascots, too.

  Five towns use white squirrels as their calling card, but only two—Olney, Illinois, and Kenton, Tennessee—claim to have populations of true albino squirrels—meaning the animals have little or no melanin pigment in their hair and eyes.

  1. In Olney, there are two opposing theories about how the little white ones came to town, though both arrived around the turn of the 20th century:

  • The George W. Ridgely Hypothesis involves Ridgely and a neighbor capturing two squirrels (one cream and one white), breeding them, and bringing them to Olney.

  • The William Yates Stroup Hypothesis involves a resident named Stroup finding two baby white squirrels and raising them.

  Either way, Olney is proud of its usual wildlife. The town bills itself as “Home of the White Squirrel,” and local police wear a shoulder patch with a white squirrel logo.

  2. Olney claims its white squirrels are the only true albinos, but Kenton, Tennessee, residents disagree and claim their squirrels are the true albinos. Kentonians also say that their white squirrels are the oldest U.S. population, having escaped from a gypsy caravan around 1869. When asked where the other town’s white squirrel populations came from, Kentonians imply theirs was the source.

  3. Marionville, Missouri, also uses the slogan “Home of the White Squirrel.” People there acknowledge that the town’s white squirrels are not albinos, but residents suggest that Olney’s squirrels are descendants of white squirrels stolen from Marionville.

  4. Brevard, North Carolina, is yet another “Home of the White Squirrel.” This town boasts a White Squirrel Research Institute, an annual White Squirrel Festival (complete with a Squirrel Box go-cart race), and the White Squirrel Shoppe in the Blue Ridge Mountains, which sells white squirrel earring, spinners, Christmas cards, ornaments, and videos.

  5. Exeter, Ontario, Canada, has the white squirrel population that is farthest north. To honor their squirrely population, Exeter residents created a mascot named White Wonder, and they celebrate the annual White Squirrel Festival, which they promote through a song and music video. (We urge you to look these up on YouTube.)

  SQUIRRELFESTS

  Billboards, municipal logos, festivals, and all kinds of knickknacks help white-squirrel towns fight their good fights on behalf of their pale-furred creatures. Residents also go out into the field to keep an eye on the populations themselves. Olney, which once had 800 white squirrels, conducts an annual squirrel count. If the number drops below 100, the town takes preventive measures, which include careful monitoring of the most dreaded squirrel foes—domestic cats. (During the 2002 counting, which was also part of the town’s 100-Year White Squirrel Celebration, visitors were invited to participate in the count, the dedication of a white squirrel monument, and a blessing of the squirrels ceremony.)

  Marionville also conducts an annual count, although many residents believe that the official counts—from 100 to 120 in most years—are usually low because some locals, like Bob Smart, nurture small populations on their own property. Smart, who estimates that he has from 50 to 75 squirrels and buys “about a ton” of feed for them each year, brings mature squirrels to town when he gets too many, since they are protected there.

  The oddest tribute to white squirrels has to be Sam Sanfillipo’s dead white squirrel dioramas in Madison, Wisconsin. Sanfillipo (a retired mortician) has friends in Marionville who, on discovering his hobby of making taxidermy dioramas, sent him some dead white squirrels: “the ones that had been hit by cars or died of heart attacks or whatever.” Some of Sam’s handiwork includes six w
hite squirrels riding motorcycles, six white squirrels on racehorses, and even a few playing basketball. (At least the beloved white squirrels aren’t in the Topless Girlie Show—yet. That diorama uses common brown squirrels wearing little grass skirts.)

  BACK IN BLACK

  There aren’t any white squirrels in Council Bluffs, Iowa; Marysville, Kansas; Kent, Ohio; and London, Ontario, Canada, but that doesn’t bother these towns one bit because they are proud boasters of black squirrels. Black squirrels are mutations of gray squirrels, and some people think that global warming is responsible for the change in pigmentation.

  Council Bluffs has had black squirrels since the 1840s, but Marysville has an official town “Black Squirrel Song.” And it was the Marysville squirrels that “seeded” a population in Hobbs, New Mexico. (Unfortunately, the red fox squirrels there—imported from Sadler, Texas—killed the newcomers.)

  Black squirrels at Kent State University in Ohio have inspired the annual Black Squirrel Festival and the campus’s Black Squirrel run, but alas . . . the rodents aren’t natives. The Kent State black squirrels were imported from London, Ontario, in the 1960s. Black and white squirrels represent only a small percentage of the world’s 300-plus squirrel species, but they certainly have left their paw prints on these North American towns.

  NOBEL PRIZE TRIVIA

  • The awards were founded by scientist Alfred Nobel, who invented dynamite in 1866. After his death in 1896, 94 percent of his fortune—31 million Swedish kronor—was set aside for the Nobel Prize.

  • The Nobel Prize is awarded annually for “outstanding contributions” in five categories: physics, literature, chemistry, medicine, and peace. It’s presented by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences.

  • Four people have won the Nobel Prize more than once. Linus Pauling won for chemistry in 1954 (for hybridized orbital theory) and in 1962 for peace (for his work in trying to ban nuclear testing). Marie Curie won for physics in 1903 (for discovering radioactivity) and for chemistry in 1911 (for isolating pure radium). For inventing the transistor, John Bardeen won for physics in 1956 and in 1971 in physics for the theory of superconductivity. And Frederick Sanger won for chemistry in 1958 for discovering the structure of the insulin molecule and in chemistry again in 1980 for virus nucleotide sequencing.

  • One group won the Nobel Peace Prize three times. The International Committee of the Red Cross was honored in 1917 and 1944 for humanitarian work during the two world wars and in 1963 to commemorate its centennial.

  • Curiously absent from the Nobel Prize is an award for mathematics. It’s unclear why Nobel didn’t account for it, although an urban legend says his wife cheated on him with a mathematician.

  • To receive the Nobel Prize, you have to be alive (although you are still qualified if you die during the annual nomination process).

  THE JOLLY GREEN GIANT AWARD

  Organic Funerals

  Going green means going all the

  way . . . even to the grave.

  COLD, WASTEFUL DEATH

  In The American Way of Death, a 1963 exposé of the funeral industry, Jessica Mitford argued that too many of our funeral processes and rituals are artificial, cold, and wasteful. Mitford would likely approve of a recent trend in the United States—the “green burial.” First it was recycling glass bottles and aluminum cans; now it’s recycling Grandma Beatrice and Aunt Cora. Natural funerals (green burials and clean cremations) involve thinking carefully and conscientiously about what we take from—and put back into—the earth.

  For centuries, the only burial possible was a natural one. When people died, they might be burned, buried in a simple shroud, or laid to rest in a plain wooden box. Many cultures attempted to preserve bodies in accordance with spiritual beliefs. Chinese royal tombs were filled with life-sized clay models of loyal retainers and soldiers. The Egyptians embalmed their dead because of their belief that a body needed to arrive intact in the underworld. While their methods were effective (we’ve got the mummies to prove it), they weren’t particularly harmful to the Earth, just space consuming. Modern Western funeral preparations, on the other hand, involve lots of different artificial and toxic substances, from formaldehyde embalming fluid to lead-lined caskets.

  THE GREENEST GOODBYE

  In most states, embalming is optional. Without synthetic liquids in it, the human body decomposes more quickly and cleanly. But an organic funeral does not necessarily mean you simply dig a pit and dump a body in. Many beautiful natural coffins and containers are available, from plain formaldehyde-free wooden jointed caskets to “ecopods” made of hardened recycled paper to woven reed baskets. Pressed fiber, paper, and recovered hardwood cremation urns are also available.

  Green funeral advocates recommend burial over cremation; ashes are alkaline and can’t be as easily decomposed as a body. But there is a “green” way to perform cremation. Having it completed “cleanly” means that a cremation machine reclaims energy and recycles it, filters mercury, cleans bodies completely first (no synthetic materials are burned), and has less-frequent startups so that it uses less energy.

  LAWN CARE

  However, all these natural preparations would be spoiled if the containers went into highly processed, artificially fertilized ground, the kind that most American cemeteries currently use. Organic burial is best done in woodland burial grounds (there are many like these in Europe) that reclaim soil, build habitat, provide oxygen, sequester carbon, store water, and create urban green space.

  The simplest option of all is being tried in Scandinavia: flash-freezing of a body in liquid nitrogen, then breaking it down into a fine powder that can be spread directly on the earth as compost. That’s “dust to dust” for you.

  WITH YOU FOREVER

  If organic burial or cremation still leaves you feeling lonely, consider a new, unique, and permanent option: have your loved one’s carbon processed into a LifeGem diamond. Created by a “special process,” these gems are supposedly identical to diamonds in every respect, and can be shaped, colored, and set to personal tastes.

  But don’t be put off by the LifeGem. It’s not made from leftover ashes, but rather from the carbon in your loved one’s locks of hair.

  THE WORMIEST TOWN AWARD

  Wiscasset, Maine

  Does any town really want to be famous for worms?

  Wiscasset does, but it’s got a fight on its hands.

  PRETTIEST AND WORMIEST

  Located on Maine’s southern coast between Penobscot Bay and Portland, Wiscasset’s motto is “Maine’s Prettiest Village.” If you head into town on a sunny morning, you’ll agree: its early prosperity left a heritage of fine Federal architecture and well-planned streets.

  So how did Wiscasset add “wormiest town” to its reputation? By Yankee ingenuity, of course. In the 1920s and ’30s, the town’s shipbuilding industry had fallen off, and most of Wiscasset’s narrow-gauge railway tracks and cars were converted to scrap metal. What remained had been there for centuries: coastal flats bursting with sandworms and bloodworms. In the early 20th century, they numbered in the billions, and as Time magazine noted, most Maine fisherfolk considered them a “damnuisance,” because bloodworms sting and sandworms pinch—quite painfully.

  THAR’S GOLD IN THEM THAR WORMS

  But the “damnuisance” started to look mighty fine when someone realized that worms, properly packed and shipped (100 worms per bag, plus “five for breakage,” packed between layers of seaweed), could be marketed to sport fishermen. True, worms aren’t as glamorous as lobsters or blueberries, but in 2003, baitworms accounted for $7.9 million worth of Maine’s marine harvest, making them its fourth most-valuable fishery crop—ahead of cod, crab, scallops, and sea urchins.

  Once upon a time, Wiscasset shipped 2.5 million saltwater worms per month to fishermen far and wide. Citizens of this southern Maine coastal town could lay claim to living in “The Worm Capital of the World,” and did so proudly.

  THE WORMS CRAWL IN, THE WORMS CRAWL OUT

/>   Diggers, who pay $43 for an annual license, are independent contractors who buy their own equipment, including specially made hip waders with tight ankles that can’t be pulled off in sucking mudflats. Worm digging is backbreaking work, with 1,000 state-licensed diggers spending up to six hours at a time at low tide in knee-high mud scratching through the mud with wooden-handled, nine-inch-tinned hoes to find the worms. State regulations restrict the tools used for the harvest to “devices or instruments operated solely by hand power” in order to protect the worm flats. When the temperatures are high, the worms make things tougher by burrowing deeper to stay cool.

  It’s a short season, peaking in July and August, so many pick blueberries, make Christmas wreaths, split wood, or process lobster in other seasons. Some families have been working in the baitworm business for over 50 years, but are concerned about the future. Other communities up the coast have gained on Wiscasset’s worm output, but the potential loss of their livelihood altogether is more worrisome to Wiscassians than who’s number one.

  GLOBAL WORMING

  Worm populations have been steadily and rapidly declining. A 1991 biologist’s review of the baitworm fishery found that bloodworm landings—the amount of worms harvested in a particular area—were at a maximum between 1960 and 1976, ranging between 140,000 and 215,000 pounds annually. A sharp decline began in the late 1970s with landings ranging between 102,000 pounds in 1988 and 168,000 pounds in 1982.