Shhh . . . Muggles . . . (pic)

(Save it, Baby! Count me in!)

So, it goes like this . . .

Shhhhhh.

We’re going snipe hunting.

Well, sort of . . . So be quiet.

Watch out for muggles, you know.

Well, if you haven’t guessed yet we are hunting for geo caches again. We went for a wild ride today from the top of Mammoth. Went on “SHOTGUN” and rode The Wall and The Log. My husband rode down “FLOW,” but frankly, that one is too aggressive for me. No biggie, I have a lot that I have to accomplish in this life. No sense in using it up in Mammoth, right?

So, yes, we are hunting.

We finally got the correct handheld GPS unit — we bought a Garmin Oregon 300. We bought an extra card for the dang thing, and then the topography maps . . . And let’s just say that this little “Free Adventure” of Geo caching has now cost us over $500 in equipment.

No problem.

If it gets us out and doing something other than what we normally do, then it is money well spent.

Two weeks ago, my husband and I decided to use the new Garmin GPS unit the first time with my son. We were excited because we just got it in the mail and had a hankering to find some geo treasure.

It was around noon, in Calabasas, 109 degrees out, no breeze, and we happen to all be wearing black.

No shade. No hats. No patience.

Let’s just say that it is a wonder that our geo caching experience that day didn’t end in familial bloodshed.

We found two geo caches, combined with a never ending eloquent arsenal of verbal attacks on each other in general pool foul spirits.

Weather really can be a deciding factor as to the success of a day, I am convinced.

However, today, it was just my husband and I in the mountains of Mammoth. A perky 60 degrees, combined with an arching afternoon sun shedding shadows of old-growth pine tree shade upon our path. Pleasant breeze. Yes. This geo caching day had all the perfect elements for success.

So . . . . Shhhhh . . . Muggles, you know.

I sound like a goof saying that . . . By that IS the lingo, baby.

When in Rome . . .

So, we walk around as if we are hiking. We are walking to the left, and then to the right — in a zag-zag direction because the arrow on our Garmin GPS keeps pointing east, west, north, south. Practically going in circles this way and that.

Yeah, right. We look like normal hikers . . . Idiot hikers.

“Is there a hint?” I ask my husband.

And he reads from the Garmin, “ . . . under a log.”

So there we are, putting our hands and feet under a log out in the wilderness.

Hello-o? Does the word snake mean anything to anybody?

Evidently, when geo caching . . . one is fearless . . . And stupid.

I am going from log to log, poking my head and hands under every open spot.

Have I lost my city-freaking mind? Is this the yellow-brick road? Bugs, spiders, and snakes, oh my!

So, I am bent over with my thonged ass held high in the air when my husband calls to me, covertly silent in a commanding tone, “HONEY… over here.”

I look, up.

We make eye contact.

He nods.