Good morning everyone. Getting back to oldest and most favorite caches in different States and Provinces with Geocaching's 20th anniversary/birthday celebrations. This week is Montana. The cache with the most favorite points is 'Military History Series - Little Bighorn Nat. Mon.' GC6F9E. Published in July, 2002, this virtual has 1,920 found logs and 333 favorite points. The very first cache published in Montana was '1st Montana Cache!' GC37F. This traditional was published in February, 2001 and archived one year later after being found five times. The oldest active geocache is 'Fairweather' GC492. Another traditional that was hidden in March, 2001. It has 337 found logs.
To be perfectly honest, I didn't know how to approach this topic. Should I just have it as a mention in a random thoughts style blog? Should I do an entire blog on the topic? It is a serious topic that I think deserves to be talked about. Especially for us geocachers who will be spending the hot days of summer finding geocaches in the hot sun. There is a more important reason why I want to discuss melanoma today. First things first, I just want to say that cancer sucks. We all know that. We all know of someone, a family member, co-worker, friend, a colleague that has been stricken with a form of cancer. The geocaching community isn't any different. I know of two very brave and strong local geocaching women who fought cancer and won. Sneaky Shields and crackerjackie. Recently our local caching community lost one if it's own to cancer. Erocks (aka Eric).
I want to pay a little bit of a tribute to Erocks before discussing melanoma and it's effects. Erocks' first geocache found was 'Paroisse Notre-Dame de Lorette Parish' GC20KHJ back on June 23, 2011. He would go on to find 5,194 geocaches, with his final find, a ten cache day adventure with his girlfriend, Crazy Owl Chick, on March 22, 2020. I remember my first successful attempt at a night cache. It was back on October 14, 2015. I teamed up with missionMode, Crazy Owl Chick, and Erocks to do 'Assiniboine Park Night Cache' GC4NQ42. Since we completed that one in quick fashion, we decided to do one more night cache nearby, even though Erocks and Crazy Owl Chick had done it already. 'Assiniboine Forest Night Cache' GC3FW63. Erocks passed away recently due to Melanoma cancer. He would have been 36 years old this year. Much too young. You can read a little more about Erocks here > Erocks To add a little more, Erocks also served as the stats person for the Manitoba Geocaching Association.
Melanoma, aka skin cancer. I did a little Google search to learn more about this form of cancer and hopefully I can pass on what I learned to you. Melanoma is a serious form of skin cancer that begins in the cells known as melanocytes. Melanoma is less common than basal cell carcinoma and squamous cell carcinoma. Melanoma is more dangerous because of it's ability to spread to other organs more rapidly if not treated at an early stage.
The first sign of melanoma is typically a new spot on the skin, or a change in size, shape or color of an existing mole. Melanoma can grow quickly and can become life-threatening in as little as six weeks. The moles can normally appear brown or black in color, but some can appear pink, tan, or even white. Some can have areas of different colors. They may not always be round in shape like a normal mole.
Melanoma may appear suddenly and without warning. They can be found more frequently on the face, neck, upper back and legs, but can appear anywhere on the body. Another form is amelanotic melanoma. The malignant cells have little or no pigment and can go undetected for longer, which gives it time to spread. One in five Americans will develop skin cancer by the age of 70. Two people die of skin cancer every hour. Having five or more sunburns doubles your risk for melanoma. When detected early, the five year survival rate is 99%.
What can you do to prevent your chances of skin cancer? Sunscreen. This can come in a spray or lotion and has a Sun Protection Factor (SPF). Dermatologists suggest an SPF of 15 or 30. Higher SPFs don't provide much more protection. How does the SPF scale work? If your skin would normally burn after being exposed to the sun for ten minutes, applying an SPF 15 would allow you to stay in the sun without burning for about 150 minutes or 15 times longer. This is a rough estimate as other factors need to be considered such as skin type, intensity of the sunlight and amount of sunscreen used.
Other preventative measures are; wear a shirt, put on a hat (this can also reduce the risk of heat stroke or sun stroke), and wear sunglasses to protect sensitive eyes. It wouldn't hurt to have a significant other give you a check over in places that you can't see, such as your back, for any new spots.
There is so much more to read and learn about this dreaded cancer. Just do what I did and Google melanoma. Hopefully this helps shed a little light on the topic and possibly help prevent at least one geocacher from getting skin cancer. Until then, be safe (wear sunscreen), be happy, keep your distance, wash your hands, and most importantly, have fun. Peace out.
To be perfectly honest, I didn't know how to approach this topic. Should I just have it as a mention in a random thoughts style blog? Should I do an entire blog on the topic? It is a serious topic that I think deserves to be talked about. Especially for us geocachers who will be spending the hot days of summer finding geocaches in the hot sun. There is a more important reason why I want to discuss melanoma today. First things first, I just want to say that cancer sucks. We all know that. We all know of someone, a family member, co-worker, friend, a colleague that has been stricken with a form of cancer. The geocaching community isn't any different. I know of two very brave and strong local geocaching women who fought cancer and won. Sneaky Shields and crackerjackie. Recently our local caching community lost one if it's own to cancer. Erocks (aka Eric).
I want to pay a little bit of a tribute to Erocks before discussing melanoma and it's effects. Erocks' first geocache found was 'Paroisse Notre-Dame de Lorette Parish' GC20KHJ back on June 23, 2011. He would go on to find 5,194 geocaches, with his final find, a ten cache day adventure with his girlfriend, Crazy Owl Chick, on March 22, 2020. I remember my first successful attempt at a night cache. It was back on October 14, 2015. I teamed up with missionMode, Crazy Owl Chick, and Erocks to do 'Assiniboine Park Night Cache' GC4NQ42. Since we completed that one in quick fashion, we decided to do one more night cache nearby, even though Erocks and Crazy Owl Chick had done it already. 'Assiniboine Forest Night Cache' GC3FW63. Erocks passed away recently due to Melanoma cancer. He would have been 36 years old this year. Much too young. You can read a little more about Erocks here > Erocks To add a little more, Erocks also served as the stats person for the Manitoba Geocaching Association.
Melanoma, aka skin cancer. I did a little Google search to learn more about this form of cancer and hopefully I can pass on what I learned to you. Melanoma is a serious form of skin cancer that begins in the cells known as melanocytes. Melanoma is less common than basal cell carcinoma and squamous cell carcinoma. Melanoma is more dangerous because of it's ability to spread to other organs more rapidly if not treated at an early stage.
The first sign of melanoma is typically a new spot on the skin, or a change in size, shape or color of an existing mole. Melanoma can grow quickly and can become life-threatening in as little as six weeks. The moles can normally appear brown or black in color, but some can appear pink, tan, or even white. Some can have areas of different colors. They may not always be round in shape like a normal mole.
Melanoma may appear suddenly and without warning. They can be found more frequently on the face, neck, upper back and legs, but can appear anywhere on the body. Another form is amelanotic melanoma. The malignant cells have little or no pigment and can go undetected for longer, which gives it time to spread. One in five Americans will develop skin cancer by the age of 70. Two people die of skin cancer every hour. Having five or more sunburns doubles your risk for melanoma. When detected early, the five year survival rate is 99%.
What can you do to prevent your chances of skin cancer? Sunscreen. This can come in a spray or lotion and has a Sun Protection Factor (SPF). Dermatologists suggest an SPF of 15 or 30. Higher SPFs don't provide much more protection. How does the SPF scale work? If your skin would normally burn after being exposed to the sun for ten minutes, applying an SPF 15 would allow you to stay in the sun without burning for about 150 minutes or 15 times longer. This is a rough estimate as other factors need to be considered such as skin type, intensity of the sunlight and amount of sunscreen used.
Other preventative measures are; wear a shirt, put on a hat (this can also reduce the risk of heat stroke or sun stroke), and wear sunglasses to protect sensitive eyes. It wouldn't hurt to have a significant other give you a check over in places that you can't see, such as your back, for any new spots.
There is so much more to read and learn about this dreaded cancer. Just do what I did and Google melanoma. Hopefully this helps shed a little light on the topic and possibly help prevent at least one geocacher from getting skin cancer. Until then, be safe (wear sunscreen), be happy, keep your distance, wash your hands, and most importantly, have fun. Peace out.
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