Camping @ MindSay

Last night was interesting. Some parts were great; others sucked.

 

Great part #1 I ate s’more (yeah!).

#2 The wind was minimal.

#3 I saw a lot of my closest friends. They are the kind of friends you don’t see all the time but matter the most.

 

Less great part #1 Random people showing up at our campsite, keeping me up till 3:30 AM.

#2 One of my overly dramatic acquaintances being, well, overly dramatic.

#3 Sleeping in my car was probably the worst option for my back.

 

The plus side is that all-in-all the positives out weighed the negatives and I had a great first camping trip for the summer. Now I need to roll up my sleeping bag, bike seven miles to lose the calories I ate last night, and take a shower.

 

I really want to just go back to bed…

You have got to be crazy. I don't know about many of you, but my idea of camping is not about staying in the great outdoors. If there areno hotels in the area, I won't be there. I absolutely detest having to stay in the wilderness. What am I going to do outside with bugs and snakes other than be miserable? I think I was more forgiving of nature and all its quirks when I was a child. Now, "the great outdoors" is something we go out in when we have to in order to do things that need to be done.

Hours spent in packing.

Two solid hours of driving.

Hours spent setting up camp (including a quick trip to a local store for a stand-alone shade canopy because, alas, there were NO TREES at our spot).

And still, my  guys and I found ourselves...ready?

Watching DVDs on a portable DVD player.  Princess Bride. We have good taste.

With unfavorable weather conditions  predicted on Weather.com, we nevertheless went because it was a camping trip with Spousal Unit's Sunday School Class.  We had paid for our spot months in advance.  We really felt we wanted to go.  Have some family togetherness. Have some time out and away.

However, it didn't work that way, really.  Cyclone is antisocial.  Had no interest in being out camping. Kicked himself for forgetting the adapter for his DVD player so he was limited to one movie a day, really, since we had to recharge the battery via the car and we weren't going to do THAT all the time.  He has no interest in hiking or sports, so the usual activities were not appealing.  He did, though, do a lot of reading. :) Of course!

Cartoon Ranger was less than thrilled too, though we tried to allow him to experience different  things. He is a contrary kidlet, and if you say "it's raining" he'll say "I want sunshine" just because it's the opposite.  If it's sunny, he'll say, "I want snow!"  In Florida. In April. Yeah. Not.  He does it on purpose, of course. We do extend great patience as we explain the realities of a situation, try to make jokes about it, but there you go. He will not be reasoned with, on occasion.


The cool thing is that he spoke to people he never met, this weekend. He did so rationally, with appropriate (if you could follow his train of thought as Mom does, lol) contexts and with good manners.  He really did well.  Except when he didn't.   Fortunately, most of the adults from our church's group have met CR and understand that he has limitations, so no one was too weirded out, but the kids didn't quite "get" him. 

It isn't every eight-year-old that understands what to do when you hand a pine cone to him, after all. <smile>

It rained.  Saturday night, it rained.  Fairly good storm.  We got wet.

It rained inside the tent, you see.  We watched it. And, through it all, the boys slept like the proverbials rocks.  Both of 'em. So only Spousal Unit and myself were up, using the dirty laundry to help dam the water on one side of our tent.  Covering the boys with a rainproofed poncho.  Making sure that -- of course! -- the cell phones were not damaged as they recharged.  (We had electrical and an extension cord!) 

The tent, after having served our family for about a decade, had rather deteriorated.  Patched in many places, it still didn't work to keep us weather-safe. So, unlike the Coleman stove, which we've had since before the birth of our firstborn, the tent met the dumpster on intimate terms.

On the way home, I asked Spousal Unit if he -- maybe? -- had fun. He worked the most for this, did almost all the cooking, etc. I had hoped he had had a good time.

No, but he did say it was interesting. 

Sunburnt, exhausted from being up all night to keep the water from the children, and having listened to CR whine for a solid hour before we left the camp site (he wanted to be "clean and dry" when we had just finished with the storm. It wasn't feasible, but he is, remember, contrary...), Spousal Unit was not a happy camper. 

Oddly enough, within an hour of walking in the front door of our house again, he was on the computer, looking for a new tent.

"A bigger one," he said. 

I have to smile.