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July 17, 2006
let's go to camp!
summer camp. did you go? what kind? did you like it?
i ran across some summer camp photos on flickr and had a sudden memory of the family-style meals they served at camp mary atkinson. i remember them being not bad and sort of comforting-- big bowls of mashed potatoes and green beans, big platters of roast beef or whatever.
i have, of course, other memories of camp besides food-- shampooing my hair outside, the time one of my cabin-mates barfed in her bed during the night, causing the cabin to smell weird the next morning. oddly, the smell of the lysol they used to clean up didn't smell much different.
plus of course, "snipe hunts" through the woods, and dim memories of archery classes. oh, and how they'd inject our ears with rubbing alchohol after swimming in the lake. i learned how to tip a canoe over by standing on the edges and rocking it. i can't believe they let us do that.
later i went to horseback riding camp, then young writers' camp. i was a lucky kid. maybe that's why i have no problem asking to be sent to conferences for work.
anyway. tell me about your camp.
Posted by lisa at July 17, 2006 12:22 AM
Comments
I went to girl scout camp. I loved every minute of it and never wanted to go back home.
The "canoe swamping" was actually part of our canoe lessons--you have to know how to handle a swamped canoe in case it ever happens to you.
Posted by: lisa b on July 17, 2006 06:27 AM
Boy Scout camp wasn't very interesting.
I sort of envy kids who got to go for multi-week camps. Then again, I got to spend my days riding my bike, playing with Legos, and digging in the dirt. That was pretty cool, too.
Posted by: Phil on July 17, 2006 09:14 PM
Hated Girl Scout camp, except the night my cousin Tracy had a massive nosebleed and left blood stains all over the floor of the cabin--that must have been fun to explain to the next week's campers.
I worked as a church camp counselor during college summers, along the upper reaches of the Susquehanna River in northern Pennsylvania, canoeing, hiking, braiding little girls' hair all day; got a concussion playing softball there, too.
Posted by: Penny on July 18, 2006 10:11 AM
INJECT your EARS with RUBBING ALCOHOL??? That sounds horrific! Please explain how this was done?
I went to sports camps, usually soccer, but they usually weren't sleep-away camps. My most memorable camp experience was the time I signed up too late and only golf camp was left... most of the other people in it had also ended up there for the same reason, so we were a fairly dejected lot. There was one other girl in it, and on the second to last day, she accidentally hit a boy in the head while teeing off. The boy bled profusely all over our (rather young and cute) golf instructor's impeccable white pants and sweater set as he golf-cart-ambulanced the boy back to the clubhouse for medical attention. She didn't come back the next day, and everyone else delighted in repeatedly asking me, "where's your friend, the bludgeoner?"
Posted by: marie on July 18, 2006 06:05 PM
they'd squirt and eyedropperful of rubbing alcohol into each ear canal of each camper.
it would trickle down into your mouth via the eustachian tube. tasty.
Posted by: lisa on July 18, 2006 09:47 PM
I spent a week at a sleepaway camp for Episcopal kids in the NC mountains the summer after third grade. One night, some of the boys decided to stage a Panty Raid on the girls' cabins -- but when we got there we realized we had absolutely no idea what we were supposed to do. The operation fell apart soon afterward.
Posted by: Jerry on July 20, 2006 10:39 PM
What are you supposed to do in a panty raid? I still don't know.
And if it's Kanuga you're talking about, Grace is there this summer working PR and such (i.e., taking photos, writing stuff, and remembering that she's one of the adults).
Question about the eustachian tubes -- how does the alcohol get past the eardrum to the top of the tube? Is the eardrum semipermeable?
Posted by: Phil on July 20, 2006 11:52 PM
i don't know-- but i would taste the alcohol in my mouth, so i always assumed that was what was happening.
Posted by: lisa on July 20, 2006 11:56 PM
Not Kanuga; it was Camp Henry, in Black Mountain.
I still have no idea what one is supposed to do in a panty raid. Confiscate panties? I only have the panty raid scene from "Revenge of the Nerds" to go on, and somehow I don't think that was a representative example.
That's a good question about the eustachian tubes. Where's an otolaryngologist when you need one?
Posted by: Jerry on July 21, 2006 04:09 PM
ok, so a) your comment won't post right away because i have to approve it first and b) you might get a server error but your comment probably posted anyway and c) previewing doesn't work so i've removed the preview button.