Stopping by Woods on a Sunny Sunday

After the bear party, it was a lovely restful night in preparation for our foray into the wild. Sunday did not dawn with any promise, however. I awoke to the sounds of a peaceful trickling fountain, and thought, "How interesting! I didn't know T's house had such facilities!?"

[Tense change]

She doesn't. The peaceful trickling is WonderDog peeing on my sandals from the night before. He is looking directly at me while he pees, too. I've never seen such a clear case of "vengeance pee" in my life. Either he knows I am taking his mom away for a while or he's thinking I have slighted him in some way. Totally urine-based revenge. They are old sandals anyway...but it's not a good sign. At least my things will smell like enormous-dog-pee. That will scare away bears for sure. (I actually have a long history of dogs peeing on or near me. That will have to wait until another post.)

After a long conversation with Wonder Dog about how I think this betrayal has really undermined our relationship and how I wonder whether I can really ever trust him again (I've known this dog for a long time. I like [LIKED] him better than most people.), T gets home from early morning work and we head out the door.

Camping requires more shopping and packing than any outing I've ever experienced. We have to pack everything we might ever need! This seems inefficient, but I do love how everything collapses down into its own little carrying case. Charming camping gear! T has even gotten me a little sleeping bag of my own. My last sleeping bag had Snoopy on it, so we thought maybe it was time for a "big girl bag."

Now we have to go buy all the food you might ever consider eating. Luckily, T, like me, is a foodie and enjoys yummy things. We got steaks and corn on the cob and good beer and I had baked cookies for the trip. We bought firewood. We bought coolers. We bought ice. This "nature" thing seems a rip-off!

But then we hit the campground. Perfect timing, since the weekenders are just packing up and leaving as we roll in. Let me describe this idyllic place -- it's a campground, for sure, but there are not many sites and they're all spread out throughout this section of the woods that has a creek running through it. You really cannot see anyone nearby, but you know that there are people in case something dreadful happens. This is key, I think, for virginal camping experiences. And, (drum roll), there are BATHROOMS!!! YAY!!! BATHROOMS!!! No wood "business"! (Although I do end up getting a nasty mosquito bite in said bathrooms and that is not fun. Not fun at all. Neither is trying to find said bathrooms after dark and after a few too many cold beers and marshmallows. Urp.)

I'll see whether T has any pix of camping in this place, because they are likely hilarious. I spend the entire rest of the weekend either poking at the fire or setting things on fire or rearranging the fire or seeing whether an item will burn in the fire or fetching wood for the fire. T literally set up a hammock between two trees and read while sending me off on fire-based adventures. I turned into a 7 year old. I uttered things like, "Wow! Chipmunk!" and would then disappear into the woods for half an hour. We saw a fox, too, which was AWESOME. But the fire was super cool. I've seen more deer in the 'burbs, though. We made the steaks (I was a useful companion in only one way -- I suggested that we could wrap some of the bacon for breakfast around the steaks when we made them. They were delicious. Damn, everything tastes good after a hike or after strenuous chipmunk excursions!)

But the best thing about nature -- apart from it being LOUD, as we both noticed at 7 am the next morning after a light rain had whispered us to sleep the night before -- is how it forces you into being incredibly industrious and then makes sure you do nothing. We made camp, we schlepped all kind of crap around, we built structures, we made food, we made FIRE, but then we basically sat around and read (or chased chipmunks and looked for pairs of snakes). No phones, no IPod. I'm not trying to suggest that we roughed it -- I ate better and slept better (thin air mattresses rule) than I have in my own house -- but we had to be still. And talk to each other. And roast marshmallows. These are all key to a healthy lifestyle. So I'll go again. Nature's neat.

So you can see why the camping story turned out to be rather...boring? It was awesome being there, but nothing typically wacky or Megarita happened. Surely this is a good thing, right? And you got to read about the only bears we saw, too. Nice, hmmm? You can't make up this kind of material, people. You just can't. I think I'll get back on the news cycle again and stop blitzing the internet with my personal life. At least until something interesting happens. Circle of life, Simba.