Camping with Fire

From the Lost August Files

For older children, campgrounds are very similar to off-leash areas for dogs.   

In the off leash areas, dogs run, bark, and smell other dog’s private parts until they are muscled back into their SUVs and collapse into a slobbery lump.   

In campgrounds, kids run around, scream, and throw things at each other’s privates until they are wrestled to the picnic table and forced to eat. 

This year we all went to Daroga State Park.  I arrived first with the children, who jumped out to chase things before I got the car in “P”.  I had to carry all the gear to the walk-in campsite. I found a nice riverside campsite, containing a picnic table adorned with sand and seagull poop.   

The tent pad looked suspiciously wet (it hadn’t rained in weeks), and the grass was unusually healthy.  Ignoring the clues, I managed to get the tent spread out, and staked before the sprinklers came on.  

 Nicole and I watched the tent fill with water for a few minutes before I decided to move all of our wet stuff to an area of dead grass.  Meanwhile, the sand and bird poop on the picnic table made a lovely mosaic before dripping off on to the concrete pad. 

When the sprinklers finished watering the poop, sand, concrete, and aluminum picnic table, I poured water out of the tent and mopped up.  I left the tent doors open to air it out, which turned out to be a great idea because Daroga State Park morphs into a wind tunnel for a few hours every afternoon.  I looked for seat belts on the picnic table, while watching our gigantic tent puff up like a bouncy house in a tornado. 

Thankfully, the tent pegs held, and after the wind died down, our tent turned into a shelter for an exciting array of flying insects.  Whilst the mayflies mated on the ceiling, a colony of gnats began creating a civilization on the door screen.  Before they were able to invent irrigation and farming, some creature that looked like a dragon fly with a hormone deficiency flew in and started eating the engineering department. 

Riveting as the bug show was, I needed to take an intermission.  I went in search of a bathroom and apparently moseyed 35 years back in time.  

I found myself in a discussion about wheelbarrows with a lovely man from the 1970’s.  He had cut off jean shorts, classic Converse sneakers without socks, a tank top, large thick framed Woody Allen glasses, and a Paul Simon “Bridge Over Troubled Water” hair style, sideburns and mustache.   

I was shocked out of my 70’s trip by the fee station information board.  Campsites were $14 per night unless you needed to add the yearly park permit, dump station fee, boat ramp fee, additional vehicle fee, shower tokens, breathing fee, and scratching yourself fee.   

Eventually my wife and our friends arrived, and experienced the sprinkler show (replete with fresh seagull poop). After the designated dry time elapsed, Karl and I fired up the stove to cook up some turkey for the chili.   

The stove ignited everything in a two-foot radius with a burst of blue flame.  Luckily I didn’t have a shirt on, and the few chest hairs I once had are not really missed.  After excluding me from the “Must Take Care Of This” list, the flaming roll of paper towels came next. I chose the “Scream and Throw It” method.  Although exciting, it did not extinguish the roll, so I stomped on it.   

Despite the picture of despair I've painted, I can assure you that we had more fun moments than not, which helped counter the lack of sleep, burned food, ruptured disk in my back, sunburn, and other stuff that I’ve chosen to forget.  In fact, we have already booked our site for next summer!   

I’m taking out extra insurance.

Bok Choy Bok Choy Bok Choy

My son and I beat the rush to the restaurant.  It’s a wok place… a wokery if you will. 

You get a little tiny bowl and build a Dr. Suess mound in it with vegetables, noodles and meat. Then you dump the sauces on top of the mound and hand it off to a sweaty guy with a big stick standing next to a round metal table that could catch water on fire.  After he woks it, he scrapes it off the metal table on to a plate and hands it back.   

I know it doesn’t sound appetizing, but it really is good and they have Bok Choy!  I don’t really like Bok Choy, but I love to say it, so I eat it regularly and look for excuses to fit it into conversations.   

For instance, “Last night, when I was eating Bok Choy, I developed a system for training squirrels to harvest elderberries.”   

So, Jay and I, being one of a very few people in line, took our time and created two separate masterpieces of food stuffs, then topped them off with a proprietary blend of sauces from the sauce stand.   

Once perfect, we handed them over to the sweaty guys for a searing.  While I was trying to get out of the way of the sauce stand, a family strolled up and monopolized the counter.  I realized a little too late that the smaller sweaty guy gave my perfect concoction to a short, old guy with a gray ball cap.   

I’m a short, old guy with a blue ball cap.  How could he screw that up?  

The big sweaty guy saw the handoff and yelled over to the gray hat guy who was making tracks for his table. Gray Hat Guy must have been worried about his place at the table, because he moved quickly and ignored Big Sweaty's barks.   

Big Sweaty apologized for the screw up and told me to go back, make another bowl and jump to the front of the line.  That’s just great, except there were now 300 people in line and NONE of them heard the instructions given to me.  

I went back and cut in line, grabbed a bowl and began my creation all over again.  I had to muscle in to the counter a few times to get my bowl built while 256 angry people tried to catch my shirt on fire with their stares.   

A little girl about 4 or 5 inches tall, with ESP was playing a Nintendo and decided to stand exactly where I wanted to squeeze in and take my visual abuse.  When I moved, she moved, but she maintained eye contact with the little video game.  I did a quick bob-weave and lost her when she collided with her mother’s leg.  Her mother apparently blamed me for this, and tried to edge me out of the meat section.  I saw the meat-restocker coming and used his unwritten right-of-way as an opening.  

Next, I reached over a short lady at the sauce stand and grabbed whatever I could reach.  It might have been Terriyaki or it could have been bacon grease, I was moving too quickly to get a good look.   

Finally, I got Big Sweaty’s attention and handed over the bowl.  I felt laser beams eating into the flesh of my left cheek. It was the short lady.   

I rapidly relayed my situation and recited Big Sweaty’s instructions.  For the first time in 2 minutes and 46 seconds, I felt compassion from another human being.   

To his credit, Big Sweaty indeed cooked it up pronto and handed it back. I plopped down in front of my son and looked over at the Gray Cap Guy.  He was eating like a starved coyote.  I knew it was good, but this guy was tucking in and glancing at the others in at the table as if he would stab a chop stick into them if they tried to get his goods.   

My second creation didn’t meet my strict standards (must not have been bacon grease), but it would get me by.  I considered going over to Gray Hat Guy to fish for a compliment, but that would have uncovered his dirty little secret in front of his family....  

In retrospect, it would have given me an opening to say "Bok Choy" a few times.

Crock Pot or Crack Pot

My wife bought ¼ of cow.  

I don’t know which ¼ she bought.  I don’t think I would be impressed by the answer.   

I decided it was time I learned how to use the Crock Pot.  I was assured over and over again (by various well-intentioned women) that the Crock Pot was easy.  

I do easy.  I pulled out the easy recipe that my neighbor gave me, and took an easy roast out of the easy freezer.   

The first instruction was to cut up the roast and remove the fat.  The thing was a block of ice.  I thought about breaking out the chisels and hammer, but decided that my chisels were too expensive to dull on a frozen cow, so I stuck the ice block in the fridge for a couple of days.   

When I broke it out again, there was a big puddle of blood making its way through the fridge.  

 Note to self: the butcher doesn’t use Zip Locks.   

The meat was properly ready for cutting, so I prepared the house and myself for cooking time.  I donned my apron, cranked up some AC/DC, and pulled out all the snacks in the cupboard.   

Next I got out a cutting board, and a big knife.  I pushed the meat around with my big manly knife awhile before deciding to sharpen it.  After a good sharpening, I made quick work of the cow parts, but ended up with a sink full of fat.  I'll have to see if the kids can use it for some arts and crafts project.  

The Crock Pot was on the top shelf in the pantry and I recalled that it weighed a couple hundred pounds, so I put on my ski helmet just in case it was going to give me trouble.   

In went the meat, carrots, celery, and….hmmmm. I couldn’t find the onion or potatoes.   

I called my wife, who reminded me that we already ate the potatoes.  I’m guessing the onion was a figment of my imagination.  She told me to call the neighbor.  I didn’t know that was allowed.  It’s like a “Get Out of Cooking Jail Free” card.  So I called AJ, who told me he used up his potatoes.   

Back to the fridge.  There were plenty of white things that could be replacements for the missing veggies, but I ruled out all of them on the basis that none of them were vegetables.  Then I found radishes.  Radishes are white, like potatoes and onions, AND they grow in the ground.  Win – win!   

In went the radishes. Then I added the spices as directed until I reached “pepper to taste”.  Okay, I’m NOT going to taste raw meat with pepper on it.  Why the heck would they tell you to do that?   

Lastly, I was supposed to pour a can of tomato soup on the whole thing.  In the pantry I found diced tomatoes, tomato sauce, tomato paste, crushed tomatoes… you get the idea.  No tomato soup.   

So, I did what any man would do - I used logic.  Tomato soup is simply two words put together: tomato (I’ve got those!) and soup (I’ve got that too!).  So I added some tomatoes, but decided, just before pouring in the Chicken Noodle, that it might clash with the radishes, so I left it out.   

As I popped on the lid of the easy Crock Pot, I looked at the final instructions on the recipe.  They called for 250 degrees for 5 hours.  There was no “250 degrees for 5 hours” button on my Crock Pot.  I checked… twice.   

I did find a button with three settings – Low, High, and Keep Warm.  I ruled out Keep Warm immediately, reasoning that raw meat which had been kept warm for 5 hours would only taste good to a coyote.  This left a coin toss for High or Low.  My nickel landed on tails... Low it is.   

Finally, for the time.  I hit the little up arrow until 5:00 showed up on the screen.  Nothing happened.  The timer didn’t start counting down. I couldn’t tell if it was on, I couldn’t find a Start button.   

I stood around for at least 2 minutes to see if I had punched in minutes instead of hours or days.  The timer changed to 4:58.  I took this as evidence that it would not cook for 5 days.  

I now have a messy kitchen, the snacks are gone, I don’t know if the food is actually cooking, and even if it does cook, I have a hunch that no one will eat it.  

 Maybe I should have put in the Chicken Noodle. 

Spiderwebville

From the Lost August Files

“It’s called ‘fishing’ not ‘catching’,” my friend reminded me.  

I was marveling at my son’s ability to throw his lure into the water over and over… with no bites… for hours at a time. 

 Watching a dead house-fly is more interesting. It seems to me that it would be more fun to replace the hook with a sparkly shiny thing that randomly explodes. 

Today, I took Jay fishing, and after two hours, he caught nothing and still didn’t want to go home. So, while Jay fished, I decided to walk down the trail, which I had spotted on the road to the lake.  

I found the trail quickly and discovered, within 100 yards, that the trail was actually a lure to trap humans in the woods… much like the type of trick that a scary movie bad guy would pull on a hiker for the purpose of killing him while screeching music plays in the background.   

The best thing to do would have been to turn around and watch Jay fling his hook at the water, so, of course, I continued walking into the thick woods of Fish Lake.   

I encountered no scary movie bad guys and there was no screeching music, but I did find Spiderwebville.  I’m not arachnophobic, but I’m also not a fan of spiders skittering across my clothes and skin looking for orifices.   

While pulling gobs of spider webs off of every square inch of my body, I took a sharp left out of Spiderwebville and ended up in Mosquito Town.   

Mosquito Town was not much better that Spiderwebville, but considerably better than Gnatland, which is the last township I visited.  During all two minutes in Gnatland, I managed to drown a number of gnats with my eyeball wetness and internal nostril moisture.   

They are still in there.  I can feel them. 

I gave up trying to dodge the webs, bugs, and bushes, and crashed back to the main road. I looked like the scary movie bad guy I was trying to avoid.  I was adorned, head to toe, with clumpy spider webs, which contained leaves, twigs, and insect skeletons. 

I removed my hat to clean it off and stood wondering how many living hitchhikers were still on my body.  I imagined a few of them were taking refuge in my underwear, but I decided dropping my pants in the road would end in a very awkward moment for me and the family toodling by in their mini-van.  Instead, I walked back to the pier leaving most of the bugs in Washington behind me. 

On the way back to the dock, I stopped by the Port-A-Potty and found out where all of the remaining insects of Washington were hanging out. I’ll take a wild guess that the majority of the population of the USA would rather relieve themselves on national TV news that lock themselves in that particular Port-A-Potty. 

With my bodily function mission aborted, I went to Jay to tell him we had to go.  I found him on the dock happily zinging a Rooster Tail into the murky water. 

As we were leaving, he picked up a dead trout floating next to the dock.  It had not rotted enough to make it unrecognizable as a trout, but it obviously wasn’t something to put on the grill. 

Jay looked around a bit, studied the fish a bit, then paused as if trying to decide if he should go through with whatever cool idea he had come up with.  A pregnant moment later, he tossed it back into the water for the next young fisherperson to pick up. 

I didn’t ask him what the alternative to tossing the fish away was.  I don’t want to know.  It’s better that way.

Walgreens Relief

 

It was Christmas Card Time.  

I entered the Walgreens with my photo CD and strode to the photo counter. I was prepared to sit at the photo machine until the fellow with the white smock gave me the stink-eye for taking up too much time. 

I inserted the CD and discovered that it was blank. 

I nodded knowingly to Mr. White Smock, and went home.   

The next day, I returned with my new photo CD and once again found the machine open and ready for business.  As I sat down, I had a sudden and urgent call to go to the restroom.   

I spotted the restroom sign and took the shortest route down the feminine hygiene isle. Upon reaching the alcove, I found the clearly marked WOMEN's door, and a mysterious door surrounded by toys with no signage.  It had a fancy pushbutton lock on it because I was in a hurry... and, yes, it was locked.

Keep in mind that this is a small town where not even the gas stations lock their restroom doors.  Walgreens must believe that a bathroom related crime wave is coming to Wenatchee, Washington.  Regardless of this ominous premonition, I still had to pee.  

I knocked on the door.  No answer. 

I heard someone coming out of the women’s room and briefly considered catching it before it closed, but the woman scuttled off so quickly, I didn’t have time to ask her how she thwarted the lock, much less grab the door before it slammed shut.   

I skipped to the Pharmacy and informed the lady behind the counter that I need to use the restroom. 

The response from Mrs. Blue Smock was, “I’ll be right there.”   

At first I thought she didn’t understand me correctly, then I wondered if she was planning to instruct me and needed some preparation time.  It looked as though the latter was true, when she walked around the counter and motioned for me to follow her to the restroom alcove.   

I began to formulate all of the reasons why I was not going to share my restroom experience with her, while she walked to the unmarked door.  She knocked on it, and I said to myself, “I already tried that.”  Then she typed in 0000 ENTER, while making no effort to keep me from seeing the code.   

That action brought up many questions, all of which would delay the emptying of my bladder, so I bit my tongue. 

Then, she held the door open for me.  I walked in fully expecting her to follow me in and begin instructing.  

Much to my relief, I was left alone in the unimpressive, but fully functioning restroom.

I managed to make it back to the photo machine just as another Christmas Carder was walking up to the counter.  Mr. White Smock turned out to be very helpful despite the fact that he was visibly disturbed that I refused to un-click the shadow button on the text.  I honestly think he broke out into a sweat when I didn’t remove the shadow on my Christmas greeting.   

While he was collecting himself behind the counter, I finished up.  The machine informed me that my order would be ready in one hour, which was plenty of time to go outside and share the bathroom code to all distressed looking passers-by. 

'Tis the season!

Monkey Chocolate

It's mid afternoon, and I'm looking for the monkey chocolate… all alone.

Let me back up a bit. This really started when I took over the grocery shopping duty two years ago. The first 10 times I went to the grocery, I read the labels of hundreds of products.  After I decided what was good, I stopped reading labels… including the actual names of the products.   

For example, I once bought a small white container with a tan wave on the label and green lettering on it.  When I bought it, I read the label and ingredients.  When I ate it, I decided it was fabulous.  I buy it all the time now, but I've forgotten what it's called or what's in it besides tofu. My daughter and I refer to it as "the tofu stuff" and usually eat it within 5 minutes of getting home from the grocery store.   

So, let’s fast forward to the mid afternoon at the cereal isle where the monkey chocolate is supposed to be.   

It’s not there.   

I can’t walk up to the guy with the box cutter and name tag and say, “It seems you are out of the monkey chocolate… it’s not chocolate made of monkeys, it’s chocolate with a monkey on it… well, actually, it’s a chimpanzee and chimpanzees aren’t monkeys… I don’t think… they’re not, right? Something about the tails, or rather, they don’t have tails, and monkeys do, which makes them apes maybe?...  Bushes! There’s another chocolate from the same company with bushes on it… or maybe they’re trees, but it’s definitely greenery of some kind, and you’re out of both of them.”   

That kind of crazy-talk would only worsen my already precarious standing in the community.  So, I suck it up and continue shopping without my monkey chocolate until I get to the end of the isle and my cereal isn’t there.   

I can only take so much. 

I find the nearest guy with the box cutter and name tag and say, “Is there any way to check and see if you have any more of my cereal in the back?  You seem to be out of it.” 

He replies promptly, “Sure thing.  Which one is it?”   

The words that come from my mouth start out on the right track, then get derailed by my idiocy, “It’s pumpkin nuts and flax or something or other.  No… well… the flax word is big and pumpkins are in there somewhere but maybe not pumpkin nuts, because pumpkins don’t have nuts, they’re… well, you know, never mind.” 

I had dodged the monkey chocolate bullet only to shoot myself in the foot with pumpkin nuts.   

Much to my relief, Mr. Nametag isn’t even mildly ruffled.  He walks to the end of the cereal isle mumbling something about a green box, and scoots a beige box of Nature Lumps out of the way to reveal my green-boxed cereal! 

I beam and thank him.  He responds by saying, “Anything else I can help you find?”   

The words, “monkey chocolate” are forming in my mouth until my medulla oblongata finally rescues me.

“No thanks, I’ll quit while I’m ahead.” 

Author’s note:  The monkey chocolate did, indeed, return to the shelves (as depicted in the photo) and all is well.  I have decided that the bush chocolate is better though.

Superdad

I am no fool.  I had planned to be digging out the drainage ditch outside for a few hours, so I made a list for each of the children to work on while I was outside.   

This is good parenting.   

I also told them that they were not to interact with each other while doing their chores. 

I was being proactive. Yes, I am one smart cookie. I am dad-tastic. I am Superdad. 

I heard the screaming before I reached the ditch.   

They had attempted to devour the remaining half of my daughter’s birthday cake after confirming that I left the house.  The fundamental flaw in their plan was that they do not share well.  They managed to get the cake unevenly divided and partially eaten before I made it back through the door.   

I’m not amazed by much anymore, but I was amazed that they had managed to eat so much while screaming at each other. I checked that they each had all ten fingers, admonished them appropriately, reminded my daughter not to let her brother do the dividing next time, reminded them of their lists, and departed again.   

Hey, it was a minor setback in a foolproof dad-plan.  I’m still numero uno in dad-land.  I had confidence in my dad-ness.   

In fact, I am such a good dad that I came back to check on them after 30 minutes.

Before I walked up to the house, my cell phone started ringing.  When I answered, the screaming through the phone was slightly delayed from the real-time screaming, which I heard through my other ear as it wafted through the windows.  It was all sort of Pink Floydish, but in a bad way. 

Once inside, I checked for structural damage to the house before being entertained with the stories of woe and abuse each sibling endured from the other.  I gathered from my son that he broke his glasses in half because his sister had only bent them after she threatened to break them, and therefore, the glasses rightly should have been broken so that his sister could get into proper trouble.  From my daughter, I gathered that the breaking of the glasses led to fisticuffs, which led to screaming (because brother hit back).  

I led the children to the counter in the kitchen where the lists were lying unmolested in the sunshine.  I pointed out that the lists did not have “Fight”, “Destroy valuable items”, “Scream at sibling”, “Threaten loved ones”, or “Concoct evil plans” on them.   

The children only blinked at me.   

My son wanted to see a hanging, and was apparently waiting for me to stop jabbering and get on with it.  My daughter expected me to grant her “Unlimited Fingernail Clawing” for being framed, and was also waiting for permission to attack.  

I looked at both of my agitated children and realized what was at the core of the whole mess...

No one told them I was Superdad.  

I spent the rest of the afternoon working with them to finish their lists.    

I figure I can get back to the drainage ditch when they’re in college.