Country Livin'

Today was a theme lunch day, "Down on the Farm" theme lunch day! Which is tied with Illini day as the best theme lunch day ever!!! (And by ever I mean this summer!). Unfortunately, predicting how darned hot it was supposed to be I had to alter a few plans, such as leaving the Wranglers at home...

-Definitely left running about 5 min behind, got 5 minutes toward camp and realized I hadn't taken my medication nor had I brought any ... turning around was a no-brainer. Speed Kills, unless you have Narcolepsy, and then it saves lives. Words to live by right there. Amazingly I was only 10 minutes late ... I still got highlighted for being late in the log book. Irk. I hate being highlighted.

-I thought today we'd have like 4 campers a tribe or something, but when I got there we definitely had a full camp! What parent in their right mind sends their kids to daycamp on a day the National Weather Service sends out a weather advisory for such insane heat... apparently waaaaaay more parents than I thought. By Noon our numbers started dropping swiftly, but still!

-The kids were absolutely dead this morning. I tried serenading them with my famous rendition of "I can love you like that" Jim Boyer style ... but that bombed. Old McDonald had a farm wasn't much better. The kids were barely audible. Although we did find out that horses have a screaming neigh and that Kimbo's favorite boy Preston can quack like a duck farely well. I also tried the infamous Alive, Alert, Awake enthusiastic with them. That worked well.

-It also turns out that these kids are getting pretty insanely good at Simon Says. You can be right in front of them outlining the clearest of instructions and they don't hear a word, yet you put it in the form of Simon Says and the little snots hear whether Simon Says it or not every time! I'm a terrible SIMON apparently!

-We had all camp Pow-Wow to start the day. I had secured a radio for Pow-Wow so that we could jam to some country tunes, but Kim "couldn't find it" and then I saw Megan Tripple's group stole it ... no country jammin' for Jim. *Tear*. We made animal masks for the kids. Securing the masks on the head became more difficult than anticipated. Not so brilliant on my part to discount Kimbo's ideas of making them hold-up masks by using popsicle sticks.

-Had a camper who flat out didn't wanna participate this morning. I tried to get him to play Simon Says and he started balling. He didn't even listen to threats of pulling hte plug on the pool. He siad his stomach hurt. So during P0w-Wow I consult keystaff and call his Dad. Nice Guy. He suggests I make the little guy take a dump, cause sometimes "things get alll clogged up and he doesn't realize it". Wonderful, this kid could be about to spew poo like Mount Vesuvius and wouldn't know it. He takes a dump, says that poo came out and he was feeling a little better. Still wouldn't participate int he craft. Said he didn't like making projects. I let him swim 'cause I didnt want him out in the sun. He's fine the whole time. As soon as we're done and in the locker room, apparently he rushes off to the bathroom where he gets on his knees ready to puke. I usher the other kids out in case he is serious, and 10 seconds later I return to him telling me he's puked. I don't buy it. He says he doesnt feel like it anymore, but his stomach still hurts. The kicker, I asked him what color it was and he replied, "Diorrehea colored". No Joke. I try and get him to tell me the truth about him not really puking, but he stands by his story. Won't eat lunch. I call and leave a message for Dad. Miraculously 10 minutes later his name was called for an early pick-up. The heavens were smiling upon me.

-Pool time wasn't too bad. Chilled with Carley most of it. Good conversation. Many counselors came and went, but we remained, just chillin' ... not moving from our post, just hanging out. Got pretty red on my back/neck apparently, but I haven't seen it yet. Oh well. Oh, and apparently Ken loves Carley, at least that's what undisclosed sources tell us. Funny, he had everyone at camp fooled! Hahaha...

-Kimbo and I chilled with our tribe for about 10 minutes poolside while everyone was else wa sin the locker-rooms. They kicked everyone out of the pool at once. MISTAKE! We suspected how crazy it would be and Aaron C. came out and confirmed the mad-house image I had in my head. We waited out the storm fairly well.

-Late start on lunch, 'cause of Grant. Whether it was all the discussion of puking or the insane humidity I had little appetite. Felt a little nausea. Ick.

-Wore my cowboy hat witha blue bandana around it and my faded gray McLean County 4-H t-shirt all day and for lunch added the old boots and my air conditioned jeans. They have built ventilation in the forms of random large holes and rips, specifically in the knee areas. Their pretty darned sweet. Although even withthe ventilation, added like 10 degrees. All the counselors that wore jeans won the costume judging. Yeah for a second Three Musketeers I left in the fridge. Oh well, I found the first one today, hopefully I remember them both tomorrow.

-Had break next, while Kimbo took the kids to listen to some story-teller. I tried napping, but that was a big no-go. Got lots of bug bites tho. Listened to the counselors have a huge discussion of religion and homosexuality. Very interesting. I didn't interject ever, despite my hankering too ... too many voices already.

-Craft time. Darned Seek and Find was one heckuva SOB today .... wasn't strong enough, had to have someone tell me where some stuff was. Got overheated just doing that today. Had to dump water on myself from my mug like three times. I was sweating up a storm. Way miserable. Waaaaaaaay miserable.

-Popsicle time, which meants that like 6 girl counselors took time to take waaaaaay too many pictures. I rebelled by making fun faces at the camera when I was involved. It was for the good of mankind (in some round about way).

-Video time. Lilo and Stitch. I love that movie! Seriously, almost teared up once, no idea why. I'm going soft. Sadly the movie was ruined because half the dialogue was to most of the campers from the drone of the large fan we had to have on and the constant chatter from all of the counselors. Some of my favorite and best counselors were guilty today of waaaay too much chatter. It was frustrating for the kids and in turn I felt frustration for them. But whatever, it was a good movie.

-Check-out time. Surprisingly this flew by! Played Go Fish .... solid game. Cutest camper in the history of camp played. He has the worst memory ever, he kept forgetting Kelly and my name and he called Jared, Jerry. Sooooo funny! Oh, and he called Aces: A's and Jacks: J's. That was way quality!

-OOOOOH, and I forgot to mention that Friday I met Jared's fiance ... the girl is a fox! He done good, he done real good! Way to be. Haha, rock on y'all!

-Jim-