This One Time, At Church Camp…
Toney was looking at a flyer last week that detailed the large number of summer camps available to kids in our area.
Most, it seemed, were sports-related. Like soccer, golf, cheerleading, scuba diving, equestrian, paintball(!) or whatever other exotic flavor you might prefer.
There were a few designed to build self-esteem, to help dumplin’ children shed weight, a couple for kids with asthma, and on down the line. There were even several generic summer camps, like in the Disney films. You know, boys running around in striped shirts and coonskin caps, a big sing-along campfire at night, bunk beds inside rustic cabins, a little light sodomy…?
One was apparently for kids who are interested in pursuing a career in the CIA or FBI. And how bizarre is that? What do you do at CIA camp, track and kill a Russian national? I simply don’t know.
We’re considering a fancy-pants swimming camp for the older Secret, but it costs a lot of money and there’s a good chance we won’t go through with it. I mean, seriously.
Did you ever go away to summer camp? I did, twice, and didn’t much enjoy it either time.
When I was ten, or so, I was sent to “church camp” at a nearby place called Camp Virgil Tate. I think it only lasted for a week (or was it two?), and probably would’ve been fun if a friend had been there with me. But I had no partner in crime, none whatsoever. I remember feeling alone, ill at ease, and just kinda floating around by myself the whole time.
Here are my main memories of church camp:
There was a large lodge-like building at the top of the main grounds, which was set aside for teenagers. It was where all the action happened, the raucous nerve center of the place. As raucous as a gang of Baptists ever get, anyway.
The younger kids, like me, were assigned bunks inside one of the smaller cabins scattered about. I remember lying in there after lights out, everyone a-fartin’ and a-snickerin’.
There were several ping-pong tables outside our cabin, and I was halfway decent at it, so I played a lot of ping-pong during my stay there.
The food in the dining hall was always excellent. They had a bell outside which they’d ring when breakfast, lunch, or dinner was ready. It was really loud, and could be heard anywhere in the camp.
They served unusual combinations of things, like spaghetti with a side of steamed broccoli. It seemed strange, but was always surprisingly good. Or maybe I was just starving, and would’ve thought a large block of head cheese was delicious? I’m unclear on it.
In the mornings, after breakfast, we had to sit for two hours of religious instruction. I dreaded it, because it was really boring and way too much like school.
Afterward we could swim in the pool, play baseball, or partake of whatever planned activity they happened to be featuring that day. And at night they had a bonfire in the woods, where the teenagers told exceedingly tame “ghost stories.”
It wasn’t bad, but I needed a like-minded hooligan to pal around with. Under different circumstances, I probably would’ve had a blast. Except, you know, for the religious instruction.
Because it’s been more than thirty years, and since nothing too exciting happened, it’s all a bit hazy now. But one episode is still very clear in my mind…
One afternoon the pastor of the church angrily called a meeting with the kids from our cabin. And the meeting was to take place in the bathroom(?!).
Somebody, and I still don’t know who, apparently took a turd in-hand and used it like a stick of chalk. They made a big swooping arc o’ poop on one of the walls, and the Big Cheese was not amused.
He lectured us for a long time, and with great passion, while standing in front of a large fecal rainbow. I had nothing to do with it (I’m capable of a lot of things, but not holding shit in my hands like a Ticonderoga pencil), so I thought it was a riot. It was all I could do not to start laughing.
And the mystery was never solved. Maybe I should’ve done an Encyclopedia Brown-style investigation, and gotten to the bottom of it? The Case of the Excremental Semicircle? Perhaps it would’ve helped pass the time?
In any case, nobody was ever charged with the crime, and there weren’t even any whispered rumors about it. Which was the creepy part… Usually the perp wants “credit” from his peers, and can’t help but tell at least one person. I think we might’ve been dealing with a hardened, serial crap-writer.
So, that was church camp. And a few years later I went to Boy Scout camp, way out in the Hills Have Eyes section of West Virginia. It was also kind of unfun. Here are my main memories of Boy Scout camp:
While driving there, with some other kid and his dad, we stopped at a convenience store for snack items. I bought a Coke, or whatever, and a bag of chips. I remember it was some unknown local brand, but knew those often turn out to be the best chips of all.
And in the bottom of the bag was… a quarter. The coin had been sealed inside, apparently at the factory. Weird, huh? I think somebody needed to tighten-up their QC procedures.
The other kid’s Dad said I should write them a letter, and tell them about it. But I was twelve or thirteen, and had little interest in writing letters to a potato chip company. Have you ever written a manufacturer a letter, about one of their products? Do people really do this? I never have.
Heck, I was excited about it. Twenty-five cents in those days was a good hunk of change. The bag of chips itself had probably cost less. I profited on the deal!
At the camp we were required to use sleeping bags, inside tiny pup tents. Basically sleeping on the ground, with only a thin sheet of fabric between us and the saber-toothed tigers, or whatever. I’m not really a fan.
And for dinner one night we weren’t allowed to go to the dining room, we had to prepare our own meals.
We had to peel and cut-up one carrot and potato each, and mix it into raw hamburger. Then we were told to slice an orange in half, and carefully remove the insides, without splitting the skin. So, we were left with two empty bowls, into which the burger/potato/carrot conglomeration was packed.
The hamburger was an orange-sized ball, and when the two halves of the peel were placed back together, you had yourself a heavy-ass gob of grossness. And this went directly into the fire.
Yeah, it was horrible. Half the meat wasn’t cooked, no matter how many times we turned our dinner-balls with a stick. And the vegetables were still hard as a bullet at the end. It was nasty-ass, and I could hear all the lucky kids eating something decent, down the way at the dining room.
It was a demoralizing turn of events.
During the days we were required to rotate through a series of activities. One day we’d spend our time shooting arrows with a bow, and the next we’d paddle a canoe to nowhere in particular, for hours on end.
My favorite activity, by far, was target shooting with a .22 caliber rifle. Somehow I was really good at it, and got addicted. After we cycled through the whole list of activities, we were allowed to revisit our favorite, and I made a beeline for the guns again.
But overall, it was an exhausting week, with bad food and nights spent “sleeping” with a rock pressed against my liver. Again: not really a fan.
So, those are my experiences with summer camps. What about you? Did you ever go to one? Did you actually have fun? Tell us about it, if you did. Use the comments link below.
And I’ll see ya next time.
Filed under: Daily
Holy shit am I first?
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First?
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Dang it.
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Yeh, you are first. We need to get some consistent schedule for these updates. It used to be 10 am every morning when you’d be snickering at your desk. Now it is 2:30 or 3:30 pm or in the middle of the night. I’m close to asking for my money back.
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Where’s everyone at?
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Keep up the excellent work, Jeff!
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I once walked into a McDonald’s bathroom one time and on the wall, written in shit, was the word TURD with a shit arrow pointing down at a turd wrapped in a paper towel. I laughed like a moron, and the employee that walked in behind me looked at me like I did it. I just left, rather than be accused as the TURD culprit.
As the door swung behind me, he was repeating over and over “OH MAN! FUCK!”
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I’m number EIGHT!!!
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Top ten? From someone who rarely comments….
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Tenth!
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The times are getting stranger, but I like these updates at random times. It’s like a present for me sometimes.
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Summer Camp? Who am I? Little Lord Fontleroy?
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My wife was raised by an honest-to-god Baptist minister. She went to vacation Bible school every year. Thank god she turned to atheism. And her dad later left the church too! Still religious, he is, but a good man.
I’d have fucking killed myself at vacation bible school.
Joe
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Hello all –
I went to a camp for a week (mebbee 2?) in Romney West by God in the summer of 77. I can’t remember the name of it and it may not even exist anymore. (anyone know the camp I speak of?) Anyway, me and two friends were sent by GREYHOUND BUS from DC to the camp, which is a good thing for 12/13 year olds to do. Think you could get away with that these days. It was a religious camp i think, at least that’s what is lodged in the repressed memory section of Dave’s Brain. I remember decent food, somehow winning a swimming competition, lots of singing to God, and campfires. And group showers, which is always nice for the fat unathletic kid. Curling up in the corner and crying now. Thanks for the memories Jeff.
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“I once walked into a McDonald’s bathroom one time and on the wall, written in shit, was the word TURD with a shit arrow pointing down at a turd wrapped in a paper towel. I laughed like a moron, and the employee that walked in behind me looked at me like I did it. I just left, rather than be accused as the TURD culprit.”
Dude, that’s awesome! My dad and I once were driving through town after a major snowstorm. On a hill in the middle of a big field, some kids had used their boots to write the word “DIARRHEA” in the snow. Shit, I can’t stop laughing, even 25 years later. They even spelled it correctly!
Joe
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What you are talking about, Jeff, is a “hobo dinner”. I did the Girl Scout camp thing as a youngling. It can actually be kind of good, but then I think mine was pretty much cooked.
Yeah, I remember camp. I hated it. My parents sent me to a fancy-ass arts camp where we practiced our “craft” all day. Mine was acting (read – no real talent there but parents wanted to send me). It sucked. A lot of rich kids from out East talking about “mummy” and their nannies… yep – square peg in a round hole I was. It was miserable.
Last year my eldest was all keen to attend Girl Scout camp and I just didn’t have it in me to send her. She will probably love it though, because she has the whole cheerleader persona down at age eight.
I will let her go next year.
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And… the further evidence camera has made me swear off men forever. (Shivers). Ick!!
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I went to Boy Scout camp may times. 4 or 5 years at least. I enjoyed the hell out of it but I’m an outdoors type person. Did all of the activities like archery, rifle shooting, fieldcraft skills, swimming, hiking, boating, canoeing, model rocketry, astronomy and lots of general fucking around. Did the whole “Order Of The Arrow” thing and played half assed injun with requisite secret oddball hazing rituals.
We didn’t have cabins. There were cabins and lodges but they were used for camp staff. We had old army wall tents with two cots and a pallet between them with enough room left for a footlocker. Food was in the mess hall and was quite good and they also had a trading post where you could buy candy, soft drinks, hot dogs, pizza and other crap.
Hell of a lot of fun.
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I went to church camp once and I remember riding a bus to get there. I was raised Southern Baptist. On the way to the camp and back, I remember singing “100 bottles of Coke on the Wall” (God forbid we should mention alcohol). And then I went to Girl Scout Camp one year. Both camps SUCKED. The food was horrible. Oh, and I also remember at the church camp one, they had campfires at night and there’d be singing. Usually, “Kumbaya” (no shit) with hand signals and everything. It was kind of like the Happy Hands Club on Napoleon Dynamite.
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I went to church camp once or twice. The first camp was Baptist. We were roused at 5.30 am for exercises (outside, in a field, in MAINE). This lasted for about 30 minutes. Then breakfast, Bible, crafts…I think I lasted three days.
I was shipped to PENTECOSTAL camp at age 13 or so. Being a tomboy, I was generally accused of being a lesbian because I preferred jeans over dresses (the horror!), hated hair curling and makeup (blasphemy!) and color coordinated chucks with all of the (forced) dresses.
My kid has been nominated to go to some leadership/smart kid camp next summer. One of the classes? Learn to be a CSI! They may as well call it “How to get away with murder”. The camp costs about 2 grand, so she won’t be going. It’d be cheaper to ship her up to Northern Maine to stay with family for the summer. She’d probably have more fun,too.
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I spent a lot of time camping with the Scouts, usually for a weekend, but once out in Banff Alberta for two weeks. I also went here: http://www.campqueenelizabeth.ca/ for two weeks as a kid, which was awesome, and I highly recommend it. The thing I remember most is the sacrifice my mom had to make to send me. It cost at least $500 back in ‘79, which was a hell of a lot of money for a single parent.
My worst experience was two weeks at “Bible Camp”. This was a day camp affair, so I could escape the insanity every night and go home, but I hated the experience. Even as a kid I never took to religion: it just never made sense. Needless to say the folks running the place did not react well when a seven year old questioned their metaphysics and called bullshit on their belief system. I’ve since learned to smile and nod politely whenever the topic comes up.
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I loved the hell out of summer camp. I went every year–and usually was the BMOC….I was from the country and was a redneck–so none of it really seemed out of the norm for me. I was superior at everything we did–shooting, swimming, canoing, building fires…It was truly my element.
I used to love to fuck with the city kids who would decide they were going to “get back to nature” for a week or had their parents send them there for “a new experience” oh yeah–they got that. Especially that spoiled prick from Atlanta who used to sleep with his clothes on. I put a black snake in his sleeping bed one night and I think he actually shit himself.
I recall seeing my first naked woman there. We reconnned to a ridgetop, climbed a tree to the right angle, and got a straight look through a separation between the roof and wall of the girl’s shower. I was probably 11 or 12……the girls were 16 or 17…..good times.
However, my most vivid memory happened in our cabin. Boys and girls cabins were on opposite ends of the property–and we were never allowed at the opposite sex area. Each cabin group became a gang of hooligans by day 2 and we all hung together. Upon a return from the dining hall one night after some kind of gathering, it was dark and we were on our own…since our “counselor” or whatever you called him left the function early without explanation. We assumed he “wasn’t feeling well.” We walked into the cabin, flipped on the lights and caught him laying pipe to one of the 17-year old female campers in his bunk.
We never saw him again–and the camp director came to our cabin to have a long discussion about “Camper counselor relations.” Oh there were relations alright!!!
Buck Out
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Went to Boy Scout camp every summer for a while and really enjoyed it.
One year, I took the BSA Lifesaving course, which would entitle me to a certificate and a big-assed Life Saving badge to be sewn on my uniform. This course was the Marine Boot Camp of courses and was about 10-times more intense than acquiring a regular merit badge. The instructor was an ex-Navy diver who was about 6′ 4″ and 250 lbs. He told us on the very first day that our final test on the very last day would be comprised of us jumping off the dock and swimming out about 50 yards to “rescue” him. He advised us that he would be feigning unconsciousness and that he might “wake up” during the rescue and his behavior would be “unpredictable”.
Holy crap.
Anyway, we get to the final exam and the first kid jumps in to “save” the instructor, who is floating face down on the surface as if he were unconscious, occasionally tilting his head slightly to the side to breathe. As the guinnea pig arrives on the “drowning victim” scene and cross-grabs the victim’s wrist, the instructor “wakes up” and goes absolutely ape-shit on the kid. Foamy water is pluming about 4 feet in the air and the scene looks like a shark attack, with random limbs jutting out of the big furry ball of churning water. The kid is literally fighting for his life, which is the point of the entire exercise. Anyway, the kid ends up having to be dragged back to the dock by the instructor, coughing and sputtering and gargling lake water while gasping for air.
At this point, about 10 of the 20 kids in the course go wide-eyed and start to go into a nervous convulsion, and turn tail and run, in full-blown “fuck it!” mode.
I, along with the others, stayed behind and went through with it. When it was my turn and I found myself upside down under the water wrapped up by the Terminator, I commenced to kicking at his balls wildly. He managed to avoid a direct hit but had to let me go to do it. I grabbed him around the neck and he allowed me to swim him in to the dock.
I never had my mother sew the badge on my uniform because I didn’t want to have to answer questions about the course and what the instructor did because I didn’t want him to get into trouble. It was the toughest thing I’d ever had to go through because of the sheer terror aspect but those of us that did it brought home a special appreciation of what we accomplished.
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Camp? Yeahhh. No.
My dad was one of those overpaid auto workers that 2/3 of the counrty seems to really hate now.
He’d take on a luxury vacation to a state campground in Northerner Michigan every year. We slept in tents, cooked on the coleman stove or the campfire and pumped water from the well. There were no other “facilities”.
We’d fish or shoot BB guns all day and at the end of the week Big Lou would go back to working Midnights without a day off for another year.
What a lazy, overpaid, underworked, overprivlaged auto woker, eh?
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Being from WV, those are the only kinds of camps I can comprehend. I don’t recall ever knowing anyone that went to any sort of camp but those two.
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oh– I think they teach waterboarding at the CIA camp.
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Perhaps we should create a WVSR Camp. That would be fun–what should the activities, food, and them be? This should generate a hurtful comment or two.
For starters…there would be at least 100 microbrews on tap in the messhall.
Buck Out
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I went to a church retreat for 3 days when I was 14. I could write a book about some of the things we did and what went on that weekend. One clear memory is of my best friend at the time having a fascination with fire. The minister that was with us was constantly telling him to stop playing with the candle centerpieces on the dinner tables. This went on for the first 2 1/2 days at breakfast, lunch and dinner. At our last dinner my friend caught the bread basket on fire (it had paper towels in the bottom of it). Next thing I see is the minister coming across the table and ripping the basket out of my friend’s hands. The paper towels fall out and we put out the fire by pouring water on it. I then see the minister beating the hell out of my friend with the bread basket for what seemed like a full minute. He just lost it. What made it so funny was the fact that it was so out of character for our minister. One of the most bizarre and funniest ass things I’ve ever witnessed.
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Buck – that’s a great idea!
activities list:
watching tv while drinking beer
dicking around on the computer while drinking beer
target shooting translucent targets
falling asleep on the couch while drinking beer
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I’m with Buck on this one; being a redneck does have it’s advantages at times. I took a Crossman air postol wrapped up in my sleeping bag and by God I had Sqwak fer dinner the first night at camp.
To an 11 year old there ain’t nothing better than roasted tree-rat on a stick while the other kids suffered with their hobo-whatever.
We now have adult camp once a year at Camp Muffly in Morgantown. The WV Wine & Jazz fest in September, it is a hoot. I work the boof/tent of the Fisher Ridge Wine Company while getting awesome pics and video of hot college girls, middle-agers trying to be young & hip and of course, projectile vomiting.
An absolute must-see good time.
My fondest memory is the lady with the blue, dripping checkbook staggering out of a porta-john. I thought I would die from the laughter.
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Camp with Buck and Jason? I don’t know what with the venison autopsy and the squid baths and all.
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WVSR BEER CAMP
Beer Brewing Classes
Beer Appreciation Classes
Arts And Crafts, making beer mugs and pint glasses
Cooking with beer classes
Home Kegging and bottling techniques
Hooliganism for grownups 101
sign me up
T
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The foil-wrapped ‘burger-n-tater meal you prepared at the Buckskin Council of BSA camp at Dilley’s Mill in Pocahontas County is called a Silver Turtle. In my experience, it was the best meal of the week. The sausages we had every morning were referred to as “lawn mower tires” by the campers and attending adults. When I attended 4-H camp as a 13-year-old, I packed my duffel with $10 worth of junk food and Cokes that I resold for $50. Good times!
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Yeah, I went to boy scout camp with everyone else – not bad.
But for a couple of years my skater (in-line) son went here:
http://www.campwoodward.com/wweast/home.html
Extra fun AND very dangerous – compound fractures in Amish country. You might think about this for the oldest secret if he is into this kind of thing.
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I also once did the Boy Scout camp (as a Cub Scout), and enjoyed the same things: rifles, bonfires, bug juice, boats, bows, arrows, fart jokes, the ropes course.
The culminating event was some kind of group versus group treasure hunt or capture the flag thing where we basically ran around the woods in the dark scaring each other by saying we saw the legendary ghost of the camper who was decapitated by lightning while standing at the end of the boat dock in a thunder storm.
Did every camp come with one of those?
The only downside I remember: the bathroom stalls had no doors, so I would wait a day or two until we were doing an activity near camp headquarters and poop in their warm, private privy.
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I work in the product development department of a medical device manufacturer… you’d be SHOCKED at the amount of letters we get from people, and also some of their ridiculous suggestions.
But… one time as a kid, 11 or 12, I got sunburned really super bad. One night i was brushing my teeth and somehow got toothpaste on my burnt shoulder and it felt really soothing, so i rubbed toothpaste all over my burns and my mom made me write a letter to Procter and Gamble about it. My letter said something like “you should put your toothpaste in a different bottle and call it Sunburn Relief”. They sent me some coupons or something in return. I’ve never written one of those letters in my adulthood though… I’m no longer an innocent child that believes that people give a shit.
Went to a 3 week long Girl Scout Camp when i was 15 or so, called “Counselor in Training”, I learned a few things about decency while I was there… apparently, people dont like it when you shave your legs over the giant salad bowl. Also, it’s unethical to bring your clothes in a suitcase?? I was ridiculed for not using a duffle bag or a bucket for my luggage. Who knew? Nothing spectacularly good or bad to report back, I was lucky and had my sister and a friend there, too. I imagine I would have HATED it without them. We used to gang up and prank the other girls… put saran wrap on the toilet so when someone pees, it just runs down the sides, open the shower head and put kool-aid powder inside, so when someone took a shower they turned red or blue – and got a hilarious scare. One girl brought a curling iron and hairspray to camp (this is ok and a suitcase isn’t??) so, we dumped her hairspray and filled it with water, she’d get her bangs all curled up just right, and then unknowingly douse them in water. good times, good times.
Come to think of it, camp was pretty fun… I’m going to try the saran wrap trick on the toilet here at the office…
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Brandy – here’s another good one. Take the little ketchup packets and fold them over, forcing all the ketchup to one end, then tape it like that. Put a tiny pinprick hole at the fat end (you could maybe use a thumbtack if you’re at an office, but carefully). Then, put the little packets under those knobs on the top toilet seat with the holepoked side facing inward and upward. Next female co-worker to sit down gets a blast of ketchup to the hoo-ha.
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They should’ve got the kids from the FBI camp to investigate who did the poo-poo Pollock on the bathroom wall…
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Look what the mailman just brought me:
http://thewvsr.com/index.php/look-what-the-mailman-just-brought-me/
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My first summer camp was at the Lake Lavon Baptist Encampment (http://www.lakelavoncamp.com/). I think I went a few times and it seems to have been more like your Scout camp than your church camp. It wasn’t a big deal really… it was just on the other side of the lake that was down the road from my house. I remember sleeping on the top bunk and falling off several times because I wasn’t used to sleeping in a twin bed and not being able to flop around. I also remember accidentally ripping someone’s sleeping bag and feeling a bit douchey because of it.
That was the first in a long series of church-related camps and summer activities that ranged from “camping” to building homes for people who should have gotten jobs so they could pay people to build homes to being sent to Russia to work in an orphanage so I would appreciate all the shit I had. There were usually one or two of these trips each summer…
The other annual camp was Camp Meemaw… which was basically making the trek from my parents’ home in Plano to my grandparents’ home in Highland Park to lounge around a different pool for a month and hang out with all my cousins whose parents didn’t want to deal with them for the whole summer. That was my favorite camp… Meemaw even made up camp t-shirts and my cousins and I got to spend time together since we were scattered all around. There were generally several Six Flags trips thrown in there as well… so that was always fun. Sure do miss Meemaw.
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Wow Jeff, you can get Makers Mark through the mail?
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I got anal warts at summer camp.
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Our church camp is located near a military training ground. I didn’t know this… one morning in chapel some F16s screamed over our church at about 100 feet above tree level.
Just as the din from the planes had died enough, I let out a “Holy Shit!”… loud.
I still have friends remind me of the story, 20 years later.
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I was kicked out of the last summer camp I went to. They were very rude. “Sir, this is a camp for cheerleaders, which you’re not. We also require that you wear more than a coin changer, baby oil, and a pair of coconut tits. You’re scaring the girls. And you’re, what, 30 years old? Get outta here, pervert.”
Rude, rude, rude.
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What assholes… Jason, you should write a letter.
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Goocher. As I read this iTunes played Butch Walker. It’s a sign for sure- I’m going to the track.
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I got kicked out of camp too… apparently the girl scouts frown upon drinking brandy at their camps.
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I went to a camp in the winter, It was called Air Force Basic Training and they teach you to ,,,,,,,,,,uh,,,,,,,,,,,kill people. Good Times!
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You’re right Adam. That reminds me. I recently wrote a letter to the makers of “Zicam”. The swabs were coming apart in the little tube, it was like sticking a straw in your nose. A lady called me a few days later and sent me a package of tablets and swabs for my trouble. She was very nice. She even agreed to send it to “exalted ruler” rather than my real name. I make my kids call me “exalted ruler” instead of just “dad”, makes them respect me more, I think. That and the taser.
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Brandy, you can’t just tease us with a bit about wierd suggestions and then disappear.
I, for one, would really like to hear more.
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I agree whore-hay. Tell us more, Brandy.
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I went to Boy Scout camp a couple of times as a kid. I hated it.
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I love the idea of Surf Report camp. One activity could be: “Practicing a Lack of Enthusiasm.”
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Funny Jason… I work with one of the Lacy’s (that’s evidently supposed to mean something in Waco) and he goes by Ogo with his grandkids… stands for “Oh, Great One!”
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Oh boy, it’s not Friday until someone says “blast of ketchup to the hoo-ha”. Thank you!
And RE: Jeff’s delivery photo: was it this comments section where someone once said they had eaten supper at Donnie Iris’ house? Or did I dream that?
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I got kicked out of the boy scouts for eating brownies.
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~~J Shifty….
I had mentioned last week that I was drinking with Donnie Iris at a local bar a few weeks prior.
Oh, wait…….
Good Afternoon Surf Reporters!!!!!!!!
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I wrote a letter to a company once.
I woke up early one THanksgiving morning to get the turkey ready and discovered it hadn’t been de-gutted…. I was very hung over and it wasn’t a pleasant experience. I wrote a very discriptive letter to the tukey place and they sent me 3 vouchers for free 20 lb turkeys!
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JCIII,
Good afternoon to you, sir. I must know what you meant by your comment the other day, it involved cobb salad. I googled “cobb salad porn” and came up with nothing. Is that some kind of code? I guess I’m not one of the cool kids.
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Jeff…Nice collection of CD’s. I see you went with The Clash…London Calling. I wore that record out when I was teen, along with the Sex Pistols (Flogging a Dead Horse)…
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Jeff– I have the same crock pot!
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it’s really not as interesting as you’d think…
we make blood pressure monitors so the consumer base is roughly a hundred years old. Mostly they want blood pressure monitors that talk to them, special contraptions that hold their arm in the correct position, the ability to get weather updates along with their blood pressure reading… that sort of thing.
we did get a letter once from some guy that demanded we call him Exalted Leader, asking for a nurse to be sent to his home to personally administer the tests.
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by the way… just got an angry letter yesterday from a woman that bought one of our thermometers and was disappointed to find that it wasn’t intended for rectal use.
do people really use thermometers rectally still? As advanced as technology has gotten, we can tell someone’s temperature with infrared light, without even touching their body, let alone entering their back door.
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Brandy,
I prefer anal thermometers. Also, I like the girls that administer them to be dressed as smurfs. But, whatever, enough about me. I’m glad to see you again, missed you. And I think I’ve used up my posting quota, or almost. So bye bye.
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I have the same crock pot too!
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No WVSR camp would be complete without a tutorial on ‘power farting through thick upholstery.’
Hey Jeff – you tried Knob Creek whiskey-likker yet? Best stuff around, IMHO. Even beats Maker’s Mark. Since you’re drinking the good stuff and all…
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How can you tell an oral thernometer from a rectal one?
- the taste
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Don’t even think about bringing me into this conversation.
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Jeff for god’s sake whenever a Minister/Preist call’s young boys together for a meeting in a bathroom RUN LIKE HELL!!!!
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wise words, pagan. Wise words.
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Jason i read why you were kicked out of summer camp an hour ago & I still can’t stop laughing! Don’t you just hate rude people!
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Brandy, My sis is a nurse at a rural clinic with a lot of seniors, she loves the story of the old guy who came in with chronic constipation, they prescribed him a series of Suppositories to help his condition. A week later sis was doing a home visit & asked how the medicine had worked? “Well nurse” the old man said “for all the good they did me I might just as well have shoved them up my Ass!”
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Thank you for the confirmation, JCIII. I thought for a little while there I may have finally killed the queen brain cell.
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~J Shifty… no problem, glad it wasn’t your brain
~Jason… “Cobb salad” was in reference to yesterday’s “Thursday Theme”… steer all conversations toward Cobb salad
I’m on my third beer at this point( ahhhh…Stella) and I have a sixer left. Yep, tomorrow I may just go into work looking and feeling my best
but at this point, I am really not caring
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Bussed off every morning for three weeks one summer for my indoctrination into who know who’s religion. Why my sister didn’t have to go started me thinking I must have demons that need to be chased out of me so I could get on with being normal. I sure hope it didn’t cost the folks much for that crap. There are a few things I remember about my training. One peanut butter and jelly sandwich in a brown bag was what I was sent off with for the entire day. The trainers furnished one small carton of milk for each troubled soul. I thought the whole thing had to do with self denial but then again, I did get jelly. The other thing is that there was a big long display case. Empty except for an absolutly huge horseshoe crab. Huge! I had no idea what that thing was let alone what was it doing in southern Ohio. And lastly…I hadn’t started wearing glasses yet and couldn’t see the blackboard that I’m sure was full of holy stuff, so I just stared off and picked the skin off my sunburned nose and ears.
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I went to A Y camp when i was a kid we had a good time for the first half, then our cabin counselor got canned for shooting heroin. we got to stay in the camp directors cabin after that and to make sure we reported nothing but good trhings back got to do whatever we wanted. I know drugs are bad, but heroin made that summer great!
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“He lectured us for a long time, and with great passion, while standing in front of a large fecal rainbow. ”
awesome
dey got dem “church schools” in Pakistan
dey’s called madrassas
NOT much different
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Jeff, I totally agree with you on the whole CVT experience. I was a band geek in high school and all four years I was in band we always went to CVT for a week of band camp (and the stories from band camp are true!). The bell wasnt rung for us, but the food in the mess hall was always some of the best food that I ever had that was produced in a MASSIVE quantities. Also you are right about the weird combinations of food, but it was good though.
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Holy hell! I haven’t thought about Camp Virgil Tate in forever!!!
I didn’t go to camp there (even though I am a Southern Baptist), but I used to get dragged there by Grandma and Grandpa with their Good Sam’s Samaratin’s) camping club.
Me and my younger brother camping with thirty seventy year olds. It had to be the absolute shittiest way to spend a summer weekend. Thanks for the memory…
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Summer Camp? You must all read “I Want to go Home” by Gordon Korman. Rudy will teach you all the truth about camp!! (Seriously, check this shit out…my absolute highest recomendation…)
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Maybe I should’ve done an Encyclopedia Brown-style investigation, and gotten to the bottom of it?
So seriously, is it just the 12 year old in me that found this funnier than it was probably meant to be?
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Vacation bible school every summer – those were day ‘camps’
A few summer away bible school retreats
and every summer thru high school, a week away for band camp. One year, the prettiest, fairest-skinned, redhead got a serious case of sun poisoning ever! Her forehead was swollen out to here. She looked like an alien from Star Trek. I don’t think anyone let her look in a mirror or she was just delirious, because her expression was just dazed, floaty, and happy that she was getting to go home.
I’ve never seen shit-glyphs firsthand but I’ve heard of them. I’ve heard of them too many times and it makes me uneasy.
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SkullyWV – wear your Smoking Fish shirt to the Wine Festival @Camp Muffly in ’09 and I’ll look for ya
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Several camp experiences…… First was Boy Scout camp, of which I was asked NOT to attend the next year. Seems I got mixedup with the “wrong crowd”, something about beer and left handed luckies…..
The there were the 2 weeks every summer at Carbide Camps for 6 years… That was actually pretty cool….
Kristin, a correction…. target shooting translucent targets “while drinking beer” gunpowder and alcohol do mix! Right Buck ?
Hey Jerry I went to the same camp, except I was there in the fall. Seems as if the curriculum was the same year round!
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Opppppppssss Happy Pearl Harbor Day!
Brought to you by those nice people that bring you Toyota…….
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Since It’s quiet…re: Further Evidence
Santa 2….drunk
Santa 4….drunker
Santa 5….Colonel Sanders
Santa 6…”Santa just farted…..RUN!!!
Santa 7….he started it
Santa 8….pedophile
Santa 9….way, way too creepy
Santa 10…really drunk and nodding off
Santa11…super hungover
Santa 13…in the witness protection program
Santa 17…”this will shut him up”
Santa 20…gay
Santa 23…probably the real deal
Others?…maybe?
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RE WVSR ‘Camp’…
Day 1)…We show up. (accomplishment #1)
Wear name tags with numbers only. We’re given a print out of attendees with their assigned number and we write next to the number who we think the number is. Day one will continue with food, beverage and laziness. Festivities begin at six in the main banquet room. Food, music etc. Like a really big blow-out wedding reception but without the relatives.
Day 2)…We’ve all been 86′d from the bar, the banquet room is in lockdown and we’ve all been asked to leave the hotel by 1pm. We’ll never know what anybody looks like.
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Never got to do the camp thing. Sent secret number one to Girl Scout Camp and she loved it.
My “camping” experiences were more along the lines of Jorge’s…and looking back on it, it sure does give a guy a much bigger appreciation for one’s father! Gotta run. Have to call my Dad and tell him how much I appreciate his working his butt off every day, PLUS finding time to do stuff with me and my sibs!
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My parents were either too cheap or too benevolent to send me to camp. I’m Catholic, and there was a Catholic boys camp in WV called Camp Don Bosco, for boys only. Never went. Now, or course, it’s a boys and girls camp, with a new name, near the WV ski lodges (and a prison). Once in college, we had a nutball who went a little freaky in the dorm. One Saturday night, he smeared crap all over the walls on our dorm floor. And he didn’t even drink. Just flipped out. He was gone the next day. Never saw him again.
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The Catholic camp is now called Camp Tygart……..
Speaking of the church…. anyone read about the Priest and his drug counselor buddy that were busted for smoking pot in South Charleston ?
Between the 2 of them they had almost 3/4 lb!
They got off with less than a 300.00 fine each including sourt costs……..and were given 180 days to pay up.
If that would have been us we would have been put “under the jail”
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Woohoo! 91st!!! I think that’s a record, even for me.
Um, no summer camp here.
Five kids + Catholic school + one income = no money for such frivolities
Oh, I wanted to go, but it was never to be. I don’t know anybody who ever went to camp, though, so I thought it was just in movies and books that kids went to camp.
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I must agree that under normal circumstances, the mixing of gunpowder and booze is a recipe for something terrible. However, given it’s the WVSR camp—the term “anything goes” comes to mind.
Buck
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I went to all kinds of summer camps.
Girl Scout camp sucked…sleeping in a tent in the woods with a bunch of cry-baby bitches…and I came home with a tick…in my belly button. Took the emergency room 3 hours to get that sucker out.
I was subjected to the worst camp of all, Gymnastics camp, every year from age 7 to 14. 2 weeks in the heat of summer at some podunk college campus in Massachusetts with 500 other young gymnasts sweating your ass off trying to learn new skills. There was no bonfire, no singalongs, no midnight run around looking for boys, no good fattening mess hall food…we had nutritionists, coaches, fitness trainers, instructors and classes, 8pm curfews and not a boy in sight.
I did years and years of church camp. It was fun, but I was also one of those “bad kids”…the ones who have to be watched out for.
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Many various different camps over the years. 4H and church camp mostly. I got my first period at church camp. I was freaked out. I don’t think that should happen to anybody when they are in a Catholic Church Camp. Shudder. Shudder. I remember not leaving my sleeping bag for 2 days. I think my mom finally came and picked me up.
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Sorry. TMI.
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Yea, the priest got off easy with the law, but the bishop fired his ass.
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I can’t write today. I don’t know why, but it ain’t happening. Sorry. I’ll try it again later.
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just think crazy thoughts – that always helps me …
speaking of which – Awww… summer camp. Being from West-by-Gawd, I thought it was a requirement. I loved going to Baptist camp – first titties I ever touched were at Baptist camp … up in the hills behind the campfire site … ah – found memories.
Boy Scout camp was a riot – especially since there were a bunch of 4H-ers camping across the lake … and well – what can i say? MORE TITTIES!
sorry- i kinda have a thing for boobs
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Hey Jeff– I understand.
I am kind of overloading on getting my Christmas cards OUT. My tongue tastes funny.
The Tree goes up on Snext Saturday and somehow I have to find the time to paint the bathroom –the tile guy just finished in there-before our guests arrive. I guess they should just be happy with clean sheets and maybe towels.
And I haven’t done any christmas shopping. I have an Amazon tradition to carry out. Anyone know if Arianna Huffington’s Blogging book is any good?
OK. This is just becoming a list of stuff I have to get done. Sigh.
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And I am extremely disoriented by the time on the Comments. Maybe its just the card glue…
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I could have used some update today, but what are you going to do.
So here’s an update from me.
I officially quit my job today; turned in my letter of resignation and my 2 weeks notice.
Holy crap.
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Well… I officially gorged myself on shrimp and catfish today at lunch… I’m now power-farting through a leather chair – far more difficult than your typical upholstery.
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Jorge – here’s hoping you aren’t storming off in a huff to the unemployment office and have something much better lined up!
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Jorge is headed back to school… if I recall… that’s definitely better than the unemployment line. Best of luck!
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Spiffy, nope. I’m leave “on spec” in a state that may soon have to be sold to Canada in order to maintain solvency.
Actually Adam is right. It’s back to school. I figure if Dangerfield could do it what the hell, right?
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…. and here I thought I was going to be late.
Good Evening Surf Reporters……..
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I wish there were an update today. I always love to hear from the master. Maybe Jeff should build up a few days worth, for days like these? It’s up to him.
I’d give a fake update – but this is not my site. I’m just a reader. So, let us wait for Mr. Kay.
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Harumpa…coulda done without that thought from camp….good grief.
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Here is a link I thought everyone could use with Christmas coming.
http://gizmodo.com/gadgets/poop-love/twodaloo-for-couples-who-share-everything-327370.php
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Hey Chad how did you get your hands on pictures of the new American Airlines first class section?
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I did several camps over the years, and enjoyed ‘em all (mostly).
One was a YMCA day camp where we learned how to lash logs together and make an elevated fort system with bridges in the woods, It was cool except for one counselor who liked to mock little kids.
‘Cadets’ were a church version of boyscouts, and their camps were the canvas army tent variety. Nothing but mosquitoes and mud, cooking in mess kits, sleeping on lumpy ground, and orienteering. Still managed to be fun, especially when one kid collected an entire mess kit full of tent caterpillars and roasted ‘em until they popped. That smell will haunt me forever.
The week-long YMCA camp was total movie-camp material. I went for a week, 2 different years, without knowing anyone there, and still had a great time. There were cabins, but they only had a sink – the showers/ toilets were a 3 minute walk away, and shared by several cabins. One of the stalls was designated by campers as ‘no-flush’ – anyone contributing to the stack would have to stand on the seat by the 3rd day. It was a shit mountain, easily as tall as the toilet itself above the rim.
The camp director discovered it and had a similar screaming arraignment hearing with everyone he could fit in the room. Without DNA evidence, he couldn’t prove which cabin did it, so he picked one (ours) to clean it up – first with those little folding Army shovels, then standard cleaning supplies, then toothbrushes.
Good times.
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