Gone camping
Finish writing your novel, you get to go camping. That was the deal I made with myself. Sure the forecast calls for cold and rainy–and your point is?
So I’m packing up the husband, the dog, the niece and nephew, adding some firewood, hot chocolate, and marshmallows, and it’s off into the wild. Dinner will be homemade chicken soup and a bagged salad, breakfast tomorrow will be pancakes and bacon. And in between, lots of stories around the campfire. And a big black dog stretched out across two children in our tent, alternately warming and suffocating them.
Good times.
See you back here in a few.
Technorati Tags: Camping, Camping with Children
January 21st, 2007 at 4:07 pm
Hey, congrats on finishing your book! You’ve earned some Robin-time. Why you’d choose to spend it sleeping outside in the rain is beyond me, but whatever makes you happy.
I could go for the hot chocolate, though.
January 21st, 2007 at 5:04 pm
I know, I’m weird that way. But it turned out great–the rain didn’t start until we were packing up camp this afternoon. We drove home in a downpour, but yesterday and this morning were perfect.
I try to live by the Billy Collins motto that there’s no such thing as bad weather, only the wrong clothing. So last night it was 25 degrees, but we were all warm and toasty and perfectly comfortable in our sleeping bags in the tent, Bear curled up on the kids’ feet to keep them extra warm. We all couldn’t have been happier.
January 21st, 2007 at 6:46 pm
don’t you, or those you camp with, ever have to use the toilet in the middle of the 25 degree night, or is there some camper’s bladder control “secret” of which the uninitiated (that would be me and those of my tribe) are unaware?
signed, curious
January 21st, 2007 at 7:37 pm
Dear Curious:
Thanks for your question. There are several key elements to a successful 4 AM, 25-degree pee:
1. If you are camping with children, you make it THE RULE that if anyone has to pee in the middle of the night–whether it’s one of the adults or a child–then that person wakes up everyone else for a pee. The benefit is that anyone else who’s been holding it all night now has a reason to just suck it up, throw on the boots, and go handle it.
The second advantage is it makes it comfortable for the child to speak up and say it’s pee time. We’ve demonstrated the rule ourselves by making them wake up in the middle of the night because we’re the ones who have to go. So now everyone understands it’s not a big deal to be the first one to say they have to go. Because we’re all going to go out with them and handle it ourselves.
What we don’t want is anyone wetting the sleeping bag, just because it’s too much trouble to speak up.
Besides, it’s a beautiful, harmonious thing to see–all of us stumbling out of the tent at once to go enjoy relieving ourselves in the middle of the cold night. Then we laugh and scramble back into the warmth of our sleeping bags, and we can all sleep for a good long time after that since we’re not restless trying to hold it any longer.
2. The infamous Pee Bottle. My husband was thrilled to discover the use of a wide-mouth Gatorade bottle to keep him warm and dry on a freezing rainy night. I’m sorry to say I don’t have that kind of aim yet, so I still have to struggle into all my rain gear just so I can go out, drop trou, get wet anyway. Sigh.
I understand a wide-mouth Nalgene bottle is suitable for women, but again, I’m just not that confident in my aim yet.
3. Preparation is vital to the success of any late-night pee. Before you get into your sleeping bag, you set your boots right where you can find them, and you lay in your supply of toilet paper where you can get your hands on it without any fumbling around. Boots on, semi-laced, and you’re out the door.
It only took a few dozen times of “Where’s my shoe? I gotta go!” to get that one right.
I hope this has helped. Please let me know if you have any more questions about camping, the Pee Bottle, etc. That’s what I’m here for.
January 21st, 2007 at 7:49 pm
Robin - you should go for drug testing. They have instructions for women who can’t aim.
January 21st, 2007 at 7:54 pm
Good to know, Patrick. As always, you’re the man with all the answers.
Does aiming involve a little rubber ducky? Or is that just for boys?
January 21st, 2007 at 8:26 pm
again, that damn nalgene bottle. i’ve already googled that once and forgotten. i guess at some point we (being the royal we) accept our limitations and acknowledge we’re more the conde nast type.
January 21st, 2007 at 9:11 pm
Do you really want me to explain? Seriously, there I things that I know that I really wish I didn’t.
I’ve also seen FAR too many breast self-exam posters from when I used to install mamography machines…