A Dull Excitement

Yes, I know that my title is an oxymoron. But what else do you call it when something has the potential to be exciting but in reality is quite dull?

Yesterday, we heard a helicopter fly over the house. At this time of year we always run out to see if it's carrying a bucket and we ran out yesterday. First, I saw the helicopter. It was carrying a bucket. Then I looked around and saw a plume of smoke rising from the mountain northwest of us about three miles as the crow flies. If you look at the picture at the top of my page, imagine you can see a low ridge to the right of the tall cedar. That's where the smoke was. Pictures? You expect me to remember to grab the camera?

There had been so many lightening strikes the last 36 hours that I didn't know if the chopper had been on that fire or another one so I called and they said they knew about it. Okay, so I'm not all that worried about it because they're on top of it, right? I kept checking the smoke all afternoon and evening and it didn't seem as if it was getting a whole lot larger or thicker so I went to bed. Okay, okay. I sacked out on the couch fully clothed until Mike got home.

I checked the smoke when I got up and it was a little bigger and a whole lot thicker. Shortly after that, we heard the chopper and a spotter plane. We watched the chopper drop at least six loads of water and by noon the fire was pretty much out. I don't think they had men on that fire. I think they used only the chopper and plane because the terrain is so steep there. In fact, they have to log that area with choppers.

If I'd sat down and thought about it, I wouldn't have worried at all because:
#1. The ridge runs east-west.
#2. Fire runs faster uphill - in this case, north.
#3. We are south of that ridge.
#4. There's another ridge between us and it.


No. No need to worry. So it ended up being a dull sort of excitement. It was very cool watching the chopper dump the water bucket, though. I think they carry about 300 gallons of water and when they open the flap at the bottom it looks like a waterfall.

A Special Supper

My birthday came on Wednesday this year. Mike and Cameron are on opposite shifts from Nick so to do anything as a family, we have to do it on the weekend. Besides, Richelle and I left for convention Wednesday afternoon. So the boys took Mike, Richelle, and I out to supper Sunday. The last two years we've gone to the Mexican place here in town where the food is good and the service is...well...fun.

I assured the boys that they didn't need to tell the waiter it was in honor of my birthday but of course they didn't listen. They only get to see their mother wear a sombrero and be sung to in both Spanish and English once a year. Of course they're going to tell the waiter.

The waiter called everyone amigo/amiga/compadre when taking their order until he got to Richelle who he called Princess. Threw her off so badly that she started giggling and almost couldn't get out 'quesadilla'.

He brought Mike's order first and then came with Richelle's and Cameron's. He set Cameron's down and said, "Beef for you and chicken for you, amigo," he looked at Nick, "is coming."
"Uh," Nick stammered, "we both ordered beef."
"Too bad for you," the waiter replied nonchalantly. "It's already cooked."
Mike laughed so hard he nearly choked.

By the time my plate came, we realized we were a tableware setting short so Nick asked the waiter for a fork.
"A fork? You need a fork." Turning to the table across the aisle from us, he asked them, "You're finished with this? You finished eating?"

The highlight of the evening for everyone else was when they brought me the sombrero. Mike plopped it on my head, and the waiters sang in Spanish and then got everyone in that part of the restaurant to join in in "Happy Birthday". A part of the whole birthday thing there is that they bring the person a shot of some kind of drink. They told me it was tequila and Dr. Pepper. A slammer? I don't know except they slammed the little cup on the table and it fizzed. Last year, I only took took a sip and was heavily teased so this year I decided to try to down the whole thing. I mean, you only do this once a year, right? It was three nasty swallows. I do believe I'll pass from now on. I had to eat three chips to get feeling back in my throat and I can do without the small but potent burps I had for the next two hours.

Drinking certainly isn't something I'll be doing in the near future. Or the far future. Or ever.

Nick received the beef enchilada that he'd ordered, we got a new table setting, and the waiter got a fairly large tip.

A new addition

No, it's not a baby.

Well, not a human baby, anyway.

A couple of weeks ago, Nick was given a puppy that was being neglected. Evidently, a brother of a friend bought this puppy and then after a few weeks, left it at his parents' house. His mother didn't want it and wasn't inclined to make sure it was being fed properly, so Nick's friend asked him if he wanted it.

Yes, for those of you who know dogs, she's a pit bull. He named her "Kalohi" which, I guess, is Hawaiian for "trouble". Not sure why he gave a pit bull a Hawaiian name.

Here are some pictures of Kalohi staying cool under a patio chair.

That's about as cute as you can get.


Tired little pup. Nick had taken her and Emo for a long walk before they came out here.


Richelle finally woke her up. Evidently, the wide-set eyes would be a deduction if she were to be shown. Nick's friend called it a "deformity" which Nick didn't particularly care for.

I was and still am a little apprehensive about pit bulls given all the news about them but Kalohi is so little that she's far more cute than frightening. We're making sure she knows who we are so we become one of her "pack" and Nick's very good at following through on training. He says she's a good little pup and is fully house-trained to the point of waking him up in the middle of the night to go out.

He brought her over yesterday and had a full-grown pit in the back of his truck named Emo that he wouldn't let out. Not that it's aggressive, but because he'd take off for the wild blue yonder and be a pain to get back. Emo isn't his. He belongs to a friend of Nick's that's doing military training right now and Nick's taking care of him. He doesn't respond as well to Nick's voice as he'd like so Nick made him stay in the pick-up bed. He's trained to the point that Nick left the tailgate down and Emo never made a move to jump out. Instead, he laid his head on the edge of the bed with his tongue hanging out and drooping across the bed-liner. He was the most un-fierce looking pit bull I've ever seen. He straightened up when Richelle tried to get a picture so I can't share the goofy look.

You know....of all the pit bulls in the world, very few get in the news. I'm thinking that they're just like any other dogs in that their training and owners contribute a lot to their disposition. I know of two rotweilers that played with young children of the family and allowed the kids to ride them like horses but they were dangerous to anyone trying to come in through the (high and solid) fence.

If it sounds as if I'm trying to reassure myself, you're right. I'm trying to reassure myself. Kalohi is a cute little pup and I'm trusting Nick to make sure she grows up into a well-behaved dog.

Camp Low Echo

Girl Scouts don't usually attend resident camps as a troop like Boy Scouts do. They usually sign up and attend as individual girls or two or three together and are sent off by themselves for the week but this little camp in the Cascades offers a weekend troop camp at the end of their season. Isn't it beautiful? There's a Boy Scout camp across the lake but they were smart enough to keep the length of the lake between the two camps.

So our troop attended with fourteen girls and four adults and had a great time in spite of the latrines. You know, there has to be something bad at a camp in order for it to be remembered. Last time it was the mosquitoes and the lightning storm. This time it was the latrines.

How can I describe the magnificent odor of our latrine? Perhaps I can quote Pat McManus; "It would give an otherwise indiscriminate hyena a fit of the dry-heaves." They said they'd limed it a number of times but one dad suggested in a phone consultation that they needed to add yeast and sugar. The lime will work on the smell, but yeast was needed to break the stuff down.

The adults' tent was quite nearby but, thankfully, the odor didn't penetrate the canvas much as long as the door was kept zipped and body spray was liberally released into the air. We overheard one girl whisper to her buddy late the first night, "I'm going in....wish me luck!"

The swim area with the tip of Mt. McGloughlin in the background. They had the usual swim area divided into three sections and the obligatory canoes but they also had some leg-powered paddle-boats that the girls enjoyed immensely.

One of the crafts they did was learn to weave some gimp into a lanyard. Some of the girls already knew how and were able to help those who didn't. Here's Richelle working on hers while wearing her brand-new camp hoody that she'd bought earlier at the trading post. Another girl also bought a hoody and didn't take it off until sometime after her mom picked her up when we got back Sunday afternoon.


Hauling the luggage up to the parking lot. Neat little carts and we had no trouble getting the girls to pull them.

It was a three-hour drive each way plus time to let the restless natives out to run off energy but it's an experience I'm game to do again. As long as the latrines smell better. And the girls fall asleep before 1am, preferably before 11pm. And our little Vesuvius goes dormant - that's the fourth time and her mom's coming next time; we can't find a common denominator and are wondering if it's a mental thing. She's perfectly fine the next day, eats a hearty breakfast and participates fully in all the activities but the evening or night before she has a migraine and then throws up.

Yup. You never know what's in store when you take fourteen assorted girls camping for two nights.

The project

I've mentioned a few time about the Eagle project I've been helping with. Well, the project is nearly done and I thought I'd post a few pictures. This young man was told that the City of Sutherlin was wanting tables for the park. Right now, they have four tables total, with only one in the pavilion. The city was wanting a minimum of six. After sitting down and working out a budget with his adviser, our Boy Scout approached different businesses in town and asked them to sponsor a table for $125. The board of our Blackberry Festival sponsored two tables and added $25/table to have them painted purple. Other businesses heard about that and added their dollars for specialized painting. The end results are thirteen very colorful tables.


I don't have a finished product picture but here's what most of the frames look like. Most of them are all one color but some of them have different colored boards bolted on. Two of the purple ones have yellow boards, one blue one has red boards, and a red one has a blue top and white benches.


Our scout had the name of the sponsoring company routered into the center board of the table. He knew Mike had cut the letters for Cameron's project, so asked him to cut his boards. Here, Mike is doing fine detailing on the logo for a local wood products company after free-handing the rest of the logo.


Our young man being shown by his adviser how to get the spacing right on the table boards. We were happy that this paint cured to a duller orange than what you see here!

He still has a couple of badges to earn before he can send in his application for Eagle rank but he's working on them right now and since his birthday isn't until February, I have no doubt he'll get it.

I Survived Day Camp

This must be my, oh, fourth year being a unit leader for Girl Scouts and I've been a volunteer at Cub Scout day camp for something like twelve years but each time I get through the week, I always feel as if I've survived something. One year I was even given an "I Survived Cub Day Camp" mug as a thank-you.

I've not helped at Cub day camp since I managed to convince people three years ago that since Cameron hadn't been in Cubs for three years, I needed to focus on Girl day camp and Richelle.

Usually, I have my child in my group but this year they needed me to be the leader of seven girls, six of whom were going into first grade and one into second. Sure was odd to see my daughter across the parade grounds with another group!

These little girls were so cute and said the most hilarious things such as:

"We screamed our EARS off!!" (loud singing contest between units)
"We're going to sit on the throne of wizz" (bathroom run)
"I don't like salad on my sandwich" (looking at my lettuce)
"Rocky-moley" for guacamole

And they hear things a little differently sometimes. The first morning, at opening flags, the camp director emphasized the need to drink water and reminded the girls to save the bottles and refill them. One of my girls heard "save the bottles" and not the "drink water" and "refill" parts and proudly showed her mom her unopened bottle of water that she'd saved. She'd had a bottle of juice with lunch and I wasn't on top of things that first day monitoring their water intake.

Another time, I spilled down my shirt getting a drink of water and murmured that I must have a hole in my lip. One little girl keep shooting me looks and after about ten minutes she leaned close and said, "I think I see the hole."

They were the best little girls, too. There were no fights or arguments until the last half of the last day when one girl managed to get two others mad at her at the same time. I'd hoped they would be able to straighten things out by themselves but after about half an hour and one of them coming to me saying they'd been pushed, I had to step in. All it took were a few gentle words and suggestions and they all became good friends and exchanged phone numbers.

The older girls, grades 4-6, camped overnight Thursday and since Richelle was one of them, I stayed, too. The campfire program was one of the best I've seen, mainly because those leaders were told they had to come up with skits that have never been done before. Campfires are so boring when the same skits and songs are done year after year. Out of the seven skits performed that night, I've never seen two and that's saying a lot after watching campfire programs for about fifteen years!

It was a great evening of fun and the girls were so tired that lights went out at 10pm and nearly everyone was asleep by 11pm. Even the dump truck's arrival at 5am didn't wake anyone up for more than a few minutes.

After so many years at day camps, I have a few tricks up my sleeve. Monday evening, I picked up some glow-in-the-dark beads and large safety pins without the spring and awarded each girl with a bead every time she drank all the water in her bottle. One bead-happy girl went home Friday with about twenty on her pins.

Another thing I did was pick up some UV-activated beads. These beads are a dull white until they're touched by UV rays and the beads rapidly change color. I gave those out each time they completed their camp-wide chores. Friday, our job was to pick up litter and I told the girls I would give them a bead for the first 30 pieces they collected and another one for each ten they picked up beyond that. Little first and second graders can't figure out how much litter they need to pick up for x-number of beads but they can figure out that the more they pick up, the more beads they'll get. One of the girls earned nine beads, three more earned eight, one earned three, and two earned one. There's lots of litter to pick up at day camp with all the crafts!

Tired as I am, I still enjoy day camps.

Things I learned this week

1. If you have trouble sleeping, quit drinking tea and soda.

2. Make sure your child knows what "off" is on the valve feeding the soaker hose so you don't have an unpleasant surprise four hours later.

3. A picnic and swim in the river makes a child's entire day.

4. Teenagers are quite hungry when they get home at 3am after a long day of work. Keep snacks on hand for them or there's no telling what they'll get into.

5. When your husband suggests you wipe down the computer chair with alcohol because he unthinkingly sat in it still wearing the same pants he wore in the poison oak, it's a good idea to remember to do that BEFORE you sit on it wearing shorts.