I have mostly boring camp stories (although I did break my arm at BIBLE CAMP once, jumping over a fence). But I'm just here to tell you, Frisbee Girl, that I love you for the url to your blog being "Budapest by Blimp."

I went to church camp once. It was in Glen Rose, TX, home of the Comanche Peak nuclear power plant.

Next to the bunkbeds there were two posters.

One had the Lord's Prayer.

The other showed a map of the area, with concentric circles radiating from the nuke plant. They were color-coded to let you know how dangerous each zone would be in the event of a meltdown. It also showed evacuation routes.

The camp was in the orange zone, next to the ground-zero red zone.

I went to a YMCA camp in the Berkshires one summer, it was horrible, the bathrooms: Sodom and Gomorrah. It was better to just pee in the woods and avoid the deuce as much as possible. I got into three fights and got shot in the foot with a BB gun in BB gun shooting class, because I told this kid that he wouldn't dare shoot me in the foot. One of the kids in my bunk got tired of being accused of fucking his stuffed animals and tried to poison us, however since all he did was add half a can of bugspray to a cup of fruit punch and then insist that we all looked really thirsty it was pretty easy to avoid. My sister went to the same camp and loved it year after year, so who knows?

In retrospect most of the problems were self-induced but that camp still sucked. I did get to eat Applejacks at every meal for two weeks, which was cool.

I got thrown out of a bible camp for having a profanity-filled fit when my cabin put me on the nail-pounding team instead of on the relay team in the Camp Olympics. My mom had to come pick me up. She was not pleased. However, that was the last time I had to go to bible camp, so everything worked out ok.

Outside of day care, my first camp experience was a two-week rural camp in northwestern Pennsylvania. I cried for the first week out of homesickness and for the second week in anticipation of separation anxiety for camp. (I was a conflicted child.) They made us swim to wake up after 6am revelie and closed the day by playing taps. I was convinced they were trying to kill us. In the end, I loved it.

Our cabin counselour told us stories and sang "House on Pooh Corner" every night to offset the dreaded taps experience. She smelled like Breck shampoo, always had cookies and was the warmest, most patient person I'd ever met.

I was in Boy Scouts so I went to camp a lot. One kid in my troop was a real psycho, always acting up, pushing kids around. I was wary around him, "always thought he was kind of a weirdo."

During one Jamboree, held on the grounds of a Franciscan monastery in central Maryland, this psycho kid snuck up on a future Eagle scout as said Eagle scout was, uh, shitting in the woods, and jabbed him in the ass with a stick, causing all sorts of trouble.

In high school, the psycho kid stabbed his ex-girlfriend to death (27 knife wounds) while robbing a local convenience store to make money to support his stepfather's jailhouse heroin habit.

Other than that, I always had a great time at camp. Except for the poison ivy.

papercake, you are the first person to ever notice/comment on that! Easily my favorite song by Mr. Dobly.

No camp for *me* - Yay!

Ok, see, now I got involved in church groups in jr. high and high school, because that was the only real social outlet in Newberg (the tiny W/C town I moved to) and camps/retreats were de rigueur and sometimes absolutely horrifying or downright brutal exercises in humiliation. Still, we went, time and time again. It was weird.

Yay, Budapest By Blimp!

Fun thing I learned at camp: if you put a flashlight pointing out from the end of your nose, the light is aligned to make wolf spiders' eyes glow green, and you can find hoards of them in the grass.

Mmmm, Breck shampoo. I wen't to a barbershop when I was a kid that had this great old framed poster of a kid with the same old-fashioned haircut that Tony would give my brother and me along with a lollipop for sitting still once a month. Underneath the boy was the slogan:

"My Daddy Comes Here Too"
............B R E C K............

I could read the words long before I knew what the hell they meant.

My other shampoo tale:

When I was little, I used to think "Tear Free" on the Johnson's Baby Shampoo bottles was an invitation to remove the label. The tear I read rhymed with pear, not pier.

Frisbee Girl - listening to Budhapest right now, 'cause of you. Thanks. (Right now, The Flat Earth is my favorite. And right NOW it's "May the Cube be with You")

Anyway.

I ended up at Bible Camp thanks to my parents sending me to a private Catholic school for four unfortunate years of blue corduroy pants and white izod shirts (with the alligators torn off so as not to offend the "less fortunate"). Bible camp only happened once a year, though, and most of one year's camp experience was spent vomiting, due to a sudden flu-type illness. The last year I went I became aware that the only reason I was volunteering to read the prayer before dinner, etc. was because I wanted to be liked -- not because I believed -- and I suspected everyone else of doig the same. That was the beginning of the end for me and God.

Don't let Satan [whoosh!] it out,
I'm gonna let it shine,
Let it shine,
Let it shine!

I never went to like, outdoors camp. I went to bible camp, and then I went to smart-persons summer-school pseudo-camp, where we like, learned stuff all morning, and had activities in the afternoon. It was my first experience spending long amounts of time away from home and with rather minimal supervision, so of course I loved it, but as I grew older I realized that I was surrounded by nerds who were years younger than me and who I had nothing in common with, and I had to spend 3 weeks in LA learning crap like etymology. Blech.

Quaker camp. I mean, I was never a religious kid, but Meeting for Worship, if you're hip to Quakerism, isn't terribly intrusive, so that didn't bother me.

I just didn't do well with the whole camp atmosphere, wasn't fond of swimming or singing or campfires, so mostly sat in my cabin reading. Also Quakers are the cuddliest goddamn people you'll ever meet and I couldn't deal with that.

When I was a kid, my folks didn't have any money in the summer because my father was a physics professor on 9 month pay. So, they shipped my little brother and me up to my grandparents' farm in Lincoln, Massachusetts. My grandmother made us go to Lincoln Summer Day Camp, and we hated it. We were a couple of hick boys from Southern Maryland, and Lincoln is a pretty wealthy town. Our hand-me-down outfits, kitchen haircuts and accents made us stand out--we didn't make a lot of friends. I remember feeling very lonely.

Should also be noted that I was shy and weird and scared of everything. For example, the summer Gremlins came out, a bunch of those kids at camp had stuffed Mogwai toys. And they brought them to the pool. Don't ever get them wet, and don't ever feed them after midnight. Holy crap...I was a mess.

Then my grandmother would roll up in the afternoon in the stationwagon to take us back to the farm where my uncle and my grandfather let us drive the tractors and taught us how to use the backhoe and the welder and let us build forts and tunnels in the hay loft. Helped to deliver a few calves and lived in the pasture in a hut my grandfather helped us build. I hated camp, but I loved the farm. Still love the fahm.

When I was 13 I went to sailing camp. Dad had a better paying job and had gotten the family into sailing. I was pretty good at it, won a lot of races, so sailing camp was fun. Had my first beer and cigarette that summer. And first french kiss. It was a good summer.

I went to a summer day camp at the local YMCA because my parents didn't want me to go to away camp at a young age. We played a lot of capture the flag. A lot. Looking back, I think the counselors just wanted us out of their hair for a good chunk of the day. It was pretty fun though aside from all the Chez Whiz sandwiches. One time, ONE TIME, I mention to my mother that I like Cheez Whiz and she runs out and buys an entire jar and starts sending me to camp with them. There's nothing quite as refreshing as a soggy Cheez Whiz on Wonder Bread sandwich on a 105 degree day. So I tell her no more Cheez Whiz sandwiches and she gets pissed and tells me that she spent good money on that jar of Cheez Whiz because I said I like it and dammit I'm going to finish it.

I also went to band camp once. All the stories are true.

Should also be noted that I was shy and weird and scared of everything. For example, the summer Gremlins came out, a bunch of those kids at camp had stuffed Mogwai toys. And they brought them to the pool. Don't ever get them wet, and don't ever feed them after midnight. Holy crap...I was a mess.

Aw. I was also a little freaked out by Gremlins when I was young. I didn't even like Gizmo. Everyone kept insisting he was adorable. No. Not adorable. Creepy. With his gigantic eyes and their creased lids and his mealy mouth and that weird trilling. Creepy.

I only ever went to day camp--it was fun, and i remember being fascinated by my counselor's cornrows--it was the first time i ever saw a guy with them, i think.

I never went to camp, I don't think they are very big in NZ. Even if they were, I spent all summer in the library. Then in high school I worked all summer. I was, however, a science camp counsellor for high school kids when I was in college. Heh.

Eight years at an overnight Jewish camp in the Poconos. Five years as a camper, three on staff. Loved it until I couldn't even pretend to belong there- summers were the only time I ever felt Jewish because of the community, and last summer I was too far removed from it (although it was fun, as the photography teacher) that I just couldn't handle it anymore.

gaspode, I grew up in NZ and went to camps often (my Mother had to work and needed to get rid of us during school holidays) - mostly the YMCA variety, which was in an old army base on Waiheke Island and which was run just like the army (boys only, too). Up at 6 and into the sea every day (even in mid-winter), lots of tough activities, but lots of fun overall. Best memories are of sliding down the huge hill behind the camp on flattened boxes. Lots of injuries from that, but they seemed to think things like that would toughen us up. I think they were right.

Also went to a camp run by a church group for several years, which I really enjoyed - go-karts and swimming and lots of other fun stuff (co-ed, woohoo!). Best memories were of the "war" that was always held on the last day (basically catch the flag, but with a large bag of sand instead of a flag). It was held on the roughest, steepest, muddiest part of the farm they could find. Always at least one person broke a bone and they had first aid personnel on standby for it. Imagine trying to do that nowadays - you would be sued from here to forever.

I went on a canoe camp once, run by the same church group. It followed on after the main camp and was just about the best 10 days of my life - canoing around Lake Rotoiti and Lake Rotorua, camping, cooking on campfires, swimming, (co-ed, woohoo!).

Went to band camp, bible camp, wildlife camp, and backpacking camp...

The most fun i ever had at camp was at wildlife camp, at the end of the session, we played this huge game on the 100-acre grounds. Everyone was given a chip with one of four colors on it. The colors had a point hierarchy... you were also given a handkerchief that served like a flag in flag football. The object was to finish the game with the best color by "tagging" people and switching chips with them. we played for about 4 hours on the last day...

oh, and yes, most band camp stories are true...maybe with some embellishment...

Yeah, dg, I was gonna actually ask you about that (the camp thing... are you from the north or south island?). Because I was racking my brains to think of anyone I knew that ever went to camp and I genuinely couldn't think of a single person.

Of course, my experience can't speak to all of NZ, but I remember talking about this with my friends at uni, who were from all around, and nobody had.

(but, like I said... science camp!)

From the North Island, gaspode - grew up on the North Shore of Auckland. The camps I went to were in Matamata (church-run) and at the Motutapu Outdoor Education Centre on Motutapu Island (YMCA run). not waiheke, as I mentioned above

All of my North Shore friends went to Rosmini. I think it messed them up.

Yeah, it would.

I also was in Boy Scouts and went to Boy Scout camp a lot. Like Hugh, there was a boy in my troop who was a little scary: besides the regular rough-housing, much of his harassment of others was decidedly sexual, and he professed an adamant hatred of all kinds of minorities, whether religious or racial. He hasn't stabbed anyone yet, but I know he's been guilty of many smaller crimes and I'm sure he's capable of more.

Other than THAT, though, camp was pretty fun. It was the source of a lot of good inside jokes that would last years. My favorite camp story that I love to tell is the time when we were at Eagle Scout Camp - basically the same as regular Scout camp, except it was designed to assist scouts in achieving the goals they needed for Eagle Scout, and as such younger Scouts did not go. This necessitated going alone for those of us who were eligible, and thus we were divided among the numerous 'provisional' troops at the camp. Luckily, the people I was most friendly with in my troop ended up in the same troop and campground as me. We all took the same merit badge classes, one of which was Rocketry. This was a moderately entertaining class, but the best part was that after buying several rocket engines in the camp store, we had a few left over after the last day of classes on Friday. That night, we still hadn't come up with any use for them, so being the bright young kids we were, we decided to coat them liberally with (flammable) bug spray and toss 'em in the fire. We had sprayed them on all sides and had just catapulted them from our hands into the fire when the man in charge came in a'hollerin':

"DID YOU JUST THROW BATTERIES IN THE FIRE?"

Now, putting rocket engines in the fire probably wasn't the best idea, but we certainly weren't stupid enough to throw batteries in there.

"No! No sir, those were rocket engines!"

"NO, THOSE WERE BATTERIES! YOU THREW BATTERIES IN THE FIRE!"

"No, really! Those were rocket engines!"

"WHY DID YOU THROW ROCKET ENGINES IN THE FIRE? WHAT WERE YOU THINKING?!"

At this point other adults had joined in the shouting and all attempts at dialog were rendered impossible. The chaos thickened and we were all sent to our tents. There were two of us who had actually committed the act of throwing the rocket engines in the fire: me and Mike. Andrew and Joe, while not having made contact with the engines before they were thrown in the fire, did help with the application of bug spray. Me and Joe were in one tent together, while Michael and Andrew were in the adjacent one. We were scared out of our wits as adults periodically poked into our tents with flashlights, asking us our names and putting checks on the clipboards they carried. Only later would we learn that this infernal mind-test was completely unrelated: that same night, a kid from another campsite had gone missing, and the administration was combing through every troop's area in an attempt to find him. Eventually the ruckus ended and, despite our apprehension, we went to bed.

The next morning was rife with tension, the very same tension a child might feel after getting home far after his or her parents have gone to bed, and waking up the next morning wondering if he or she will be punished or not. After lining up for breakfast without one mention of the previous night's events, we let ourselves breathe a sigh of relief. But then, as the rest of the troop filed out of the campsite, me and Michael were called over.

The man who called us was holding a plastic bag with a charred, almost unrecognizable rocket engine in it.

"Are you the two responsible for this?"

What could we say? There's no way he picked us out by chance. Lying about it would undoubtedly make things worse. At the same time, we both couldn't help but being curious where the hell he had gotten the info from.

"...Yes," we said, with the terseness that almost always accompanies guilt.

"You understand how unsafe that was. That engine could have fired and hit someone, or it could have traveled into the woods and started a forest fire."

A pause. We were nervous, but then, he only had a day to punish us.

...One whole day!

"Your punishment is to clean the mess hall after every meal today. You will sweep the floors, take out the garbage, and clean the bathrooms."

And so it was. No one was called; our parents never knew about it, nor did our Scoutmaster. It wasn't such a terrible punishment, although it was kind of disgusting at times. It was over soon enough, though, and when Sunday rolled around, we were free, never to return to that camp again.



...


I have other fun stories from Boy Scout camp but I think I'll refrain from sharing, that one was long enough as is.

I also went to computer camp and academic camps, both for more than one year, but while they were fun, they weren't quite as memorable. Still, they all served as a good and very early indicator of what dorm life would be like, since they were all hosted by colleges.

I forgot to mention that the kid I was talking about at the beginning of my post also hated anyone who wasn't heterosexual. Scary guy.

Oh, and the funny thing about the way he found out about the rocket engine was he claimed that they had the Secret-fucking-Service come in and fingerprint us while we were asleep, and then they matched it to the engine. Andrew would later dispute this saying that he went to bed with his hands in his boxers and woke up with his hands in his boxers, undeniable proof that he, at least, was never touched. The guy just probably asked some kids who were around, don't know why he had to lie to us.

OMG, I totally forgot Space Camp...that was really cool!

Two new books: Sleepaway and Camp.