Magrilless

On Saturday night we drove with some friends over to Kickapoo State Park to do some run-away-from-home car camping. We were all really excited about this, as we all miss the opportunity the Southwest affords for easy outdoor recreation. I’m a little embarassed to say that I spent the better part of 2 days planning for this overnighter. Mostly this planning took the form of menu perfecting (which is about the only thing that went smoothly), but it turns out we should have done a dress rehearsal of everything. We ran into a number of problems in a mere 14-hour span:

Problem No. 1. We had planned on cajoling the camp hosts into letting us use the group campsite. I had written for policy information about it, and it seemed like only one or two white lies away. It turns out that pretty much everything I was told was exactly opposite of the actual policy, so we had to camp at the “real” campground next to other campers. This wasn’t really a big deal; we were just looking forward to being separated from all others by at least a half mile radius.

Problem No. 2. We set about pitching tents first thing. Bill and I had our ground sheet all laid out, the tent poles straightened, and the tent ready to unfurl. When we started to unroll, however, we noticed black splotches all over the lighter areas of the tent. It turns out our tent has completely molded over. Ah, thank you Midwest humidity. There was no way we were going to sleep in a mold-infested tomb. So we made ourselves laugh and look on the bright side: “We get to sleep under the stars tonight!” There was no rain forecast, so it was just my fear of creepy crawlies that could get in the way. Time to buck up, Gretchen!

Problem No. 3. We brought out our camping stove and the fuel bottle for making dinner. The first step is to pump the fuel bottle. Pump pump pump pump. Fuel’s leaking out the top of the bottle. Hmm. Maybe there was a lot of pressure built up in the bottle already (altitude change?) and we’ve over-pressurized. Open the bottle to release pressure. Rescrew the pump on. Pump pump pump. Fuel’s still leaking. Okay. No stove to use tonight. Must build fire for dinner as well as marshmallows. (Thankfully Tyler is a super fire builder and had the wet wood smoking/flaming in no time!) We even remembered to set some wood aside for making coffee in the morning.

Problem No. 4. It had become increasingly obvious over the course of the evening that Eliza was hyper-vigilant and was going to be up and on alert at every noise. If we were in a tent to sleep, she might have calmed down eventually, sensing that we were “in bed.” But sleeping outside, having tied her leash to either a tree or one of our waists (1-2-3-not-it!), was going to be a problem. And there was the creepy crawly issue still at the back of my mind. So we decided on the car. (I know I know. I’m ashamed. I can never remember sleeping in the car before.) The back seats fold down absolutely flat. Eliza fits snugly in the passenger seat. We even cracked the windows to minimize heat/condensation/carbon dioxide buildup. Unfortunately, the cracked windows resulted in lots of mosquitos as well as letting in the rain. (Rain! Absolutely no rain was forecast!) And the car is about 6 inches too short for Bill to be really comfortable. But we were saved from serious middle-of-the-night rain mickey-mousing and Eliza did settle down nicely.

We still had fun. In a sort of “Who invited Murphey and his stupid laws?” sort of way. But we did find ourselves muttering more and more often as the time passed: “We are actually good at camping. We are actually good at camping. We are actually good at camping.”

So we’ve ordered a new tent. And we’re researching pump to fuel bottle seals. And we’re experimenting with seat configurations in the car to see if we can find a more comfortable way to sleep if there are future emergencies. And we’re actually good at camping.

We know we were hiatus-ed for a long time there last week. An entire 11 days with no humorous anecdotes. The truth is, we had the blues. The end-of-graduate-school-is-near-but-will-it-ever-really-happen blues. The chemistry was failing. Again. Our schedule had us up early and out late. We were eating separate meals at different times in other places. One bad day led to another bad day led to a general malaise. And to add insult to injury, I discovered that the cat on my bike route who always sits in the window of a particular house, greeting me as I fly by each morning, constant always, this cat is a wood cut-out.

But then came Labor Day. We’ve recharged. Had some rest. Eaten some great meals together. Spent time with friends. Made plans to go camping this weekend. Chemistry has started to return interesting results. Finally. This summer’s work schedule is history. We’ve passed our last hot hot hot day. We’re again ready to push to the really-the-end-of-graduate-school days.

We are heeding the words of Dory, the plucky fish from Finding Nemo: “Just keep swimming, just keep swimming, just keep . . .”

Ever laugh at someone’s joke only to realize they were in fact not making a joke at all?

Our garage door stopped opening for us on Wednesday afternoon. The automatic feature doesn’t lift it more than a couple inches, and we can’t get it to work manually either.* So we called the landlord, who willingly called maintenance workers to look at the problem for us. Our regular maintenance man, Vern, has been ill for a period of time, so there are new guys who will be coming to fix the garage, the landlord told us. He described them to us and assured us that despite their appearance (as redneck hicks, from all I can tell), they are friendly and professional people who have been doing good work for him. Great. No problems here.

Off we go to work on our bicycles yesterday. When I return home, hoping to find a garage door that will open, I instead find a note from our new maintenance personel. Call me, it says. Uh oh. Dreading what I will hear (we need a new part and it will be at least a week; we’ll probably have to blast it open; your dog bit me and I’m suing), I pick up the phone. He wonders when would be a good time to come by. They had stopped by earlier in the day, but had assumed there was someone still at home not answering the door. After all, they could tell a dog was loose in the house and the car was in the garage.

. . . .

Of course the car was in the garage! That’s the problem! I wanted to laugh, but I held my tongue and assured them that we’re out of the house by 7 and that the dog is personable. These guys may be friendly and do good work, but . . . come on!

*Yes, yes. I know about the catch at the top that you pull to go from the motorized to manual operation. That part goes smoothly, but then the actual opening doesn’t happen. Either the door is too heavy for either Bill or I to lift or they did something when they installed the automatic feature to prevent manual opening.

In one of my first posts about being a bicycle commuter, I mentioned that I had seen a heron on my way to work one morning. I think probably most of you thought I was lying. Okay. Well, if not lying, then employing poetic license or hyperbole or something that amounts to me lying about the bird. As proof that I’m a truth-teller, he was back this week. And I just happened to have the camera with me. So, ta da!

He’s in the middle of the frame, just below the darkest of the trees. Spot him? Click on it so it’s bigger. See? Not a liar. Just lucky.

And before you think in utopia must we live, this is what the other end of the “lake” looks like. Ugly and kind of gross, huh? Stupid Canada geese breeding and loosing all their down.

I didn’t dare take a picture of what the bicycle path looks like next to this part of the lake. Some of you might be having a snack and I wouldn’t want to be responsible for the automatic reflex that would result. Let me just say that there’s only one thing worse than riding through a bunch of Canada goose poop, flinging all the junk up behind my wheels onto my legs and paniers: thinking you’re riding through Canada goose poop and having a specimen suddenly come alive and fly at you because it’s actually a Canada-goose-poop-looking cicada. Aaaugh!