To the Jilli-est of all my Ans:
It was with a frown and a heavy heart that I noticed an empty space next to mine this prior week at family camp. Without moving, I glared at that empty bed for days, sometimes refusing to get up from my own bed to eat or even use the pooper. I was lonely, soiled, and miserable. But I forgive you.
Because you had to be selfish and rest your ailing body, I have compiled a sort of camp diary to keep you up to date with all of the goings-on that occurred on the week of July 17 through July 23. Hopefully you will lock this information in your Trapper Keeper forever, because it is dispicable that you missed a week such as this simply because you happened to have strep throat, a sinus infection, the flu, and herpes all at once in a thundercloud of misery and oozing sores.
Sunday, July 17, 2005:
We arrive. This is where you would take our bags and lead us down the tanbarken lane to our humble domicile for the week. When we arrive to the cabin, you would have waited on us hand and foot: sweeping the floor; making us pie; and perhaps a light footrub in the early evening hours. Because you were not at camp, it was a solemn and grueling time for all. We had to sweep the floor ourselves. There was no pie to be had (at least not at this point in the week). Melvin's footrubs were jerky and atrocious, and we all sighed, clucked our tongues, and wondered: "Where is Jillian when we need her?" I'll tell you where: probably rubbing some other family's poor feet! Forgiving this probable infidelity, we managed to make it to the dining hall for a lasagna-type dish that was made all the more palatable by the large hunks of lamb inside. Watermelon was dessert. You would have liked it, but you were at home eating creme brulee and fried chicken tenders. After dinner, other stuff probably happened.
Monday, July 18, 2005:
Today, breakfast was scrambled eggs. Camp's scrambled eggs are never cooked enough for me. I was so depressed that I remained in my cabin for the rest of the day, sobbing. I came out in the evening to play Photo Phun Extravaganza Scavenger Hunt Game For All!!!! which was the evening activity. I stripped down to my skivvies and bathed in the spring by the pool. This became important later on in the week when I stumbled upon a fellow counselor of yours drinking out of that very same spring! In a six-degrees-of-kevin-bacon way, I totally had my nipple drank by that chick!
Tuesday, July 19, 2005:
The Skit Night Talent Show Old Timey Extravaganza is tonight. As always, it is as painful as a nail being driven through my nut. Children rushed up on stage with poorly-performed skits of their own design that rambled aimlessly for hours without point until you just wanted to run up to the children and say, "SHUT UP YOUR MOUTH, SIT DOWN, AND BRING ON THE TECHNO DANCE MUSIC!" Even when the techno dance music finally came, it couldn't soothe my jangled nerves. I needed a patent-pending Jillian Chilcoat world-famous footrub, and there were no dice. No dice to be had anywhere. Figurative dice, that is.
Wednesday, July 20, 2005:
e witnessed quite a scene at the dining hall, where dirt pudding was served by the staff and enjoyed by the everyone. In fact, it was enjoyed so much by some people that they dug the sweet, sweet pudding out of the trash cans and ate it (along with, of course, any scraps of salad and stir fry that were stuck to it). And, lo and behold: it was a counselor. A female counselor to be more precise. When polling other members of your staff of ill-repute, many seemed to think there was no problem with begging for scraps--something better left to dogs, the homeless, and Louie Anderson. Only one seemed to take issue, quoted as: "Oh, it was in the food waste bin? Out of a bowl? You're right, that is a little gross." Silly!
Thursday, July 21, 2005:
The camper vs. staff basketball game went well; I scored 82 points, including three amazing, behind-the-back, between-the-legs, three-hundred-and-sixty-degree slam dunks and one half-court shot at the buzzer. Later, Melvin took over your duties as Unholy Vespers Leader of the Dead. The sermon she delivered was about how global warming and nuclear holocaust would not be the problems that they are today if only the Nazi party maintained a majority power in the British parliament...or something. Anyway, everybody ended up really pissed off about the whole thing. In a roundabouts way, it's really your fault that Melvin got on that soapbox and preached her little heart out about "white power" and the "master race." If you had been there, you could have talked about the Care Bears, or something else that's fluffy and good and rainbows. Maybe you could have even thrown in the Care Cousins. I mean, sure, it doesn't make the most sense in the world (how can a ragtag team of assorted jungle animals be related, even as cousins, to a den of multicolored bears?), but you can't go wrong with Braveheart, the mighty lion leader--and to a lesser extent, Lotsaheart the Elephant. Immediately after the church service, I caught what can only be described as the worst cases of the sniffles in the history of mankind. Fevers, chills, headaches, blistering sores...
Friday, July 22, 2005:
I wake up feeling like somebody dropped a pile of bricks on me repeatedly, except instead of bricks they use axes. And instead of axes they use giant elephants with venomous snakes for trunks and black widow spiders for feet. After downing an overdose of ibuprofin and being declared legally dead for seven whole minutes, I found the strength to drag myself to Dinner (The Afternoon Meal Previously Known As Lunch). I am confident that you have never witnessed what I witnessed that day, so I'll feel free to go into extreme and uncomfortable detail with you. Peanut Butter Pie was served. I've never understood the thrill of peanut butter pie. To me, Kathy has nineteen or twenty better desserts in her repertoir (even watermelon!). I was just finishing my discussion of this very point with many a fine young lady at my dinner table, when thunderous applause rumbled across the mess hall. Hooting and a-hollering, stomping and a-clapping like a ground of toothless rednecks watching a jugband have a hoedown in front of a freshly raised barn, staff members and campers alike united in glorious exaltation usually reserved for the resurrection of a messiah, or at least a really good rerun of Seinfeld on TBS. Not only did this indeed happen: IT HAPPENED ON AT LEAST SEVEN NON-CONSECUTIVE OCCASIONS. INDEED. Spontaneous applause burst out every time a sweaty kitchen staffer lugged a tray of overly-sweet and underly-tasty pie through the swinging kitchen door. It was like my childhood years on the shores of Ye Olde Rustic Cheddar all over again. Pure chaos and a complete and utter lack of reason. I said a little prayer to Xenu, the intergalactic overlord of Scientology, in hopes that all of the applauding buffoons would choke on their pie. Oh, not to death of course. But just enough that their face turns purple, so maybe they'd reconsider their fanatical devotion to eggs, sugar, butter, and Skippy.
Saturday, July 23, 2005:
Our epic journey ends with a sputter.
Knowing now what you didn't know then (but what you will still probably know later), you can almost have the entire Family Camp I experience right inside your noggin. I will leave you now with an Olde Scottish Proverb that was passed to me from my father, who learned it from his father, who learned it from the Loch Ness Monster.
May your sores halt their oozing and may your showerhouses be clean and free of mildew.
-Spoodles
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