Mary woke up around 6:30, and her moving around the trailer woke me up.  Went outside for my morning smoke, and it’s still raining.  Today’s first lesson learned is: try not to park on a downhill slope.  The carpet we put outside for our shoes is soaked.  The canopy is still out, but last night when I went out for the last smoke of the night, it was holding quite a lot of water.  Doug warned me that I should make the support legs uneven, to encourage run-off… I guess I didn’t have it set quite drastic enough.  I saw the water dripping through the canopy material, and decided to let one leg down.  I think there must have been 5 or 6 gallons of rainwater up there!

Had some strange power fluctuations last night with the rain too.  It wasn’t wildly out of control, and it was raining pretty good last night, so I took the lazy way out, and just started turning things off.  I figured it could fluctuate all it wanted if we weren’t using it right?  That’s something else we need to get completely familiar with: electricity.

Sy was completely worn out last night.  As soon as Doug and Andrea got back from their IGO event, and got back to their campsite, the kids went nuts.  The middlest and the boy both wanted to see their dog, Oliver.  (I love calling him Oreo when I talk about him to the kids – they think I’m a complete boob that can’t remember anything, and all three in this unified sing-song voice say “Daa-aad!  It’s Ahhhh-livvveeeerrrrrr”) too funny.

Sy got lost.  Well, he didn’t think he was, but he slipped out of sight, and it took about five minutes to find him.  He walked over to the bathroom to play hide-and-seek (he says “hide-and-sneak”).  had no idea why we were all in a tizzy when we finally converged on him.  Andrea asked what he was doing, and he said he needed her to go into the bathroom with him.  She said she was a girl, and he could come with her into the girls’ room, and he said “but, I a boy.  I go into dis one”.  That was right when I got there, so I made sure he could get the door open.  Then stood outside the stall while he insisted I go away, because “he can do it”.  He and I had a talk when he was done, about him wandering off.  He assured me that he wasn’t scared, wasn’t lost, wasn’t hurt, and could leave camp whenever he wanted.  I let him know I was willing to compromise, and give him more leash, but he had to keep me informed.  (and yes, I have conversations like that with my three year old) of course, it sounded more like “ok Sy, I’ll let you go when you want to, but you have to tell me first, because Daddy gets scared.  I thought you were lost in the woods”.  hehe.  then he assured me that there were no monsters in the woods.  and if he saw any, he would shoot them for me.  whatta guy.

So anyway, we had some venison chili at Doug and Andrea’s campsite.  Very tasty.  I didn’t realize when I was eating it that it was venison, but, I kind of had my suspicions.  Tasty all the same!  Doug and I talked more about camping, and organization, and a couple of the finer benefits of towing your home.  (he mentioned a very peaceful nap on the side of the road, sitting in his camping chair, overlooking a very pretty mountainside view).

hehe.  I don’t know what the girls were talking about.  Handsoaps and low-fat recipes, I suppose.  I like talking “generators”.