let it snow, let it snow, let it snow

so it's been snowing like crazy up here! seriously it's a bit crazy arctic winds blowing through ice rain and now a few feet of snow...ahhhh -7 is more like -20 with wind chill! bah!!

this is a picture of my little lane- or housing development

Happy Thanksgiving

I'm really thankful for Day Camp. I definitely got more from that experience than I gave. More than any other place -- and I'm including high school, college, and the Forest Club, Ukiah's most notorious drinking establishment -- Day Camp grew me up.

But these are strange times for this good group. The Day Camp Yachting Club, whose membership is restricted to past directors, sorry, has been oddly quiet for this time of year. In years past, long before now, Burt, Shaggie, Muppet, and I would have been tossing around ideas for a Day Camp New Years party. This year, the yachts are lonely in the harbor.

Let's ignore the obvious fact that I could easily sack up and start resolving this by, you know, just e-mailing those three (plus Who now, of course). Here's why I'm not. Here's why none of us are: Day Camp is growing up and moving on.

This is a fact that's sad for obvious reasons and really, really cool for less obvious ones.

Burt first worked Day Camp in 1997. 1997! That's like 20 years ago. And no matter how cool the really cool counselors of 2006 are, some distance and fragmenting is kind of unavoidable there. From what little I've gathered from the pretty-darn-reliable grapevine, the über-tight Day Camp girls of 2000-2002 (Fragment #1) are pulling their own group together to do adult-type things like trade Tupperware and fill out mortgage applications. Which is cool. It wouldn't surprise me, especially given this, to find out that DC06 (Fragment #3) wanted to do its own thing too.

Which leaves Gator's Fragment. (Yeah, I know, "Fragment #2," would make a lot more sense, but c'mon, please?) I should've taken the lead on this and made sure anybody who wanted to reconnect had a place and a time for it. I haven't because in a lot of ways it feels like Day Camp The Experience has been dying a pretty natural death since last summer, and why should any of us call an ambulance?

It's just that I really want to make sure that Day Camp The Experience, the New Years Extravaganza, and even this blog are here to serve us; not the other way around. To the extent that these things have made community easier for all of us friends, I say great. But I'm not about to shed a tear or feel guilty over Day Camp The Experience, over New Years parties, or over this blog. These things have been great for us, but let's all acknowledge how cool it is that even the best things grow and fade and end. I'll continue to be good friends with the Day Campers I'm already good friends with long after these things are gone. Let's not force friendship or feel guilty about a fragmented Day Camp, a canceled New Years party, or a blog that kinda limps along these days.

After all that, I just want to say, my bad for not taking point on this. Do you guys want to get together this New Years? Seriously. If there's enough interest, say 15 people, I'll make the invitations, buy the streamers, stock the Kool-Aid bar, and look into housing. A cabin around MH, maybe. Someone's parents' home somewhere else. (Heyyyy, aren't Scout's parents out of the country?!) I know it would be so so fun to say hi to Hula (for example), but even if that doesn't happen this year or ever again, I'll have nothing but fond things to say about her when Jav, Fish, and I get together to gamble on cockfights late December.

This is easy. The Yachting Club is suddenly open to everybody. If you want to get together, let's talk about it. If you don't, comments are pretty unusual these days anyway so no one's gonna be all like, hey, why the hell isn't so and so commenting? We either do this or we don't. I really want to be intentional either way, though. No matter what, thanks for the good run with you guys.

G8R

Thanksgiving Anyone?

Which of you will be at the Mount for Thanksgiving? I'll be there with my friend, Chris. I've gotta come up with a camp name for him because we're working Thanksgiving Camp. Anyone wanna hang out? You know where I'll be... ...please hang out! 530.306.9830

Spider-Tastic

I know most of you don't care, but you should! Venom, Spider-man's (Widely considered) #1 foe is going to be in Spider-Man 3! The images just leaked on the web before Sony wanted anyone to know. I was there to snag a snapshot of the video before it was silenced!

how having a DC blogger profile saved my life... at least my education.

so... as many of you know, i somehow have the most strange things in life (ever) happen to me on a fairly normal basis... some quick examples:

*i get a phonecall by a number that says it's meredith's best friend miriam ("pixie" if you remember her from camp)who actually turns out to be some random guy from eureka (gators uncle, possibly?) that asks me on a blind date to a 311 concert (turns out he's a good 20 years older than me... no thanks.)(and, no, it definitely wasn't miriam or meredith)

*at the jr high summer camp i went to with our church, another counselor comes up to me and asks if i remember breaking his heart at MH years ago by not agreeing to dance with him, and respond to his loveletter he had written me in junior high. this was back when we held dances in lakeside lodge... by the way, he lived in michigan...

and one of my recent personal favorites:
*i have had jav's phone # for the past year and a half, only to find out that jav really WASN'T joking around speaking spanish every time i called (like i thought,) the number 7(EIGHT)7-206-8213 actually belongs to a guy in PUERTO RICO...

so i guess it really shouldn't come as much of a suprise to me when i found out that my lost design project turned up... in IRAQ.

really, only i would lose my homework an have it end up in iraq... but seriously... read this email:

Ally,

Kinda of a funny story...First, I figured I must have picked up your binder when I grabbed my stuff out of the seat back on my way up to Seattle. Second, I'm an Air Force Pilot in the Reserves. Now fast forward to Iraq....Air Force pilot flys a bunch of young Marines into Baghdad, before allowing them off the jet I must grab this binder in my back pack. While digging through my back pack I find your binder that doesn't not look familiar to me. I open it up and start staring at it's contents in confusion! What is this? Where did it come from? Oh, the guys are messing with me! Then I realize two of the Marines I just flew into a combat zone are laughing and making jokes about what "the Air Force guys bring with them into combat". I begin to try and explain myself, but I really have no idea what I was looking at, how it go into Iraq with me, and where and when it hitched the ride. After a little embarrassment and much laughter I decided I must make an at finding the owner of this fine work. So it stays on the trip back to the states and when we get home I Google the only clue, Your name on a luggage tag. Countless weird and freaky sites came up, just kidding. But, one of them had your name and email attached to it, from your Blogger account. So I gave it a shot.
So your binder and work have gone International...from Seattle it went to North Carolina, Germany, Iraq, San Diego, and now back to Sacto. I will try and send it to you tomorrow. Good luck explaining this one to your professor, it might be easier going with the proverbial...my dog eat it!! Take care and good luck in studies. Alex

so... i know this is long, but really... i probably would've failed this class had i not have had you amazing people that i have a desire to keep in touch with...
and i guess i owe a special thanks to gator (who began this lovely blog thing, i believe) and to bro... for calling me and telling me my "profile is boring" so that i put some information on there that now, any random guy can access.

miss you all!

Day Camp Family

To the Day Camp "Family",

I am sure you are all asking...who is this scout that is posting as though he is a part of this "family". No I am not shaggy changed his name to scout. I am that day camp counselor that use to look at this blog and use to actually communicate with those who have worked at Day Camp. I feel as though I am the child that has run away from home. Where has Scout been or what has he been doing? Why has he abandoned us for oh so long? Though I doubt I could answer all of your questions, some I can. I have been in New Jersey all summer and it was amazing. My only problem this summer was whenever I checked the day camp blog...yes I still check it every day yet never comment. Each time I checked this summer twas a new post about the summer staff. It only made me hurt and cry with saddness to not be at Day Camp this summer with all you people I love or be able to tell stories of old day camp counselors that we all miss terribly. I have returned from New Jersey trying to avoid heart ache by not looking at the post as much (this doesn't work!) So that is where I have been, though it is all a bad excuse.

Now, to clear things up that I didn't realize I left confusing. My roommates at school and myself have started a blog that we post on every few days. Who do you think were the first people I wanted to share this with...Day Camp. Not that you all have to check and/or read the blog but just so you know that I care about you all I put the other blog on there. It obviously didnt' go as planned but I hope this can clear it up. theheartofavalon.blogspot.com Check it out if you want but it is a BLOG not some creepy wicka book, Scout's honor! (I know stupid joke but i felt as though I had to put it in there)

The newest news for me is that my parents moved to Africa. They went to the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) but recently were fleeing the country to south Africa because of some rioting over election results in the country. I also have a new nephew, Milo Ross, whom I absolutely love and get to see him about once a week. I work and go to school. Nothing new there. I miss you ALL a lot and wish I could actually see you all some time. Maybe I will. That is all I can think of but expect more comments and posting from me.
I'm Out,
Scout

I give up.

Time For inFormal Apologies and Plans

I, Christopher "Spiff" Matson to permanently bury the hatchet and move forward, do hereby apologize for whining, sighing, and frowning for having to listen to the Postal Service and Death Cab For Cutie for the Summer of '04. I have recently rediscovered the music that made such a wonderful soundtrack for Craft Nights and Skit Night cleanups, and I have become obsessed with it. Sorry for getting bored with it in '04.

Second, I'm 90% sure by my plans (not God's devices) that my roommate and I will be visiting SC for Thanksgiving and shacking up at Spidey's crib, so if you're in town and want to visit, I'd love it. Thanks, mmkay?

Lastly, this is a pic of the RAs in my dorm, my roommate is the one in the dark gray hoodie with long hair. Any ladies interested? His personality reminds me of Flip...

It's Game Day

Here's to hoping (and working) for the Dems to take back the House AND the Senate.

Please go out and vote today.

Go Sheldon Whitehouse!

New Orleans

So Tuesday I go back to New Orleans...with 31 other people to gut houses and do some roofing.

Please pray.

love lark.

My First Day of School!

Ok friends. I need prayer prayer prayer!

Today at 11am stepping back into a public classroom for the first time since i graduated high school. Today is my first substitute teaching job! eeeek! It's been a long time coming, and i know a lot of you have been praying for me to reach this point - so the paper work, the transcrips, the doc. appts and the headaches are all finished... now i get to work.

but now... please pray for me and for Ms. Bayha's kindergarten class as Seibert Elementary.