Mud!

Tried to take a van into town today, was planning on running the five miles back to camp, but sadly weather conditions did not cooperate. It rained a lot more than I had realized last night, and dry dusty roads were transformed into nightmares of brown puddles and deep mud. I was piloting the van with all of the skill and excellence one might expect from the talented pillar of glory that is David Dentinger, when I came around a corner and observed Abigail Johnston (her backstory will be unveiled in an upcoming entry) spinning the wheels of the camp's F350. Her difficulties in the four wheel drive truck crippled my confidence in my driving arts, so I made a speedy retreat back to camp, although I will say the quarter mile of driving in reverse on island roads was a very nice piece of vehicle operation. If you'd seen it you would have been impressed. The van had been meant to transport a new crew of volunteers and some staff returning from time off, including the infamous womanizer Jimmy Kirkham, but the depth of mud proved too much for even the F350. And so it was that Becky summoned a shoreboat and saved the day.

Also I watched Season of the Witch. Was not impressed.

Gunfight at Upper Boys Camp Field

So this weekend the site manager's son Tommy Kern had some friends over and they had spent the afternoon running around engaging in a lengthy cycle of spraying airsoft pellets at each other and pausing behind cover for the arduous reloading process. My roommate Phillip and I were walking by and immediately came under heavy fire from the guns of the renegade children, and had to make a rapid tactical retreat to our cabin, as we ran screaming back to the porch of Riptide, we noticed that a whole bunch of student volunteers were standing around gawking at something, and we halted, panting heavily and stared out across the field toward the High Ropes course to find a bison grazing. Not wanting to spook the beast we took a moment to caution children and college students alike from approaching much closer, and it was then that Tommy's mother, Holly Kern, arrived on the scene. Clad in her foul weather gear and a beanie, and with both hands in her front jacket pockets, she strode up quietly and stepped into the circle of her son, his three friends, and myself. I didn't take note of the fact that she wasn't saying much or even that she wore a pair of yellow safety glasses, but drew forth her hands and revealed her twin airsoft pistols, her murderous intent became explicitly obvious. I ducked and ran for cover, knowing that a duel of stunning ferocity was about to ensue, and I was not to be disappointed, for within moments, the sounds and screams of a pitched airsoft skirmish filled the air.

Tales of the Bike Tour

Touring on Bikes

Hey it's me, I'm still alive, been a bit busy lately hence the silence.

I have recently returned from a monstrous bike trip up the coast of California, and find myself writing from my grandparent's home in Cupertino, CA. As a man who can write thousands of words to describe a single day (and does so regularly on this blog) I now find myself struggling to overcome the ultimate blogging challenge; brevity. In lieu of a more detailed account of events that occurred on this trip, I shall merely impart a few excerpts of particularly memorable instances on the tour.

One of the primary by-products of the great and worthy adventure from which I have just returned is the acquisition of a road bike. I was assisted in my online search for a bike by Becky Morrow, Julie Baweja, and Danny Sudman, the latter of whom can claim the honor of locating my bike in Mission Viejo. I purchased it for a wallet-compressing 500 dollars, which admittedly was less than most of the other people on the tour were forced to spend. The bike which came to rule the next 18 days of my life following its purchase was painted a distinctive blue and white, with red accents and red tires, thus making it the most patriotic of the vehicles on the trip. Being the incorrigible ass that I am, I promptly named the bike in honor of the most reviled American politician in recent history; Richard D. Nixon, Tricky Dick for short.

Having never ridden a road bike before, I had little concept of what to expect upon mounting up for the first time, on the second day of the trip after a few minor repairs were made (new clamp for seat pole and new bottom bracket). I will say I was somewhat apprehensive about the diminutive size of the seat that came with it, but my comrades assured me that such frugal seating technology is the mark of a truly exceptional cyclist. And so I mounted up on my bike that day in the bright sunshine of Santa Monica. We then rode off to the North, passing through the luxurious residences that dot the coast of Malibu, the cliffs soaring overhead. Some other stuff happened, and then...