Our last evening in the wilderness was a lot of fun.  The neighbors, I shall call them the TMI’s (and they know why, no one makes me blush…ever!!), came over for dinner, drinks and fun.  We had all 3 in abundance but, then, we always do at camp which is why we’re all always so sad to have to go home.  I know I probably make us all sound like total drunks but really that’s such a harsh word.  I would say the worst we get to is, perhaps, “tipsy.”

I had been planning to pack up before bed so that Duhdee and Grampa could go fishing guilt-free the next morning but that didn’t work out exactly as planned.  You see, instead, I went to sleep.  I gave melatonin to Monkey (as usual), BOTH of the dogs and myself and then we all slept straight through the night, yay!  Of course, that meant we had to pack up in the morning which killed any chance of fishing.  It all worked out though.  We needed the sleep and it ended up pouring just as we finished packing the car.  If we’d started any later would would have gotten totally soaked rather than just uhhh…soaked…  My shirt was still damp 4 hours later when we got home.

Normally, the ride takes about 5 hours, we did it in less than 4!  We weren’t speeding…we just didn’t hit any traffic and we didn’t have to stop.  Both the kid and the dogs made it the whole way without needing a bathroom break!  Woah, baby.  Of course, we also had an incentive to keep moving.  Something is wrong with the blower motor in the truck so although the A/C was running fine the cooled air wasn’t being blown into the truck.  We had the windows down as much as possible but it was still sunny and in the upper 80’s so that was not very effective.  Not effective enough to keep Duhdee comfortable, at least, and an uncomfortable Duhdee is a crabby Duhdee.  Fun.

We had been telling Monkey as we were packing that we were going home and expected some anxiety.  We thought he’d be eager to leave, he’d been mentioning “home” for a day and a half by this point, but that was not the case.  He kept telling us “No, campt!”  He did finally come around once the truck was packed but then he switched from protesting our imminent departure to “OMG WHY HAVEN”T WE LEFT YET!!”  Which is always nice.

Our arrival home was predictibly cwappy.  Monkey’s transitions are often stressful and this one was no different.  He was a crying, snotty mess while we unpacked.  He didn’t settle down until I was in my pajamas and we spent some quality cuddle time in the big bed.

Now who wants to go break it to him that he has to go to school tomorrow?  Anyone??  Please???

At first I thought maybe it was his thunder-phobia but I took him outside and there was nothing but millions of stars for miles and miles.  There wasn’t even a single cloud in sight.  Just after I reassured him that there was nothing out there to be scared of something stepped on a dried branch in the woods and sent us both scurrying for the door.  Ultimately we gave him a sedative that we normally reserve for thunderstorms but I still lost a good 3 hours of sleep trying to get him to settle down and stop trying to squish himself into spaces that were much too small for him.

This morning, for something new, Duhdee and Grampa went fishing!  They got up early, as usual, but the oppressively hot weather here finally broke overnight and then this morning it poured.  They eventually left around 8:30 and Monkey and I got up at 10:30! Yes, TEN THIRTY!!!  Of course, that threw off the meals and meds schedule but whatever.  I needed that sleep!

We took a quick turn through town in Grammy’s van to see if there were any yard sales but I guess the morning rain caused some cancellations.  We did manage to find 3 deer and a moose in our travels so we didn’t get skunked.  Oh, wait, we kind of did.  Someone had hit one in town recently and the smell was noteworthy. Yuck.

The neighbors are coming over for dinner again tonight.  We’ll be having the 3 brook trout that Grampa and Duhdee have caught over the last couple of days, teriyaki steak, garden salad, pasta salad with shrimp and banana cake for dessert.  And, of course, Maine Blueberry Lemonade *grin.* I’m going to try to avoid another whipped cream incident.  I don’t need to remind Grammy that she hasn’t yet exacted revenge with only one day left!

Today, I don’t know if they caught any keepers, small ones or if they were totally skunked.  I neither asked nor listened if the topic arose.   But, as I’ve heard my dad say before, the worst day on the lake is better than the best day at work…and even I would have to agree with that.  So, I’m sure they had a great time. In fact, let’s just assume that.  I don’t feel like asking now.

While they were out on the lake, Monkey was stubbornly refusing to do anything at all.  I have been taking him to the dock so Grampa and Duhdee can pick him up for a couple hours on the lake but when I asked him yesterday he told me, “No, Mommy.  Stay here, upstairs.”  So, that’s pretty much what we did.  He played with some of his toys for a while but mostly just wanted to hug on me.  I can handle a few hours of that!

In the evening, after dinner, we decided we needed to go into town for ice cream since we had not been in for ice cream yet.  We took some, uh, bread…the ends that no one eats…for the ducks.  There is a pond behind the ice cream shop with hundreds of ducks in it.  Back when I was a kid, the shop sold bags of cracked corn for $.50 a bag so you could feed the ducks.  Then the flock grew and grew leaving lots and lots of duck poop all over the lawn and polluting the waterline so they stopped doing that.  People will still sometimes bring their own food so the flock never disappears but it’s nowhere near as large as it used to be and the back lawn is marginally cleaner.

I can’t recall off the top of my head if Monkey has ever been to feed ducks before.  It’s pretty much banned everywhere these days because of the mess the ducks (and the inevitable Canada Geese) make.  I get it. I hate parks covered in duck and goose poop and I know you don’t want to make wildlife dependent on humans either but it does seem like such an innocent childhood thing to do and it’s kind of sad that it’s not done, IMO.  Regardless, we took our own bread and Monkey had a great time.  He thought it was hilarious to watch the ducks scramble around trying to get a bite of bread.  A few of the braver ones, including 2 ducklings from this year’s brood, came up on land and ate from our hands.  The ducklings, in fact, were really aggressive bordering on threatening.  I think they might have gone for our toes if we hadn’t coughed up the bread!

After we finished the ice cream and ran out of bread we beat a hasty retreat to “Grammy’s van” for an hour of moosin’.  We had a nice ride and we saw 2 moose (also, a deer, as a bonus.)  The best part of the trip though was when Monkey totally messed with Grampa, lol.  “Grammy’s van” has a bunch of drop down doors to storage areas on the ceiling between the driver’s seat and the front passenger’s seat.  Monkey kept saying, “Grampa, open!” and Grampa would open a door.  Monkey would then reply, “Noooo!” in this “You’re so silly!” tone.  Then he would try again, “Grampa, open!”  Grampa tried every door, several times, and got the same reply each time.  After a few minutes we were all laughing so hard it was hard for Grampa to talk.  Monkey was very amused with himself.

Oh!  Dinner last night was very good!  I’ve discovered my new favorite summer cocktail, “Maine Blueberry Lemonade.”  It’s Stoli Blueberi vodka, lemonade and a few squished blueberries in the bottom.  Mmmm, yum!  We had crab fondue for an appetizer, I had a sirloin and Duhdee had duck.  Gosh, I hope it we weren’t out feeding the duck’s siblings today…

What else?  Let’s see, Grampa had a birthday!  He is now ___!  And he retires in 7 months!  Go, Grampa!  We had chocolate cake!  And a, uh, scented candle for … Monkey to blow out?  Grampa didn’t seem to mind too badly   It was way too hot for birthday candles and the cake was too small to support the proper number anyway, lol.

Then, Grampa, Duhdee and Monkey went fishing!  The newly repaired boat is finally, really and truly, repaired!  Woot!  They were able to get out on the lake for the first day of actual fishing on Day 7 and Grampa caught a salmon.  Then, we ate it.  They went back out today and caught a brook trout as a group effort.  Somehow this brook trout managed to hook itself on Grampa or Duhdee’s hook and then went and got Duhdee or Grampa’s hook caught on the hook already in its mouth.  They’re both laying claim to it but I’ve already told them that I don’t care who caught it.  I’m eating it!  Monkey reeled in his first fish today too!!  Duhdee caught it on video.  I’m not sure if I’ll be able to share it or not yet.

While the menfolk were out fishing I amused myself by doing 3 loads of laundry at the un-air-conditioned laundromat, can you stand the excitement?  Heh.  I did get a chance to read, uninterrupted, for an hour and a half!   That, I liked.

Last night, after another day of brutal weather, Grampa, Auntie, Monkey, Duhdee and I went swimming in the pond.  The little minnows were very hungry, apparently, they were practically swarming.  If they were longer than 1”and had teeth of any real size they could have been scary.  Monkey loved the pond, of course.  After a dip we took a spin on some of the dirt roads around the pond and on the ridge behind it looking for wildlife.  All we found was more dust so Grampa had to wash Grammy’s van when we got back.

Today, while the menfolk were out fishing, again, Grammy, Auntie and I went to the nearby Strawberry Festival.  There’s a community garage sale, lots of arts and craft booths and, of course, the strawberry shortcake tent.  There is a gentleman, who is there every year, who makes the coolest wooden planes, trucks, trains, skidders, bulldozers, etc.  If it has an engine and a little boy would obsess over it this guy makes it.  They’re so cool!  Monkey has one of his 6 foot long wooden trains (it’s massive) and a car carrier (the top layer actually folds out so you can drive the little wooden cars on and off of it!) from past years and today I added a tractor-trailer.  The trailer is actually a bank, very nifty.

We ended up spending a little over an hour there checking out all the tents and then we scarfed down our shortcakes in the one shady spot we could find.  In the firehouse with the ambulance (singular!), fire truck (singular!) and rescue boat (singular!) This is a small town, lol.

Tonight Duhdee and I have dinner reservations for our date night.  The restaurant is in an old log lodge overlooking the lake.  It’s not air-conditioned so we’ve got a table on the upper deck.  Of course, now, it’s starting to look like rain.  Figures!

Hmmm, maybe I’ll even try to post some of these blogs I have built up!  There’s really not a lot to do in town on a date night, lol.

The first bit of trail was really muddy which is totally Monkey’s thang.  “Splash!” is a near constant refrain here.    The rest of the trail was dusty, dusty, dusty.  It hasn’t rained here for a while and it definitely showed.  Grampa’s eyes were bothering him because he wasn’t wearing goggles and he rode the whole way home at the back of the 4 quad caravan.  He had goggles.  He chose not to wear them.  I wonder if they clashed with his outfit.

The dust didn’t really bother my eyes but, hours later, I’m still blowing dirt out of my nose and the insides of my elbows are not even remotely skin colored.  A good shower and a box of tissues will fix that.  I’m not sure I’ll ever regain feeling in either my @$$ or my arms though.  Not that I need those, right?

After breakfast there are hours and hours of playing ball.  The best part is that there are so many grown-ups around that there is a new one to step in each time he exhausts one!  Yay for endless playmates!  If playing ball ever gets boring (hey, it could happen) there are always rocks needing to be thrown into the brook, butterflies to be chased and dogs to be teased.  Earlier Grampa dug out a beach ball about ¾’s the size of the Monkey-man so the chances of ball playing getting to be boring today are slim to none.  I’m not going to break that bit of news to my nephew who has been on ball duty for 3 hours now.  Oh, to be 18 again!  Ha!

Have ya’ll ever had a Trashcan Turkey?  I know how it sounds but it is yummy!  The turkey is placed vertically on a spit stuck into the ground.  A small galvanized trashcan is placed upside down over the turkey.  Then BBQ briquettes are placed around the outside base of the trashcan and on top of the inverted can and it’s left to cook for a couple of hours.

I’m a little vague on deciding the doneness of the turkey but I know it involves either the beginning or cessation of some noise or other.  Clearly, I’m not a qualified trashcan chef.   Fortunately, there are a number of folks here with us who do know how the process works.   No one of us has ever died from food poisoning after consuming one so they must know what they’re doing, right?  One year the poor little turkey came out rather…mummified…but the technique has since been refined.

Lunch will be a well-executed potluck -style meal for, errr, 12, I think.  Trashcan turkey, pasta salad, stuffing and strawberry cupcakes with cream cheese frosting are on the menu.  There will probably be other stuff too, if there is one thing we know how to do here it is eat.   Oh, and drink.  Cocktails will start on the deck at lunch today; and will continue until bedtime, lol.

I’m hoping bedtime comes a little bit earlier tonight than it did last night.  After putting Monkey to bed about ½ hour late we all went about our business.  Around 10 PM he called me upstairs, I tried to get him to sit by the campfire but it was a no-go.  I think he was freaked out by the dark.  “Dark” up here, far from any town, is a lot darker than “dark” at home surrounded by thousands and thousands of homes and streetlights.  I’m fairly sure he never got more than two hours of uninterrupted sleep.

I wonder if there is any chance he’ll nap?  Not really.  I’m acutely aware that he’ll be up until 7:30 or 8 again tonight, no matter how painful it is for all involved.

**Updated later**

Cocktails started promptly but the turkey took a bit longer than expected.  That is my excuse for, uh, smearing whipped cream in MY MOTHER’S FACE shortly after we finished.  In my (very limited) defense, she had been laughing at me because my perfectly styled whipped cream had just fallen off my cupcake and landed on the counter.  She was totally dissing me, within arms-reach even, and I had had cocktails (plural!)  I’m an awful daughter.  She’s promised revenge, though, so at least we know where I get it from.

One might think I would have gone down to greet them, and I totally would have but…did you catch that bit about the wine?  I probably would have hurt myself.   Used to be, I could have had the entire bottle and managed the stairs but I’m all “grown up” now and my tolerance is not what it once was.  So, I decided I would just apologize in the morning.  Not that either of them gave a hoot.

I’m not entirely sure my nephew was even conscious enough this morning to realize we weren’t all just bits of his own personal nightmare but he was a good egg and joined Grampa, Jr. and Sr. out on the boat. Though, ultimately, the day of fishing was a failure.  The newly repaired boat, still not so newly repaired.  My dad is pretty bummed out.  He hasn’t spent the day on the lake since Memorial Day weekend and it looks like it will be awhile yet.  The repair shop, which is a 2 ½ hour drive from camp (each way), doesn’t reopen until Tuesday.  *Sigh*

Earlier today Monkey went in to town with Grammy and Auntie for the parade.  I had to stay home and read.  Woe is me.  After they returned we spent time riding on Grampa’s quad, chasing each other with squirt guns and throwing Monkey’s ball up on the roof.  Oh, also, I spent some time making Monkey cry.  I am so mean.  Do you want to know what I did?  It was awful.  I made water balloons.  And then…we threw them…not at him.  Just up, so they’d do what water balloons are designed to do…which is break, right?  Monkey…not a fan.  He’d throw one and then yell, “Oh, no!  What happened?”  Then he grabbed another and another and another…until he was crying and had snot running down his face.  I thought he might stop but, well, no.

Now, he’s upstairs talking to Barley though he is supposed to be sleeping.  Everyone else has gone into town for the fireworks but they start well after bedtime so we didn’t want to risk it with Monkey.  I’m going to grab one of my 18 remaining books while Duhdee plays in the fire outside.  I’d join him but I’ve hit my bug bite max for the day…maybe for the week.  I hate horseflies, but I still love vacation.

We did spend some time on the lake in Grampa’s newly “repaired” boat today.  Monkey was so, so excited.   He took what is normally Duhdee’s seat in the boat and relegated us to the back seats.  After cruising the length of the lake, the newly “repaired” boat let us know that it wasn’t quite 100%.  When Grampa left it to idle, it stalled.  And then it gave us enough trouble restarting that I asked my dad if he carried OARS.  FYI, he does not and he was not amused by the question.

He got the boat running again and we cruised the length of the lake, again.  He stopped to call the gentleman who’d “fixed” the boat while we sat enjoying the soothing sounds (and smells) of a backfiring 2 stroke engine.  Gosh, I hope no one was trying to fish, or anything.  The advice?  Uh, drive some more…faster.  So, we did.  And Monkey, at least, loved it.  He spent the entire time saying, “Grampa, splash!”  Shockingly enough, this did not magically fix the engine!  I know, right?  Whatevs.  I think Grampa fixed it once we got it back to camp.  Hopefully…since he and Duhdee are headed out fishing tomorrow at some ridiculous hour.  It would really suck if it’s going to conk out 20 miles from home again.

Monkey was not entirely excited when we got home but when I tried to say goodbye before Duhdee and I left to go in town for some (more) groceries he nearly melted down, “I wan stay here!” Fine by me!  It gave us a chance to scarf down some gourmet Whoopie Pies (almost) unobserved.  Yum!  There is at least one gentleman in town fully aware of what massive dorks Duhdee and I are.  He witnessed the splitting of the Whoopie Pies in the parking lot and was still laughing at us when we drove off.  I guess, if I were truly embarrassed, I wouldn’t have waved at him when I first realized he was laughing at us.

Tonight, after a dinner of moose steak (really and truly, Grampa shot it, even), salad and peas from our garden at home we uh…sat….and talked….and uh….had two glasses of wine.   OK, I had two glasses of wine.  Happy?  Now we’re just sitting here, trying like hell to stay conscious until a reasonable hour.

Now someone is, oh, never mind.  I was going to say, someone is shooting a gun off nearby and, to prove we’re not at home, no one is the least bit worried.  Not that it would matter if we were, 911…not so much here.  But, I was informed it’s just fireworks.  So…disregard.

Oh, look!  It’s 9:30.  All the coolest kids go to bed at 9:30 on a Friday night, right?  Oh, shut up.  We are so not old!

• One recent morning, I asked Monkey if he was hungry and he said, “Hungy, capiller.”  “Are you a hungry caterpillar?”  “Yes!”  Hee.  He then informed me that hungry caterpillars eat “Crunch (Cinnamon Toast Crunch), milk, and ‘gurt (yogurt.)”  Who knew?  It certainly wasn’t in the book I read.
• One recent evening, he was reading The Very Hungry Caterpillar to me and said…”Booful, buffly!”  Which, is not new, what was new was when followed up that statement with “Mommy, two bufflies.”  There weren’t but that’s the first time he’s ever used a plural and he nailed it!
• One distant evening, we took Monkey out for dinner at our favorite restaurant.  As we walked up to the door, he saw an elderly gentleman standing by the door.  Instead of hiding he looked the man square in the face and said, “Hi, Grampy!”
• After he greeted this complete stranger so nicely, he then knocked on the door to the restaurant rather than walking right in.  Now we just need to convince him that he doesn’t have to knock at a restaurant but that he should knock on the bathroom door at home…
• After we opened the door for him, he walked in and greeted each of the servers and the hostess at the hostess stand.  He also greeted every person we walked past on our way to our booth.  He greeted the cute high school girls sitting in the booth behind Duhdee several times…naturally.
• When we were in a toy store recently, Monkey picked a toy off the shelf.  It was a craft activity and, under normal circumstance, I would have bought it for him  just because he asked but I thought it was going to be a little too difficult for him to do and would frustrate him/go to waste so I said no.  Once I convinced him that we were not going to buy that craft, he pouted and refused all other suggested replacements.  He’s never done that before!  Most people wouldn’t cheer that but it is more developmentally advanced that we’ve seen in the past.  So, yay!
• Monkey has picked up a new saying.  Actually, he’s picked a few  new sayings but  most are not appropriate so…we’ll skip those. Though one of the really, highly inappropriate ones (that he saves for traffic jams) secretly cracks me up.  The one that he says all the time, that openly cracks me up, is “Oh, dear!”  He says it whenever anything goes wrong, unless it’s traffic related.  It’s such an old man thing to say, I find it endlessly amusing.
• Another saying that we heard recently that struck my funny bone is “Hi, fella!”  No idea where he picked that one up but he used it when talking to Copper which seems appropriate.  He said it in such a sweet voice too.
• I’ve been asking Monkey if he will let me cut his hair for a while now.  His hair, when it’s wet, comes down below his shoulders!  Good thing it’s so curly!  I’ve asked him so many times that he has a very emphatic “No” that he uses each time I ask now.  When I ask him if he likes his hair short or long, he tells me “wong.”  So, I guess he now has an opinion on his hairstyle.
• He’s started dressing himself more frequently and he has style opinions in that department as well.  The rule is, if it is seasonally appropriate, he can wear whatever he picks.  It makes my eyes cross some days to let him out of the house but we wanted him to be more independent…
• Speaking of more independent, he’s started refusing to hold our hands when we’re out and about.  Remembering the days when he was so uncertain about everything that he kept a death grip on my index finger whenever we left the house, it’s hard to believe that he actually refuses to hold hands at times.  If it’s safe, his preference is to walk a few feet in front of us now too.  I thought we had another 7 or 8 years before we had that particular issue pop up.  No matter how desperately I want him to gain that independence, my heart is not quite ready for this sight…

Phew.  OK, now I can clear out my “Draft Post” folder!  Go me!

Is that vague enough to pass the internet security test?  Just in case it is not, for any would be thieves who may be lurking on the world wide web, or masquerading as “friends” on Facebook (I’ve got my eye on a couple of ya’ll), we’re leaving a rabid, wolf-hybrid loose in the house with no access to food.  It won’t kill him, it will just make you taste extra delicious should you slip by 1. our amazing neighbors who will e-mail us as soon as you set foot out of your car and 2. Grampy who, I must warn you, is hopped up on some serious steroids at the moment and thinks he’s Superman.  So, there are probably easier pickings in the nearby mall parking lot, FYI.  Though, really, GET A JOB…geeze.

I will still have my CrackBerry and I’ll do my best to keep you all posted on Monkey’s adventures somewhere or other…perhaps…sneaky people we are…in our very own backyard!  Perhaps this is all an elaborate ruse to catch bad guys doing bad things.  Who knows, we may have a whole TEAM of police officers camping out in our living room just WAITING for you.

So.  Later gators…or not…mwah, ha, ha!