I'm going camping tomorrow and I'm a little nervous. It's my first foray into camping and also into the summer music festival scene. Several months ago, I was sitting and getting all warm and fuzzy with Joe in a wine bar when I informed him that Snow Patrol was headlining the Oxegen Festival this year. Somewhere between the first and second bottle of Albarino, I was on the phone to Mark, suggesting... nay, insisting, that we book tickets for the weekend. Somehow, before the second bottle was finished, Mark, Joe, Miles and I had full camping weekend tickets. Clearly, I should drunk dial in a much different way.
In the months since we've purchased the full camping weekend, Joe has cancelled, Miles promised the tickets to his friend Chris who then sold them to another party altogether, and then Mark, who originally purchased the tickets, got the spare back and sold it to Matt, who is now sick and will be joining for the concerts but not the camping. And those are just the highlights, folks. I no longer work with Miles, Mark, and Matt, so I missed all the intervening conversations, and apparently one huge shouting match, that comprised the interstitial spaces between those milestones. So last weekend, while The Professor was here, I met with the boys to make crucial decisions on tents, transportation, preferred concerts and alcohol. Gripping for him, I'd imagine. We purchased tents and chairs and thermoses and rain gear. Oh the rain gear...
It's been miserable here lately. Coworker Clare has been watching the forecasts for me for over a week. Depending on which one you read, it's all intermittent showers to mostly raining. Today was so cold and miserable I wished I had my gloves. And then the skies cleared and I wished I had my sunglasses and lighter layers. Now that I'm sitting in the cozy house with wine and Sex and the City, Mother Nature has decided to send me a wind storm. Nothing scares me more than a wind storm. And if this is what it's like tomorrow night, I'm sleeping in the car. I consider that much harsher roughing it than sleeping on the ground. On my air mattress. Covered in 300 thread count Egyptian cotton sheets. What? I'm not going to shower for 2 days, I consider that hardship enough. No one said camping had to forsake all the creature comforts, did they? Did they?
I've asked for advice from plenty of people, who have come up aces on things I'd have never thought of, like ear plugs and a private stash of toilet paper, fresh fruit and veg and a thermos for hot coffee for the morning. Flatmate Suzie chimed in with waterproof trousers. Jenn suggested cereal bars in the backpack. I'm taking more on this little foray into the wilderness than I do on a 10 day vacation anywhere foreign. It's amazing how compact camping gear packs down but how much camping gear you need to take with you. So I'm camping in the rain this weekend. And the sun. And the mud. Keep your fingers crossed. Not for me, for the M boys who are spending the weekend with me. They might need some extra help. Talk to you next week!
Oh, and Maximus... can't get thru to your email for anything in the world. Thought you were IT in a former life. :-)
1 comment:
and that's the last time we ever heard from her again.... Some say she was swept away with the mudslide, some say she just gave up on the country and its climate and left without telling anyone... We'll never know! :-)
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