We went camping again this weekend, our second time this season. This time, the group was mixed with both parents and non-parents. (In my younger days, I used to call these different groups: people and people with kids; it’s sad how times have changed.) The campground, Samuel P. Taylor state park, was set on the side of a hill in a great big redwood forest. As a result the sun went down at about two o’clock, and I mistook this to mean it was already happy hour. We started eating guacamole and drinking beer early, and it made for quite a night.
By the time the kids went down to sleep, we were good and drunk, roasting marshmallows and playing a dangerous game of “That’s what she said.” I joined in the fracas, but became confused when I had a fleeting thought that two of the women there were lesbians. (I couldn’t tell whether they were lesbians or not, as it was getting cold and EVERYONE was wearing jeans and flannel shirts.) How does one approach saying, “That’s what she said” when some of the listeners are gay? I struggled with this metaphysical dilemma for exactly five minutes before my beer and wine induced mental narcolepsy hit and eliminated all traces of thought.
One by one, the parents with kids there peeled off and went to their tents to either respond to a crying baby or prepare for an early morning crying baby. I would like to note that Amy and I were the last parents standing, but quickly faded when the non-parents exclaimed with glee that it was only 10:30 and that there was plenty of night left to party. Amy and I immediately thought, “10:30! Woa, it’s way past our bedtime.” We immediately withdrew to our tent.
Nobody slept much that night, because our campsite was overrun by a never-ending gaze of raccoons. (Yes, I looked it up; a group of raccoons is called a gaze. Bust that out at a party and you will be championed conversationalist of the night!) When I first heard the raccoons, a mere ten feet from our tent, I figured they would eat whatever was left at the table and then move on. When the sounds of rummaging through all our belongings did not subside, I poked my head out of the tent and flashed our flashlight at them. They turned to me, and sauntered off, as if to say, “alright boys, the gig is up, let’s get outta here.”
In reality, they just went and got their bigger, tougher friends. By the time that I got back into my sleeping bag, a larger group was making quick work of everything they could get their dirty little fingers on. They must have found something crispy, because I could hear the crunch of their tiny little jaws like someone was crinkling paper in my ear. I poked my head out of the tent again, and when the flashlight trick didn’t work, I began throwing dirt and pine needles at them. Now, I don’t know what raccoon laughter sounds like, but I am pretty sure they laughed at me, “Look at fatso! He thinks he scare us by throwing soft pine needles at us! Oooh scary!!!” This pissed me off ( I have a history with raccoons) and I got out of the tent to physically remove them from the premises if need be. They casually left the campground, looking back over their shoulders to see if I had gone back to the tent yet. When I finally was back in the in my sleeping bag (AKA my fart locker), I heard them again, and decided that I was outmatched, outwitted and was going to let them have their way.
I eventually fell asleep, and I when we woke the next morning, the damage was quite astonishing. They had pried some chips out of the storage container, unzipped a cooler and ravaged the yogurt and milk, and rifled through the garbage that we had neglected to throw in the dumpster. It was dirty, messy, exhausting, but fun. And that’s what she said.
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