I'm baaaaaaaaaaaack!!!

Soooo, as most if not all of you know, I went to the River/Elk River/camp/heaven on earth for the last week-ish, and since I'm just cool that way I'm gonna just post a quick summary of what we did there, and...yeah. It's a lot, so be prepared. ;) Anyway, enjoy the summary of campness. :D

SUNDAY - HALF DAY
12:45 - Leave for camp, kinda sad because no one was online, so I couldn't say goodbye to anyone.
2:00 - Arrive at camp, go in and say hi to Monty (riding director), Scout (riding manager), and Winona (lifeguard), who were at the front desk. Get lice and fever checks, and basically get signed in that I'm healthy and whatever. Annoying, but it keeps people with lice out of camp and stuff. ;)
2:30 - Checks are done, drive up to horse-side and just pretty much set my stuff on a random bed. Watch some people go in and out and kind of just sit there awkwardly. Say goodbye to mom.
3:00 - Giggles (counselor) figures out that we're all really bored and awkward and decides to play games in the field with us. We play stuff like Elbow Tag, Rock, Mafia, and, after a while, Rush. Learn a couple people's names over the course of that, and figure out who all is in my cabin/group.
4:00 - Go back to the cabin and unpack. Kind of stare at the people in my cabin and make stilted conversations with the people who'll respond. Just hang out.
5:00 - Walk the mile or so down to program/wimpy/NCE/etc. side of camp for dinner.
5:45 - Do flag. Yippee. So fun. Not. The CITs do it, though, so it's not the worst EVER or anything...
6:00 - Go into dinner, where we have these beef tacos and a couple other things. It's delicious. :D Sit with a couple people from my cabin.
6:30: Do capers/clean-up jobs/chores. I was the scraper. Don't know why you'd need to know that.
7:00 - Capers are done and we went down to campfire, where we did this really lame skit that I'm not even going to tell you about because it was so lame. Figured out that our specialist was Redd (YAY).
9:00 - Campfire's over, and we walk up to horse side in the dark. Go into Pinto (our cabin) and get ourselves ready for bed, also sort of talking with the people in the cabin.
10:00 - Flashlight time. Figure out that my flashlight's totally dead. Darn.

MONDAY
7:00 - Giggles walks in and wakes us up. We get dressed, not too tired since we all slept well.
7:20 - Head up to program side for flag/breakfast. We're all wearing our jeans and carrying our boots, sunscreen, bug spray, and water bottles. It's still about a mile or two from our cabins to Grey Koch (pronounced "grey coach"), the dining place. Some steep hills, but nothing too bad.
7:45 - Flag. The little kids do it today, so it takes forever and we're all starving.
8:10 - Ten minutes late for breakfast because of the slow little kids. The hoppers are being impatient. Whatever to them. ANYWAY we go into breakfast and eat. It's these amazing apple cinnamon muffins, toast, milk, orange juice, oatmeal, etc, etc. Good meal. We do capers.
9:00 - Go back down to horse side and basically learn how to mount and dismount, like it's possible to forget that sort of thing. Saddle Cowboy a few times to practice, and learn the quick-release in our spare time. My feet hurt from wearing the boots for 1.5 hours straight. Then we spread hay in the pastures (easy barn chore, for ONCE. Redd isn't lazy like Freckles is. Heehee.)
12:00 - Get to lunch. Eat lunch. It was Italian dunkers with some stuff. Do capers.
1:00 - "Me time", so I read my book for a while and write a letter, then get mad because I can't find my envelopes, which sucks.
2:00 - Go down to Lake Barbara (Barbie) for swimming. Take the swim test, where you swim the 100 feet or so to the middle of the pool/lake, tread water for a minute, then swim the rest of the way out to Winona, who gives you the last of the wristbands. They're these weird Church Mutual ones because they're running out of wristbands. Swim in the 2.5-foot-deep shallow end for the rest of the time.
4:00 - After taking a shower, go up to low ropes and do both the ropes course and the "Raging River", as well as Willow in the Wind and trust falls. A bunch of team-building stuff.
5:30 - Go back up to Grey Koch for flag and dinner, which consists of chicken strips and a bunch of sides. I sit with a bunch of people from my cabin--who I now know as Carly, Syl(via), Sam, and Megan--as well as Limbo and Andi and Sarah, who's 9 years old and not even 3 feet tall, weighing in at about half the weight of Veronica, my almost-3-year-old cousin. Not kidding; that girl is TINY.
6:45 - Practically fly down to horse side and go to the horse barn, where we got helmets and like spaz out for a little while, even though I become exempt from the spazzing when Redd walks up to me and goes, "Hey, Emily, are you OK with riding Denali again? Freckles said you were really good with her, and this is a level lower than you're used to, so you might be the only one that'd be able to control her..." Say yes, of course, since I love Denali (OKAY SO I'M BIASED NOW BECAUSE OF SOMETHING THAT HAPPENED LATER. SHUDDUP. :P).
7:10 - Groom and saddle Denali, not to mention Cowboy and Sampson because their riders are totally inept at saddling. Hug Denali hello and play with her mane while waiting for the slowpokes that STILL aren't done. Talk to Sam, who's riding Cookie-Jay (the name's a long story that I'm not explaining).
7:15 - Start walking. Denali's about 5th (out of 11). We do a few patterns, no trotting or anything yet. Serpentine, figure-8, centerline and crossline, 180 and 360, stuff like that. Would be pretty boring, but nothing's ever boring with Denali.
9:00 - Go back to the cabins and chillax for an hour or so. Nothing too spectacular.

TUESDAY
7:00 - Wake up and get ready for the day. Check the agenda and talk to Sam and Megan. Get dubbed "Erin" by this girl, Courtney, who decided that I don't look like an Emily and instead look like an Erin. Colleen (Courtney's friend) and Courtney decide to call me only Erin for the whole week.
7:45 - Get to Grey Koch. We do flag, and I'm the caller. Go into breakfast, which is eggs and sausage. Camp sausage is the BEST. Anyway, then we do capers.
9:00 - Head back to horse side to groom, saddle, and ride. We trot today, and to my surprise Denali doesn't once slip into a canter. Redd gives me some pointers on my posture, but otherwise looks kind of shell-shocked. I think it's for the same reason I'm surprised. On the other hand, horses like Alaska and Cowboy (both of whom are the wimpiest, easiest horses ever) canter for a few strides each. Alaska wouldn't canter unless you kicked him REALLY hard when he was already at a trot.
12:00 - Go eat lunch, which consisted of a ham wrap, Cheetos, an apple, and my water.
1:00 - Me time. Read my book and talk.
2:00 - Go swimming with Sam and Megan. Deep end's closed for half the time because supposedly a couple people're going to take the swim test, but of course they wimp out. Swim for about an hour and a quarter in the freezing cold water, which is about 10 degrees warmer in the deep end, which opened an hour into that time. Then take a (warm!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!) shower and dry off.
4:00 - Do archery. I got it into the red (right outside the bullseye ring) twice, the black (next one out) four times, and the white (next one out) twice. Used a lefty bow for like 2 shots, both of which totally shot off into the weeds. Great job, Emily (or Erin, as about half of my cabin-mates have taken to calling me).
5:30 - Flag and dinner. Seriously having mental problems and forgot what we had. Sorry.
6:45 - Walk down to horse side for chores. We scooped hay in the pasture.
8:00 - Horse science was supposed to start, but instead we continued to scoop hay. Redd was just like "What color is [horse name]?" a few times. I knew them all, and decided to shut up after a few answers. Then, when no one else knew, I started answering again to put Redd out of her misery.
9:00 - Head back to the cabins and get ready for bed. Read about 4 pages in my book and write a letter. Still can't find the stupid envelopes.
10:00 - Flashlight time. Mine is still dead.

WEDNESDAY
6:00 - Guess what? We got to wake up reeeally early today to ride. We get ready.
7:00 - Arrive at the horse barn and saddle up a couple horses. Does no one in my group know how to tie a four-knot? I now officially hate leather latigos. They suck.
7:10 - With my help, we saddle up in only 10 minutes and are off. We go on a trail ride, and I coax Denali into a triple-space, then (with only one klick [yes that's how you spell it]) I get her to trot for a few strides. I'm the 2nd horse, right behind Redd, who's riding Simon. Simon's a really pretty frosted App (or maybe a bay roan...but I think he's an App [for those who don't know, frosted Apps and bay roans look exactly the same, just are different breeds]) and he hates it when people are up his butt, but walks at a good pace. ANYWAY, Redd just laughed at me and told me that I had good control and much better posture.
8:10 - Done with the trail ride, and head to the upper arena for some individual and ring riding for the rest of the time. I get Denali into a really measured trot, and Redd's jaw almost unhinges. I crack up, and Denali starts nickering a little bit like she got it. I'm definitely better with her than before, and Redd's spazzing out to Giggles in the center of the arena.
8:30 - We head back to the horse barn to change out of our riding gear, then head down to Big Red (triple-storied barn) for a late breakfast of toast, fruit, orange juice, and these cute little mini bagels.
9:00 - We scoop poop and rake hay for chores, and do "the magazine activity" for horse science. Then we go to our cabins and -- joy of joys! -- change into shorts for the rest of the day. Wow!
12:00 - Head down to zee Grey Koch for lunch, where the counselors are all waiting outside with rolls of duct tape in their hands. Redd tapes my thumb and pointer finger together (on both hands, of course). I end up sitting at a table with Sam, Megan, Courtney, Winona, Redd, and Monty, as well as some younger girls from levels three and lower. We all have an...interesting time trying to eat honey BBQ chicken wraps with our taped-up hands, which supposedly simulate having no thumbs. Even though raccoons have them, and it was called a "raccoon lunch". Nice going, whoever named it.
12:30 - Capers start, and we take the tape off and do them. I'm dish carrier.
1:00 - Me time. I finish my book, then draw some pathetic attempts at horses, and do a weird collage thingy with me and Denali. I actually drew a fairly good horse in that one. Sylvia and Carly assure me that all of my drawings are good, but that's because they just turned 11.
2:00 - Swimming: deep end's open the whole time today, and we begged and pleaded to play Sink the Counselor. No luck; the canoes are down at Stone Lake. Oh, well. Still have a good time.
4:00 - Cooking time!! We go up to Grey Koch and into the dorm kitchens, where we bake some really awesome chocolate chip cookies. We each get 3, Giggles and Redd get 2, and the lifeguards and horse workers get 1 each. They're all warm and gooey and melty and amazing. (: Yum.
5:30 - Walk back to horse side and have a cookout. We made pizza pudgy pies and banana boats, and Redd was watching the fire and being really funny. We begin to get really hyper after having 2 chocolate-y desserts, and get really into laughing and stuff.
7:30 - After the very long cookout, which was super fun, we walk back to program side for art, where we make these weird scratch things that I immediately threw away. We were all really hyper, though, so it was really fun.
9:00 - Arrive back at the cabins and get ready for bed. Sort of. We're all really overtired and slaphappy, especially Syl and Courtney, so we're running around and doing Edward Cullen impersonations. I'm trying to get Syl to stop screaming and jumping off the table. VERY fun time.
10:00 - Supposedly lights out. We sit up and talk for a while, though, and do a few more Edward impersonations. Courtney dubs a few more people a few more names, and we finally fall asleep at almost 11. Oops.

THURSDAY
7:00 - Wake up at the normal time and get ready.
8:00 - Go down to breakfast--chocolate chip muffins and strawberries--and flag. It was really good. Sat with Sam, a bunch of random people, and Andi and Giggles. I "get" to sweep the floor around the table, which actually isn't a bad job, for a caper.
9:00 - We go do chores, which is washing water troughs. Then we learn about feeds and medicine, which I've only gone over ABOUT a million times before. But whatever. It was still cool.
12:00 - We head back in and go to lunch, which is "fun on the run"--I packed myself a turkey sub at breakfast, as well as some other stuff. It was tasteh.
1:00 - Me time. I write another letter and can't find the envelopes. Sam, Megan, and Carly can't either. It's a sad deal, people. Sad deal.
2:00 - Swimming, as usual. I buy this cool light-up thing, a keychain "liscense plate" that says "Elk River" on it, and a stick pen at the lake-side store, and take a really long, warm shower. I'm still scared that the showers were warm every single time. Barbie's showers are NEVER warm. Ever.
4:00 - We cook again, and make these cool things called apple spinners. We melted brown sugar and butter together, then drizzled that and marshmallow taffy over some granny smith apples. It was really good, but when Limbo walked through, Carly and I gave our last pieces (one each) to her because we'd had 2 scoops of the brown sugar mix, which was way too sugary. Limbo thought it was great.
4:30 - Done with the food, we play this game called Sleeping Prey where one person like walks around and tries to make people laugh. So Courtney got up, and I laughed at her because she's hilarious. So I stood up and walked over to Danielle and crouched down to tell a random story. "So I was walking to the park with my friend Kirsten -- not Kiersten, KIRSTEN -- and it was a pretty long walk. But we got there, and..." She laughed. I moved on to Carly. "We got there, and when we got there we got on the swings. The swings were REALLY fun. And then we fell into a sand pit." Suddenly, every single person in the room started clutching their guts with uncontrolled laughter. I'm not kidding. They thought it was THAT funny.
4:45 - We go outside to flag, where Danielle tells me to go up to Limbo and Redd and tell them my story. Basically, after we fall into the sand pit -- HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA, go the people in my cabin. O.o, goes Emily -- we walk around in a labyrinth of caves and finally make it out when someone hears us yelling from the water fountain, and gets it ripped up and lowers a rope down. Mhm. Limbo asked if we met any animal friends down there, and Redd was just looking at me in this amused-but-weirded-out way. *nodnod*
5:00 - We ate a dinner of pasta and whatever else, which was really good as usual.
6:00 - Head back to horse side and ride, ride, ride. We trot the weaving poles, and I do it at an extremely controlled trot to freak Redd out. It works--she gives me this super, super incredulous look before trying to compose herself and go, "That was really good, Emily." Then a few minutes later, after she talked to Giggles for a little bit (I heard the words "Denali" and "never" a few times), she turned back to me and said, emphasizing it really heavily, "That was REALLY good, Emily. REALLY good job."
6:10 - Sam/Helga and Cookie Jay start trotting the weaving poles, and suddenly Cookie starts to spaz out. He goes to the middle and starts trotting in a circle, and Sam's like "HOLY CRAP", but kind of quietly. Redd has to go over and grab his lead rope, then Sam gets off and sits on a barrel while Redd runs Cookie through the poles again, as if to tell him that he can't get away with slacking off. For the rest of the time, Cook's a little angel, and whenever he stops, he glances over at Redd to make sure she's not coming over. Teehee.
7:30 - We hear screams coming from the cabin area, and they don't sound like the kind of screams you hear when someone nearly gets caught during tag. We're all nervous, but kind of shrug it off.
9:00 - The rest of the lesson is uneventful except that I got a 2.54 on my Spiral, which is only 55 hundreths of a second away from the record. Then we head back to our cabins...
9:10 - ...and find out the reason behind the screaming. There was a hornet's nest about 10 feet away from our cabin, and Sam's sister's group was playing Charades and stepped in it. Most of them got 2 stings, some got 1, and one person got 3.
9:30 - They taped it off and forbid us from so much as talking about it, so when someone came into the cabin from the bathroom (not naming names...) and opened the window to see, Winona--usually a mellow, bubbly person--came in and screamed at us.
9:50 - Winona comes in and apologizes, saying that she'd had a lot to do and that we were by far not the only ones she'd yelled at. Then she gave us all hugs and told us to just go to sleep and not worry about it, and that they'd sprayed the holes with nearly a gallon of insect killer, so they should all be dead.
10:00 - We all passed out, basically, despite plans to stay up until "at least midnight". I woke up briefly to Carly and Syl digging around in their bags, but fell back asleep in a few minutes.

FRIDAY (today)
7:00 - Woke up, got ready, etc. You know the drill by now. ;)
7:45 - CITs did flag, and I requested Murray the Rabbit Boy, which I know for a fact is Redd's favorite song. It's definitely mine, anyway, and all the counselors were like "Ohmygosh I forgot all about that song!! I love that song!!" which made me happy. We sang some other decent songs, too.
8:00 - Went into breakfast, which was bagels and cream cheese, and grapes and toast and cereal. Sat with Andi, Redd, and Danielle, along with some little kids. We were all teasing Redd, and Andi kept stealing Redd's apple juice and drinking it. Redd like looked at her for a second, then laughed and kept eating. Twas very funny, and very yummy too. ;)
9:00 - Headed back to the cabins to pack. I took some pictures of Big Red and people and Little Red and a bunch of stuff, trying to waste pics. I also finished packing first, so I got the great honor of sweeping the cabin. Just in case you didn't know, the cabins/treehouses get REALLY disgustingly dusty and dirty and...just...disgusting. From half the room, I got the equivalent of like 2 weeks' worth of sweeping at meals. It's really gross.
9:30 - Starts raining out. We all get really nervous.
10:00 - We go out to the horse barn to prep the horses, and Redd and Frecks say that there's a good chance that there won't be a show. We go to Little Red and watch Spirit while eating popcorn and marshmallows and raisins and some of this honey-cinnamon cereal of some sort.
12:30 - We check outside, and it's still raining. We head back to our cabins and I play Mancala against Sam. I beat her 7-4 (games won).
2:10 - We do this weird skit and talk about what we learned in horse science and stuff. It was really pathetically sad and retarded. Basically we went like "I rode [name]. (S)he's a [color] [breed]. My favorite thing about them was [blankity blank]." And then we answered questions about meds, feed, breeds, etc, etc, etc. Very stupid. Then we got our stuff and left.
3:30 - Got home and went through my school supplies.
3:50 - Got online and talked to Kali and Rae.

THE END!!!!!!!!! Told you it'd be long. Took me like 4 hours to write, too, because I was talking to Kali and Rae while writing it. Kaliyan wants me to read Janet's story and update TT, Rae wants me to watch FMA and read Wing It, and...just chill, you guys. My god.

Buh-bye.

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-Emilee