All Good Things Must Come To An End

 My daughter’s summer camp ends today. As you read this, we will already be packed and on the road headed home. It’s been a little over two weeks since we arrived, and it has been a blur of work and sleep for me. M&M has been enjoying her last year as a pre-teen camper. Next year, she will be staying in the dorms with the teens and participating in full spectrum of camp activities which includes being escorted to the dining hall by the teen boy campers. 

To say that The Queen and I are prepared for young men to be interested in our daughter would be a gross overstatement. We know most of the boys in the church at least passingly well. Some better than others. I honestly don’t know with which boy I would be comfortable trusting my daughter (as if I have much say in the matter). 

For now, I will let next year’s worries wait until next year. I didn’t get out much this year since I was on kitchen duty again. But here are some photos of my time here. 

M&M at mealtime with some of her friends. 

Sabbath church services all dressed up. M&M is 12. The young lady next to her is 19. Can you believe it?

The camp runs on its collective stomach. The kids and staff burn a huge amount of calories while here. Very few people miss a meal here, and it’s interesting to see people ignore their special diets while at camp. 

M&M had a “cold bore” shot in the yellow. 

Happy camper. 

One of my kitchen staff companions enjoying an early morning canoe outing. 

A nearly perfect omelette. The first few each year are kinda ugly, but we hit a groove where we know how much and how long to make a decent looking folded omelette. 

The side by side omelette station gets pretty messy after slinging several dozen omelettes two at a time with a partner in crime sharing the station with you. I try to avoid the solo station as that’s where the special needs ingredients are (dairy free eggs and vegan cheese). 

Our main dishwasher. She had a lot of help from campers and staffers alike. It’s eye watering how big a mess we can make in a short amount of time. I tried to be a good coworker and rinse my utensils and cookware before leaving it stacked to run through the wash. The kids though…I’m not saying some of them were raised by bears in a barn, but they can sure see it from where they were raised. 

Our main prep and cooking area. It gets pretty tight in there with multiple butts competing for space. The stove and griddle are my main areas of operation. 

The infamous tilt skillet / steam bath. That’s our kitchen staff director doing battle with something. If you embiggen the pic, you can see the steam up around the ceiling lights. 

M&M awaiting her turn on the knee board at the lake. 

240 ounces of li’l smokies. I have no idea how many those are, but we get them up to temp and on the line for hungry folks. My second favorite breakfast item here at camp after breakfast tacos. 

Scrambled eggs but the skillet load. We crack and scramble 22 dozen eggs most days with the exception of the 5 omelette days. That’s 264 eggs that have to be cooked everyday. Those skillets get pretty heavy. It normally takes us five or six batches of eggs to cook them all. 

M&M's Monday Meme Madness

Today's collection of memes is brought to you by M&M. She has developed a keen sense of humor and has been bombarding me with snake and horse memes....because she wants a horse and a snake. Enjoy.

 

A Girl in Her Happy Place

The crown princess, M&M, communing with her riding instructor's horse, Primera. M&M is horse crazy like no other kid I've seen. She's trying to convince me to build a barndominium with a horse stall on the other side of the wall from her bedroom. I asked if she wanted a window into the stall too. 

I'm destined to go broke feeding animals and stroke out while cleaning up horse turds.

Daddy Daughter Date

As many long time followers can probably figure out, M&M has progressed from The Cutest Baby In The World to The Cutest Little Girl In The World and is racing head long towards The Cutest Little Young Lady In The World. She turned 11 not too long ago, and she's been horse crazy for several years now. The Queen and I, being doting parents that we are, get her horseback riding lessons to indulge this youthful passion. Last week, she had her first lesson in a while after taking a rather hard fall off a horse and then being sick and us traveling and such. She chose to have a trail ride instead of a formal lesson. I mentioned as how I wanted to go too, and plans were hatched. 

M&M confident upon her trusty steed, Turbo

My view for most of the ride

It's rather peaceful in an open field on horseback

The weather was absolutely amazing. Even thought it is mid January in north Texas, the temps were in the mid 70s, the sky was clear and the winds were light. All in all, a beautiful day to ride. The place we take M&M to for her lessons has about 80 acres worth of land to ride and a fairly nice trail to follow. 

It has literally been years since I was atop a horse for any length of time. Fortunately, M&M's instructor had pity on me and chose an even tempered horse named Ginger for me and even took care of saddling her up for me. Now, come to find out later in the ride, Ginger is known to be lazy. She also likes to eat. ALL. THE. TIME. 

She was not thrilled with the prospects of leaving her hay bale and feed bucket behind to trot my fat sorry *ss around. She did not want to keep up with the group either. So, I repeatedly had to encourage her to keep up which led to a "lope" every few minutes to catch up. Thus, my groin, thighs and lower back all got a workout they were not expecting. 

All in all, I am not too displeased with my performance. Ginger only tried to kill me twice. The first time, I was just giving her more squeeze to catch up to the group again when she literally dug in all four hooves, dropped her head and took a massive mouthful of dry grass in her mouth. I almost went Tango Uniform right off the flight deck. I did lose my grip on the reins which Ginger took as a sign to keep her head down and keep eating. 

The second time, Ginger decided she needed to relieve herself of some recycled feed. Unlike some horses who are quite content to keep egressing the area while conducting evacuation exercises, Ginger prefers to stop dead, lift her tail and take careful aim. Not a problem says I. I'll wait. Someone forgot to mention that Ginger is "extra spicy" when she is finished. I don't know if she burned her bung whole or if she was so overcome with joy at offloading something foul, but she shook her head and took off with nary a warning almost leaving me hanging in mid air a la Wile E. Coyote. 

Before long, we had circled back around to where the barn was in sight. Ginger liked that part of the ride and was only too happy to take the lead at that point. She didn't want to stop for gates or wait for the group to catch up. We had a little discussion about that. 

Everyone survived.  No blood was shed. My groin and thighs were not happy for days afterwards. M&M had a great time, and we have another Daddy Daughter outing in the planning stages.