Camp Stuff

Last Saturday as we were cleaning the animals cages and feeding them, Packer got loose. Packer is a green and yellow parrot. She can be quite viscious at times, but she's treated me rather decently this summer. Anyway, we wear this heavy flannel shirt over our arms when moving Packer so when she bites, she doesn't bite us. On Saturday, as I was carrying Packer back to her cage, she bit through the shirt and ripped out a small piece of my flesh on my arm. It hurt, but I was really proud of myself because I didn't throw her off or anything. I used to watch those animal shows and wonder how animal trainers could let a creature bite them and not seem to have a care in the world. Now I know.
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This week is high school week and I've been given the opportunity to counsel again. It's been going great and I have an amazing group of high school juniors and seniors. This makes my 52nd week of cabin counseling here at Timber-lee. I've spent one entire year of my life doing this. It's a great way to have spent a year.
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One of my campers this week is a camper I've counseled before. He's quite eccentric and unique, but he's a very humrous and fun-loving guy. He has a lot of issues and has had to deal with a lot of major problems in his life at a fairly young age. I love this guy. I'll call this camper Dale.

Dale says a lot of random and funny things. Sometimes the things he says make no sense, but are funny. Other times they are almost morbid, yet not quite. Below are some of my favorite quotes that Dale has said this week.

After having only been at camp for a few hours and while we were waiting to start devotions, Dale points at me and says, "Tom, I want you to start writing the alphabet backwards but you'll need a co-signer. You, Ned, be the co-signer and pretend to be a mime who has his hair on fire." It was so random and hilarious.

We were making cardboard boats to race for the tournament on Thursday morning and as we were finishing our boat, Dale looks at the boat and says, "We need to put a number 3 on here." "Why three?" "Because that was Dale Earnhardt's number. He was a great racer. May he rest in pieces." "What did you say?" "I said Dale Earnhardt was a great racer, may he rest in pieces."

We were doing word associations and someone gives me the word "flannel". I said, "Spam" (I was thinking of the old Monty Python routine). Dale says, "I hate spam. Everytime I go to check my email there's a bunch of spam in there trying to tell me how to make my buttocks more beautiful."

"I want to dress up like Abe Lincoln and wear a beard of slugs while delivering the Gettysburg Address."

"My home is the insane asylum."

"My favorite movies are Jaws and Jackass."

"I hate that song 'Save a Horse, Ride a Cowboy.' Hollywood and the media takes a song like that and blows it out of proportion so we end up with things like BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN."
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"I've hated soccer ever since I was in the 8th grade when they made me play skins."
-----Aaron Leonard
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"I've never seen Josiah Hager sleep. I don't think he sleeps. I think Josiah's a vampire or something." ---Dan Pinkhaus