Camping is in tents

**Names have not been changed to protect the innocent because frankly, there were no innocent people. Also, I just don't care that much.**

So, I went camping this weekend at the Sawmill campgrounds with my buddy, Laura. For those of you who've known me for a while, you know that my idea of "camping" is staying at a Holiday Inn. This real camping thing was a big deal. Laura and I got to the camp site on Friday and set up the tents (yeah, you heard me... tents). Laura had also invited (out of a mixture of pity and annoyance) a "club buddy" and the club buddy's friend, to join us. Now, Laura is a pretty rad girl, but this club friend, Rachel... I just don't think words could accurately describe her. Here's a little taste, though: a 26 year old who dropped out of school at 16, never even received her GED, has a serious problem with alcohol (and a DUI to prove it), with an unhealthy obsession with an over-sized Curious George stuffed animal ("he has his own Facebook page with 44 friends!"), and to top it off, has the mental capacity of a sidewalk brick. Actually, that's not right... that was an insult to the brick. Obviously, this girl was a genius.  Rachel and her friend, Amy, arrived at our site around midnight on Friday. They were both drunk and ridiculously loud. We were off to a great start. Laura and I were cordial, even though they woke us up but, we pushed through it. We had to endure their drunk, incoherent mumblings, like this gem from Rachel: "I'm not saying that crazy people are seductive, but..." Yeah, we're still not sure what word Rachel meant to use there...

Laura had told me that the two girls shared a brain cell between them and that I would need to dumb it down when I spoke to them. I took this as an opportunity to practice my trial skills when addressing jury members. After all, we're taught in school that the average jury is comprised of people who have the equivalent of an 8th grade education. Apparently though, I failed in this endeavor and Laura informed me the next morning that Rachel had commented that she "was not very fond of Bailey. She uses big words and isn't very mutual." Laura had to bite her lip to keep from laughing. MUTUAL?! WHAT?! I'm assuming Rachel meant something along the lines of "accommodating," but who knows?

Laura regretted inviting Rachel the minute she set foot on our camp site, and I had to agree with her feelings of regret. Amy wasn't so terrible, though. Stupid, but not nearly as annoying as Rachel. Amy and I started talking and Rachel went into defense mode. She scowled, pouted, and glared when Amy spoke to me and would always interrupt me when I spoke, and called Amy "babe" constantly. I felt like I was watching a Discovery Channel special on the practices of the insecure butch struggling to assert her dominance. Apparently I was in the middle of a power struggle, despite the fact that I was not an active participant. I'll never understand the ridiculous subtleties and nuances of the lesbian community. UGH.

After just one night with the two other girls, despite snickering at their stupidity, Laura and I had had enough. We decided to go canoeing, leaving the girls to sit by the pool and fry in a drunken stupor.  Laura and I were picked up by a toothless, but pleasant good ol' boy and taken to the canoe drop site for a 3 hour tour... a 3 hour touuuur... to be continued...