All Things Anne

(Probably more than you ever wanted to know…this is…very long.)

Saturday
8:00 pm I got up at 8 am, which is sleeping in for a weekday but not really for a Saturday! But it’s alright; I dreamt I slept in until 2:30 pm!
We had a lot to do before we left still. Some food had to be made, propane tanks filled, water gotten, campers to be packed, etc.

4:45 pm It’s now almost 5 and we’re off. Dad, Mom, the girls, the little boys, and the dog are in the van, which is pulling the larger camper, which is aka the “Girls’ Dorm”. The big boys are in Ben’s pickup, which is pulling the little camper, aka the “Boys’ Dorm”.

5:15 pm At a Kum and Go, fueling up, got drinks too. Just got on the freeway. If you think we’re taking a long time, well…you gotta remember it’s like moving the Queen Mary! Beth and I went into the gas station with Mom to get drinks.
“I hope nobody says anything about my gun,” I said. “It’s mostly covered by my sweatshirt.” (Once before, Eric was stopped in Walmart by a woman who was offended by his 6″ Buck knife.) At home, I had switched the cylinders out of my revolver (it’s more fun to say “revolver” than “.22 pistol”) from my .22 mag to the .22 long and short rifle. .22 mags are what I keep in it beside my bed. If y’all are gonna come rob our house, you’d better not tsart with the boys’ room, Mom and Dad’s room, or my room. We all keep loaded guns, after all, what’s the use of an unloaded gun?
Beth and I have too much fun together. (Yeah, there’s no such thing as having too much fun, eh?) While getting drinks, Beth was getting Em’s (I got Kate’s) and Em likes lemonade, so Beth started putting lemonade in the cup.
“How about adding some lime flavoring? She’d like that,” Mom said.
So Beth started putting Squirt in.
“No! Flavoring,” Mom and I said. I pointed at the flavoring things. They had four flavorings to choose from, you could just squirt them in your pop. Beth squirted some lime in, then missed the lemonade and put Mountain Dew in! She realized her mistak
e and put more lemonade in, and tasted it. “Mmm!” she said, and made herself one like that!

5:57 pm Got off the phone with the boys; I talked to them for a while. Dad was surprised we had reception for so long, but finally it just got too fuzzy.
Beth and I are recording this trip for posterity’s sake. She’s much more detailed about every town we’re going through. Writing them all down, I mean. Not me. I’m writing about what happens. So, read both of our posts and you’ll know everything! Ok, well you won’t be God, but you’ll know more!
While on the phone with the boys (they had it on speaker), I mentioned Beth and I were blogging.
“Are you writing while you’re on the phone with us?” Eric asked.
“No,” I said. “Why?”
“I wanted to know how important we are!” he said.

6:30 pm It’s almost too dark to write, but Beth is so kindly holding her flashlight for me. My eardrums are doing the popcorn thing and popping. Ouch! And itching inside. IRRITATING!!
Dad’s filming; not at this second, but while we were at home and leaving, and a couple shots of us in the van, and he plans on shooting more footage during the week.
It’s Mom and Dad’s anniversary; we all just kind of realized that and told them “happy anniversary!” They went out to dinner last night for it.

6:40 pm We just stopped to get hunting regs in Red Lodge. Our beloved Taco Time is now a pizza place!
Ben’s been having trouble keeping up with us, pulling that camper. It’s all mostly uphill!
We’re hoping our spot for camping isn’t taken!
Tess is telling Rase a joke, but she forgot the joke so she’s only telling him the “answer” (punch line)!
It’s too dark to film us coming up the hill to the camping spot, like Dad had planned. Too bad!

6:47 pm Almost there. Probably ten minutes away. Dad didn’t want Beth using the flashlight so I can hardly see to write. My ears are still being wacky and hurting.

7:17 pm CAMP! I guess it took longer than 10 minutes!

7:25 pm Nobody was at our spot, yay! The guys are chocking the campers. Eric’s starting the lantern and Dad’s chopping wood, so I guess just Ben and Joe are chocking the campers. It’s cold out there! When camp’s set up, we’ll have dinner. Talk about a late dinner! At least it isn’t at 10, though, like that one night we had eggrolls!
Dad just poured Boy Scout fluid on the wood and started the fire. Somebody’s improved the fire pit since we were here last year!
Dad said being in the van here is the last time we’ll be warm. At least we don’t only have the van and a fire! That was cold! I smell the fire, it smells good. Usually, when we go home we smell like campfire!
We forgot the skillets this time, but at least we brought the coffeepot!
Dad brought his Gretsch, I think I should have brought my accordion!
Elle Jane woke up long enough to look around, then went back to sleep.
Abby had a hard time understanding how to answer the call of nature in the wild, and decided it wasn’t worth it!

It was so much fun coming up to camp and pointing everything out!! I’m sure there’ll be more tomorrow, too!
“Just over that hill is Eric’s Spot!”
“This is the hill Ben rode the deer on a sled!”
“Just over that hill is where I shot the deer I drowned!”
This is fun!!

Abby finally did decide to “use nature”, as we call it. Previously, she decided to wait until we got home, until we convinced her we were going to be gone for a LONG time!

8:36 pm Joe wants me to write about him. Joe, Joe, Joe. And I’m supposed to tell you about how Joe jumped in the van to get warm after working for an hour. He saw me writing and said, “Have you blogged about me yet?”
“No,” I said, then said how the inside of my ears hurts and itches.
“I bet you blogged about your eardrums,” he muttered.
“Yeah–”
“And not about me!!”
“He’s so vain and selfish he wants you to blog about him!” Ben said.
So I started writing about him!
Then Ben said, “Have you written about me, and my awesomely cool pickup? Will you take pictures of it to post on your blog?”
“I put a picture of your pickup on your birthday post,” I said.
“But not with my cool bumper!”
He just got that bumper installed yesterday!
I’m also supposed to mention that his pickup is the awesomest, coolest pickup on earth and it has a cool bumper with a cool winch.
Joe says Ben’s trying to impress “the girls” (who read my blog, I guess) by having me write about his pickup. Ben said Joe’s trying to impress the girls because Joe was saying about how the pickup he doesn’t have is going to be better than Ben’s!

8:45 pm Beth and Eric just came in. Beth left; I just asked Eric what he wants to say for posterity.
Ben says “I’m not trying to impress the girls, I don’t have to, they just flock to me and I try to steer clear of them!” Eric’s thinking of something to say, and Ben said, “Do write Eric has a blank mind right now.”
“I do not, I’m just trying to remember what I was going to say!” Eric said. “Once I said something brilliant, but I forgot it.
He wants to share his pearls of wisdom now. Behold!
“If you think you’re someone really hot, step outside and you’ll be cool.” (It’s cold out.)
“Haha, punny, Eric, punny!” was Ben’s reply.
“It is not advisable to use mascara for a beard,” is Eric’s other one.
“From personal experience,” Ben put in.
See, last night while Mom and Dad were gone to dinner, Joe put on a long wig and I let him dip into my makeup (figured I’d let somebody get some use out of the makeup I don’t really use!) to paint himself like a girl. He put more on in one night than I’ve used in three months! (I don’t wear makeup much, only when I want to feel really girly!) First thing he put on was mascara. Ever notice nobody can put on mascara without opening their mouth? (Except me, I practiced cuz I didn’t want to be like everybody else!) Well, he put his mascara on with his mouth open, so I told him about that, and he got self-conscious about it!
After he had his makeup done (he colored his eyebrows with mascara, too!), he decided to put mascara (waterproof, by the way) on Eric as a beard. It matched Eric’s wig, which was a curly black Afro. They both looked SO funny!
I guess I’m kinda rambling here for lack of anything else better to do. I guess I’ll quit and go see what everyone else is doing–all the big folk left the van!
Yay, the twins came and said for me to bring Abby, Jay, and Elle Jane into the Girls’ Dorm, dinner’s almost ready!

9:30 pm About half of us are here in the Girls’ Dorm, we haven’t had dinner yet. I cut the little kids’ steak with my Buck knife. I’ve only use it a couple times, for cutting string and stuff, it’s really sharp and worked real swift! I was just worried I’d cut through the paper plate!
The other day Eric was sharpening Beth’s knife, and I asked if he’d do mine.
“For a batch of cookies?” he asked.
“Yeah.” I got my knives–Buck and Kershaw–and gave them to him. He got Buck, and shaved a patch off his left arm. It came off smoothly.
He looked up at me with a startled look. “I thought you said it wasn’t sharp!”
I think by the end of hunting season, the boys are going to have bare left arms from trying all the knives out!

9:40 pm We just thanked the Lord for our dinner, but so far only the little ones and Mom had some! Dad left the camper, not sure where he went.
My flashlight was in my pack, so I had to borrow Em’s flashlight, and hers had a wrist strap. When I dug my flashlight out, it had nos trap, so I found a piece of string long enough to make it a necklace. Handy!
I was just given my dinner–

11:00 pm Bible reading.

11:05 pm Lights out!

Sunday
5:30 amAlmost everyone–well, at least most of the girls–were up an hour before the alarm went off. Alarm went off at 5:30.

5:55 am Everyone in the Girls’ Dorm is awake.

6:15 am Everyone in the Girls’ Dorm is up and doing things.

8:00 am Finally at a sit. Beth is just over the hill from me. I’m watching a meadow, she’s watching the river. I’m sitting in a patch of sagebrush and it smells good. It occurred to me to wonder if there’s ticks! I HOPE NOT!! We got out late because Dad kept pushing snooze on his alarm! Then we all had to get up and put away beds and get our stuff on.
The sleeping arrangement is like this:

• Ben and Joe on the fold-out bed in the Boys’ Dorm.
• Eric on the bunk above them.
• Rase and Jay on the table bed in the Boys’ Dorm.
• Dad, Mom, and Elle Jane on the table bed in the Girls’ Dorm.
• Abby in the bathtub in the Girls’ Dorm.
• The rest of us five girls on the two beds by the bathroom.

We put a board across the two beds, to make it bigger. Beth by one wall, then me, then Kate, then Tess, then Em.
I’ve got the Baloney song stuck in my head! I was singing it to the baby earlier and she smiled!

9:50 am At 9:30 or so Beth and I got back to camp. The little kids and I are going to get marshmallow sticks.

12:43 pm Back at camp, waiting for lunch. After getting marshmallow sticks, the big boys and Duke went in Ben’s pickup around the Loop, road-hunting and collecting firewood. The rest of us went in the van the opposite way around the Loop, and we passed the boys at the top. Well, we got up side by side with his pickup and we see this huge tree branch in the bed! Dad mentioned it and Ben said, “Everything else was too small to pull with my winch!” That was when he said they’d been trying out his new winch by pulling rocks!
After that circuit, we went over to the windy meadow, where last year Dad, Beth, and I almost blew over, the wind was SO strong! We passed the buffalo in the pasture, and Dad took a video of them.

It also turns out on our stand this morning, Beth’s and mine, Dad was on the ridge behind us, videotaping in case we shot anything! He was also videoing us (I think) when a guy came up and talked to us. Hunter-talk.
“See anything?” Me.
“Five or six deer,” he says. “Walked up to the mountain over there.”
“Oh.”
“Where does this road go?”
“It loops all the way around and comes back to the bridge.”
“Oh, ok. I’m gonna go see if I can’t see any elk.”
“Good luck!”
“Thanks.” He left.
“I don’t mind meeting strangers when we’re hunting,” I said to Beth, “because I have a gun!”
I’m carrying around my revolver, my rifle, and my Buck knife, all fully loaded. FEAR ME!!
Dad said if he’d seen the guy (dubbed “The guy with the glossy gun”) do anything to us, he’d blow his leg off…and believe me, with his .338, he could do some damage!

1:00 pm Lunch!! Gonna make myself some cup o’ noodles. Yum!

8:10 pm Just finished dinner, which was hamburgers. Joe, Eric, and I are at the table in the Girls’ Dorm, drinking cocoa. I’ve got stuff to say but I better go get some marshmallows before they’re all gone–they already ate all the strawberry ones!

8:55 pm Well. After lunch we headed back out again, at a quarter to three. We all loaded up in Ben’s pickup to head out. Dad, the twins, Beth, and I got off first; Ben had misunderstood where Joe and Eric were going so he went back to drop them off.
Beth and I went to the Deer Jump meadow, where I shot at a deer last year (Dad thinks I’d just gotten it through the brisket, not enough to kill it or wound it seriously). The twins and Dad went to Ben’s meadow (where he likes to hang out). Beth and I saw the guy with the glossy gun on the next hill over. He went all over! Dad and Ben saw deer, but none they could shoot.
Then we all came back to camp and had an exciting (not in a good way!!) night. Tess hadn’t been feeling good all day, Mom said, and she threw up all over. NOT FUN! Mom cleaned that up, and Tess slept on the floor (that was the night Em decided to sleep on the floor too, so it was just Beth, Kate, and I on the bed…lots more room!). But! In the middle of the night, Ben brought Jay in; he was kind of sick, too. Mom put him in bed with Beth, Kate, and I to spend the rest of the night (which pretty much everyone stayed up anyway). Then when Mom went to take out the bag Tess had been using to throw up in, it had a hole and made a mess!
Then, when Dad turned the lantern on this morning, the whole thing caught on fire!
“Things are never this exciting when just we go!” I told Mom.
Beth was very good about it all, being very patient and helpful and cleaning up. She and I shared the blankets I brought; she let Em and Tess use hers. We put one under us and one over us.

10:00 pm Bedtime!!

Monday
8:45 am Sun’s almost up over the mountains. Sittin’ here writing! Seen nothing yet but a subaru, a white pickup, a dog, Joe wayyyyy far away across the Big Meadow, and the kids and the camper (see it from my spot). You know…I think I’m lost! Break out the emergency rations!!!

9:37 am I’m back at camp. At nine, Beth ahd come to me and we’d started back. After a while of walking, we were almost to Eric’s Spot (over a little hump and around the bend from him) and I saw a deer. Just the had and front shoulder, then she disappeared. We kept walking, then after a couple minutes we heard the shot. I didn’t know if we should walk over quickly to see if he needed help, or wait in case he missed! So we just walked real quiet. I whistled a few times to let him know I was there (but he didn’t hear). When we walked up, he was crossing the river, so I knew he’d gotten it. We walked up to the camper, and waited for Dad before they all (except Tess, Rase, Jay, and Abby) left to dress it (and video!)

2:05 pm Most of us are at camp. Mom’s napping, same with Ben; Eric and Beth are trying to. Earlier, all of us (well, the ones left at camp, which were the little ones and I) took a nap. Ben and Eric brought back Eric’s deer (Ben stopped by Eric’s Spot on the way back to camp). The rest went road hunting (it takes about an hour to circuit the Loop). I woke up because they were using Ben’s winch to winch the deer into the tree!
After everyone else came back and lunch was eaten, Ben, Joe, Eric, Beth, and I went out road hunting in Ben’s pickup. Ben and Eric were in the cab, the other three of us were on the tailgate. We started out slow, but towards the end, sped up. One of the boys had “a pressing delivery”, as Ben put it. We had to have been doing 30 or so, with the three of us on the back hanging on for dear life!
I forgot to mention, Joe has been recording podcasts on his mp3 player. He did one not long after we left camp, road hunting. I told a joke on it.
I think Mom’s up, I’ll go.

2:50 pm Eric’s going to go to his spot right now because it’s quieter to sleep in! Now that Mom is up, all the kids are noisier! (It’s rather a habit to sleep in one’s sit, especially in Eric’s Spot!)

3:15 pm Ben and Joe just left, I’m going in a sec. Beth left, too.

8:55 pm Gettin’ ready for bed, the boys are already in bed. Talk about chaos!
After sundown we all came back to camp, told our stories, and ate dinner. We ate and roasted marshmallows and talked. I saw my first shooting star! Eric lay on his back looking up at the stars. While the rest of us looked very un-Louis-L’Amour-like into the fire and talked about dead bodies, vampires, morticians, and embalming. Just as I was thinking about how weird a subject it was, Dad said, “What a ghoulish subject we’re talking about!”
Then we came in to get ready for bed.

9:25 pm Bible reading, then lights out!

Tuesday
7:15 am All the hunters except Beth and I are gone. Eric just walked from here, the rest went in the pickup. Beth’s sick this morning; she threw up. I wasn’t feeling to well either, but now I feel better and am eating. It looks almost shooting light, think I’ll go out soon.
Betha nd I were sharing my blanket again, but I woke up with it all. I’d dreamed we found a blanket in the woods and washed it up for me, and in my sleep she was stealing it!
Anyways, I better go.

10:35 am Long story short, Joe got a nice buck.
Early this morning, it was about shooting light when we all heard a shot. I was just headed out to my spot over the road and just down the hill (I’ve got a nice spot there). I sat for a while (saw nothing), then Mom came with the van. Joe had whistled (I didn’t hear it, but Mom did). I jumped in the van with Mom, and we went down the road. He’d dragged it a ways. Nice three-point buck! Not too big, but still good! We tied it to the hitch (it looked like a spiderweb! He didn’t want the antlers dragging on the ground) and drug it to camp where we waited for Ben to come, and he winched it up. While waiting, I videotaped Joe. That’s fun! Eric came along while we were waiting, too. After a bit Dad and the twins came (Mom went to pick them up).
It’s snowing. Ben went to sit in a meadow with his pickup.

2:20 pm Just finished a few emergency rations. After a little bit, everyone but Mom and I left (This was before Ben came back). I wasn’t feeling exceptional, so I laid down to take a nap. I don’t know what it is about those red pillows in the Gorls’ Dorm, but they make me drool SO MUCH in my sleep! This is the second time I’ve used them, and MAN! I slept until 1:30 or so, then when I woke up, Ben and I went around the Loop looking for the van, since they had been gone so long. I left my radio with Mom so we could communicate (Ben had his radio). When we were a ways down the road, Mom said they drove up; they’d gone around twice.
When Ben and I got back, they were playing go-hunting with my Saddam cards. (I have these cards; the backs have sand camo and the fronts have the regular suits, but all the aces are Saddam’s top dudes–Saddam’s the ace of spades–with all his other advisors and stuff pictured on the cards in rank with kings being the most dangerous after aces, all the way down to the twos.) They had lots of fun trying to pronounce the goofy names! They would say things like, “Dad, do you have…Muhamed Al Brazil?” (or whatever the name was) and “I have three different cards in my hand, and all the guys are named Muhammed!”
It started snowing again a bit earlier, and it’s sticking.
We’re making plans for the night, and everyone wants to go to Eric’s Spot!

6:55 pm Camp. Eric and I are the only hunters back so far. Ben and Joe passed in Ben’s pickup on their way to get Dad, the twins, and Beth (Beth went with Dad this time instead of me). I saw nothing. I thought a lot, though!
It snowed today and was colder than yesterday. I thought about the pros and cons of snow vs. dry and warm.

Snow Cons:
1. Cold.
2. Wet.

Dry, Warm Cons:
1. Meat spoils faster.
2. Brush is dry and crackles (harder to be quiet).
3. Harder to drag a deer.

Snow Pros:
1. Easier to see where the deer travel, and if any deer have been through recently.
2. Easier to drag deer.
3. Wetter, so brush doesn’t make as much noise while walking throug hit.
4. Deer cool faster.

Dry, Warm Pros:
1. Dry.
2. Warm.

See? More pros to snow. But the cons to snow are awful large, I think!

I’m holding a sleeping baby. It’s a lot nicer than earlier, when I was holding a crying baby! Eric’s got out his harmonica and that lulled her to sleep. She’s so cute in her sleep! (She’s cute when she’s awake, too, unless she’s crying!)

When I was sitting on my sit, my fingers were cold so I practiced accordion. See, there’s this one song I’m learning, and I haven’t the timing down in one part yet, so I was wiggling my fingers and hearing it in my head. Kind of like Beethoven!

There was something else I was going to write, about what I was thinking of while I was sitting, but I can’t remember.

Jay was jumping off the back beds so I told him if he did that, he’d go through the floor and make a hole and land on the ground outside. He believed me!

Tonight we’re going to film us playing Idiot’s Poker with my Saddam cards!

They aren’t back yet and it’s 7:35 now!

8:23 pm and still no sign…Eric’s hoping they got an elk!

9:41 pm They’re back!!! Dad got a NICE buck, a 3×4 with a wide spread. It’s bigger than Joe’s, and is a muley. Beth and Em stayed in the pickup with Ben’s radio, but we couldn’t hear them from here (the radios only have a 2 mile range, but last night they reached at this range!). Dad said he got a video of the buck alive, because he thought Em would shoot it! But she was cold, so she had her face in her coat and she couldn’t see it!

I guess we won’t film tonight, it’s too late! Maybe tomorrow night.
I think we’re gonna make the bed soon. We’re all tired!

10:50 pm Lights out! Dad’s gonna read his Bible now, then…sleep!

Wednesday
6:45 am Everybody’s outfitting up, about to go out.

10:40 am Sat on a meadow all morning, Beth and I did.
Dad came to camp and asked who had elk tags; he and the twins found elk sign. They’re going to the Deer Jump meadow, and the rest of us are going to do a drive through the woods to hopefully chase them towards Dad and the twins.

12:10 pm Been sittin’ here with Dad and the twins (Beth, Eric, and I) for 10 minutes. Good grief, I do NOT want another hike like that!! But, if I didn’t do that, I might not have seen a moose 25 yards from me, and also what we think might’ve been a black bear.
(Dad wants to see what I’m writing, he says he has a sneakin’ suspicion, but I won’t show him. Maybe I’ll tell him I’m writing about him. He just yawned, by the way.) I also saw squirrel or chipmunk tracks on a log, they were very cute and tiny!
When we got here I said to Dad, “I do NOT want to do that again!”
“Writer’s legs,” he commented.

Well, here Ben and Joe comes. Funny, they were on opposite ends of the skirmish line! The twins said they did see Ben pass before us, though.

1:45 pm Ben, Mom, Elle Jane, and I are at camp; the rest are doing the Loop again. Ben’s cleaning his .44 Colt Navy Revolver again. It’s a very time-intensive gun. It’s black powder, so he cleans it a lot. He took a look at my revolver. “Wish I’d brought .22 patches,” he said. “I’d run one down the barrel.”
Instead, he cut a .44 patch in half and ran it down the barrel, and oiled the barrel and cylinder.

It’s 2 now, everyone else is back. I’m going to play Rummikub with Beth.

2:55 pm I didn’t play Rummikub; Joe and Beth did. I had something else to do. Maybe I’ll play with her later. We still have to film us playing poker with my Saddam cards!
Most of us hunters (and Abby and Jay) are outside. I’m writing, and they’re goofing off.
Mom brought out an unmarked bag of emergency rations. “Whose are these?” she asked.
“Mine,” I said, lying quite convincingly.
“It’s unmarked,” she said, meaning “if it’s yours you better mark it.”
“It’s mine,” Dad said.
“No, mine!” Eric and Ben said.
“No, it’s mine,” says I.
Mom looked at us funny and went back in.
“You shouldn’t have said that, Dad,” I said. “I had her convinced they were really mine!”

We were making hamburgers for lunch, meanwhile singing the Baloney song. I got a plate and was singing about mayonnaise, about to squirt some on my bread (Mom got the squirt mayonnaise), when I realized I didn’t have any bread! I stopped and laughed. “I was about to put mayonnaise on my plate!” I said. Everyone laughed. “Well, bread wasn’t mentioned in the song!” I said.

4:30 pm Time for the evening sit. I’ve got Em with me this time, in Eric’s Spot. There’s been a few deer hanging out in this area this afternoon, so we’re hoping to get some. If Em gets a deer with me here, since she’s a newbie hunter, I get a bar. (We have an awards system for hunting; the person who gets the most meat gets a parachute badge; for every elk you get a silver star charm; for every little deer you get a baby rattle charm; your first deer is a red and gold chevron, the next four are gold and green chevrons, and after that it’s a deer pin on them and…I can’t remember it all; and if you help a newbie get their first deer you get these bars.) I’m hoping both of us will have a chance at a deer! I’m also hoping we can get some soon; her snow pants were wet so she didn’t wear them, just jeans and a coat which is not enough in my experience, and we have two hours yet. This is the shady side of the hill, too.

I named my rifle and revolver. The rifle is Bendigo, after a Louis L’Amour character, and my revolver is Jack Robinson. And my knife is Buck. I feel pretty safe with my bodyguards–Bendigo, Buck, and Jack Robinson!
Ben just brought by my heavy gloves. I guess they fell out of his pickup!

5:30 pm Been watching a skunk eat Joe’s buck’s gut pile for the last little while. It was so cute! (The skunk, not the guts!!) Then a woman in a car came by. We put our guns up (so they wouldn’t point at her) and waved. The skunk panicked and ran into the road ahead of her. She slowed down so she wouldn’t hit it, and shook her finger (pointer, not middle!) at us! The skunk ran down the middle of the road a ways and she followed it slowly until it veered off. Still waitin’ for deer! We saw some on private property, but I think they went over the hill.

5:30 pm Em shot at a deer, but missed. We’d been watching them for a while, and it was about 10 minutes to the end of shooting light. Em psyched herself out, thinking the shot was going to hurt worse, but it didn’t. Tomorrow morning we’re going back there to Eric’s Spot.
Ben did get one, a little one. Another baby rattle charm for him! That makes four–Dad and Joe got bucks, Eric and Ben got does. Tonight is the “victory dinner”–cubed potatoes and fresh (within the last few days) backstraps. Yum!

10:10 pm The boys all went to bed, we girls are getting ready for bed. Dinner was soooo good! Dad filmed us eating. Unfortunately, my spot happened to be RIGHT in front of the camera!! Hmph.

Tomorrow is the day we go hom! Home is going to be SO nice!

10:40 pm Lights out! (Takes a bit to get settled, eh?)

Thursday
6:40 am Not sure when we’re goign out; they’re talking about meat with bones and “beaks” in lunchmeat, and false teeth!
Em and I are going to Eric’s Spot.
Today’s the beginning of NaNoWriMo! Yay!!! Now I have to remember the cool opening I thought up in September!
The boys are joking about hunting in New Jersey…they’re coming up with some funny stuff!
We’re going.

9:40 am Camp. Em got too cold so she decided to walk back to camp. Met Eric and Beth there, they were just over the hill from camp, looking at the river.
Em accidentally got Eric’s gun, and he had to take hers! He hates it. He found out probably why Em didn’t hit the deer she shot at last night; a screw came off her scope mount and it’s loose!
Gonna play Rummikub with Beth, Eric, and Em.

12:30 pm Packed and on our way home! Now we’re on the highway (12:45) so it’s easier to write. After spending all week in the mountains, paved road is so smooth!

When Ben winched the deer down (we hang them in a tree), we took pictures of Dad with his buck and Ben with Dad’s buck, so he could show the guys at work.
It was funny, instead of tying Ben’s little deer to the tree, he put the hooves of Dad’s buck through the hocks of his little deer! To tie a knot one day, Ben climbed up the rope the deer were hanging from and sat on them, straddling them, and tied the knot! It was funny; we got pictures or videos of it.

I guess I should get going on my novel, eh?

1:37 pm The boys had propped the buck heads up, one on either side of the pickup bed, so people could see the cool racks. Passing through Joliet, an old guy waved at the boys and smiled because he saw the antlers!

1:41 pm Ate my last emergency ration. Reese’s…my favorite!!

2:07 pm Dad got himself, Mom, and I a Pumpkin Spice cappuccino in Laurel. Needs a little more coffee, I think, but yum!

3:00 pm HOME!! Home sweet home! Thing I missed most was my OWN BED! I learned two things while being gone:

1. I’m VERY PARANOID about “foot-and-bottom-germs” on my pillow, where my pillow goes, or on the part of my blanket that’s closest to my face. You might say it’s an obession! It’s a good thing you didn’t see me and what I did to protect my pillow…you’d think I was daft! (Or maybe you already do??)

2. Do not close the top of pop-top waterbottles with your chin. Why? It pulls your chin hair! No, I don’t have a beard, but I DO have fine little hairs on my chin (so does everybody except the guys who shave!)!

So that’s the trip in an…ocean liner (as opposed to nutshell)!

Didja miss me? Pi did!