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Because sometimes a status update just isn't enough.

Because sometimes a status update just isn't enough.

25 June 2012

It happened one Sunday...

Well, it finally happened.

I finally said the stupidest thing I've ever said, ever, and hopefully ever WILL say.



It happened so quickly that I relived hearing the words in my head at least 5 times before the sound actually registered and the words erupted into the atmosphere.  Even as I was reaching to snatch them back and swallow them, it was too late.

They were out there, never to be unsaid.

It happened like this:


Dan and I were driving to a camp site along the St. Lawrence River to hang out with his family, all of whom unexaplainably like camping.  

(Right?  Why?  WHYYYY?)

I'm not a camper.  I was raised by wolves campers and spent my childhood being dragged through the wilds of every remote part of the western United States and Canada, being forced at gunpoint into a canoe/kayak, shot down the fastest and most treacherous rivers available with nothing between me and certain death but a piece of fiberglass and a paddle, and tortured nightly by having to sleep in a tent with only a thin piece of nylon keeping the grizzly bears and wolverines at bay.  I spent weeks shivering in the rain, being devoured by mosquitoes and eating freeze dried concoctions that my mother never would have forced upon us in civilization, like Chicken a la King (wtf is it, anyway?), Turkey Medallions and mixed vegetables (hurl) and dried milk in our glutenous bowls of oatmeal cooked over a campfire.  You haven't lived until that was your breakfast every morning for 6 weeks.  

So yeah... I've dedicated my adulthood to not camping.


Dear Not Camping,  I love you more!  No, I love YOU more!  You hang up!  No, YOU hang up!!



(Note how I'm procrastinating about disclosing the actual Really Stupid Thing I said?)

Anyway, as I was saying:

We were on our way to hang out at a campsite with Dan's parents and some random relatives.  (The only thing that got me in the car was the promise of booze once I got there and the close proximity of a bathroom that didn't involve porta potties.)  


As we were driving down some picturesque farm roads in a part of the state I've never seen before, we passed what appeared to be a Deer Farm.  (I don't get it, either.  Deer Farm??  Why????  There are 6758495867 bazillion deer roaming the streets of northern New York.  Do you really need to breed them, too?)  Out of the corner of my eye, I saw something that didn't seem to belong.

Then, this happened:

These words will go down in infamy.  They will appear on my headstone.  Life, as I know it, will never be the same.


Me:  "Oh my God... LOOK!  A baby camel!"


*cue sound track of my life*


Dan:  *slowly turning his head to look at me*

Me:  *scrambling to shove the words back into my mouth*

Dan slowed down, turned around and drove back by the deer farm.

There, lurching happily among the fawns and yearlings, was an ungainly baby moose.


Dan:  "Camel?"

Me:  "I didn't say that."

Dan:  "No, seriously... a baby camel?  In northern New York?  Because, why?  The climate is so arid and camels would thrive here?"

Me:  "Shut up."

Dan:  *losing it*  "HAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAAA!"

Me:  "IT COULD HAVE BEEN A BABY CAMEL."

Dan:  "No, it couldn't have been.  Oh my God, I can't breathe... HAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAA!!!"


Okay, in my defense:


Baby Moose... Mooselet?  Mooseling?  Whatever.





Baby Camel.  




SEE????

Just because the probability of a camel appearing in upstate New York, land of water, mosquitoes, green grass, and Amish, doesn't mean it couldn't have happened.


And why the hell would I be expecting to see a moose, when I haven't even quite adjusted to the reality of deer farms???

Meanwhile, Dan had a glorious time on the drive home pointing at random bits of livestock and shouting, "LOOK!  A BABY CAMEL!"


(Have I mentioned lately that I hate him?)

In other news, I learned first hand that drinking half a gianormous bottle of Bailey's Irish Creme WILL make me throw up, possibly for days.


Me, camping.




19 comments:

  1. I so love you on so many levels!

    ReplyDelete
  2. They DO look alike, and that is totally something I would've done too.

    I was never apt to drink beverages with such low alcohol content. I drank around a liter of whiskey at a time. I sure don't miss hangovers.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Ugh... it wasn't the alcohol that got me in the Baileys, it was the cream and sugar... blech. It tasted fabulous going down, fabulous coming back up... but never, never, never again. Never.

      Did I say never?

      Because I totally mean NEVER.

      Delete
  3. I can see where you could make a mistake but its still funny !

    Deer Farm???

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I know, right???

      Deer Farms are alll overrrrrrr the place here. Instead of cows or lambs, they raise deer. People can totally show up, point out the deer they want to eat, and come back later to pick it up all butchered, packed, and ready for eatin'.

      I know it isn't any different than other meat, but somehow it seems... wrong.

      I couldn't go anywhere and point out my dinner. I want it already dead before I lay eyes on it.

      Delete
  4. If that's you camping, you are doing it right! But wait. I thought you hated thongs? I call shenanigans!! :p

    I loathe camping as well. I have that camping picture on a nail file I got for my bday. Love it! I was a girl scout as a child and do not look back fondly on my camping experiences, thank you.

    Totally looks like a camel. I'm with ya. Tell Dan I said "shove it!"

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thongs are only for those special moments when I OD on booze and pass out face down on a picnic table, surrounded by beer bottles, without my top on.

      But ONLY then.

      I was a girl scout, too. Guess who my leader was?

      My mother, that's who.

      And it DOES look like a camel.

      Thank you.

      Dan can suck it.

      Delete
  5. I cannot say for sure what my brain might've thought that was. The ears are a little wonky for a camel, but I'm not even sure what family a moose belongs to, or if it is in a class of its own!

    BTW, the bod is looking good there!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I've seen more camels in my life than moose (no idea why that is, but there ya go... probably because they don't tend to have moose at Marine World or Sea World, but tend to have an abundance of camel) so my brain registered "camel."

      That's all I've got.

      And yeah... I look like a drunk 20 year old college student. It takes hard work, but dammit, I do it.

      Delete
  6. I TOTALLY WANT TO KISS THAT BABY MOOOOSE!

    Also, I can see the resemblance.

    ReplyDelete
  7. I live in NJ and used to work at a zoo. Once, we had a camel get lose. No, really. He escaped and got up the road from us. We finally cornered him at a golf course where I was nearly trampled.

    Camels don't like to be cornered.

    So, SEE?!? IT COULD TOTALLY HAVE BEEN A CAMEL!!!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. BOOOO-YAHHHHH!!!

      I feel so incredibly validated.

      xoxo

      Delete
  8. That last picture with the picnic table is definitely a baby camel.

    There is a good sized herd of buffalo just inside the loop of Amarillo Texas in the northeast part of town across the road from the prisons. Last week we got to see a bunch of baby buffalo in that group. A little farther north of them you can occasionally see a water buffalo near the Buddhist temple. To add to aLL that surreal combination of imagery there are humongous stacks of rectangular hay bales at a business just northeast of the temple on the outside of the loop.

    ReplyDelete
  9. Yeah, I wouldn't have known it was a moose either. I might have gone with a baby alpaca:)

    And that last pic...that's how camping should be.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Marion in SavannahJune 26, 2012 at 12:31 PM

    Years ago, back when I was still moderately young and springy, I made a promise to Sweet Baby Jesus that I would try to be a good girl for the rest of my life if he only got me back to civilization from Georgian Bay. Camping, yea verily portaging carrying the canoe... IN OCTOBER. God, I've never been so cold and wet in my life. My hands couldn't hold the ax to cut saplings to set up the tent...

    All I can say is the guy didn't seem like such a great idea after that, Jesus did bring me home, and I've never been in a canoe again.

    (Don't start me on chicken a la king... My mother used to make that puke for my birthday parties when I was a kid. Stuff still makes my gorge rise.)

    Totally looked like a camel, by the way.

    ReplyDelete
  11. I haven't laughed this hard in days. So thank you for that. Also, I see the resemblance. The stupidest thing I EVER said??

    "Canada is so weird. It should be its own country"

    Yea, that jem slipped out at around 7am one morning when I was in college running on little sleep. It was unfortunately followed by "But if it's a glacial lake, shouldn't it be frozen?"

    I promise I'm not that blonde in real life.

    ReplyDelete

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