Afterglow 2009 - Day 7 Friday

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I was pretty excited about the free ice cream. I was downright spellbound, enough so that I felt the need to make a face that is frightening to 99% of the Afterglow population. This was all me, and in no way was the effect of an ice cream headache. Every now and then you have to give credit where credit is due.

Friday is a sad day at Afterglow, but the sadness is always lifted when everyone and our Moms start dishing out free eats. No body wants to take home groceries purchased up here, and some items (like those from the freezer) would thaw or melt by the time we got home. So that is why Kevin and Tim are feasting on some strawberry ice cream. Friday is the one day where people really don't mind us rummaging through their cabins in search of food. In fact, some of them actually encourage us to do it. You don't have to tell me twice to grab some free eats.

There are a few traditions that I try to uphold every year, and one of them is night swimming. It doesn't seem like it would be difficult to find people to go night swimming with (because you really shouldn't go night swimming alone) but most of the kids up here decline to do it for various reasons. Some might say that it is too cold, others may say that the night is a very dark time for them, while others may say that they are afraid that  the dead bodies that rise up from the lake floor at night will grab hold of them and pull them under. Whatever excuse the kids use, I can almost always find 1 other person that is just as crazy as I am. This year it was Kevin and Stacy, and we stayed in the lake long enough to qualify as swimming. Unlike day swimming, you don't have to go off of the high dive to qualify, you just need to swim out to the raft and hang out for a bit, then come back. The lake is so incredibly peaceful at night, and tonight the water was strangely warm. The air on the other hand, was not, so as soon as we made it back to dry land we cozied up next to the fire to warm our bodies up.

The broken hats sat quietly on the rocking chair, sobbing silently to themselves because they were no longer sombreros. I feel their pain, and I also feel guilty because I helped bring them to this state. But they shouldn't be sad, they should be happy and think about all of the joy that they brought us during the week.

So I'd like to know where you got the notion - to rock the boat. Don't rock the boat baby. Rock the boat. Don't tip the boat over. Rock the boa-oh-oh-oat. None of these kids are old enough to know that song. Hell, I'm not even old enough to know that song. But thanks to oldies radio stations and candy commercials, these kids should know better than to rock the boat. But kids never learn, so Brian, Kevin, Timmy and Jenny put their lives on the line. Thankfully the boat was dry-docked on land, so they didn't have to worry about causing a splash.