All About the Weekend

So, my pal B and I made our annual pilgrimage to the North Shore this past weekend. We always head out of town on a Friday, set up a tent somewhere north of Duluth, and goof off.

We’ve had some adventures over the past few years. Pouring rain. Freezing cold. Unlightable fire wood. Random encounters with boys old enough to buy us liquor (this was with pal Little Shrub and was before the mister, when none of us could legally have booze).

Last year it got down to 29 or 30 degrees at night. That, ladies and gentlemen, is cold when one is sleeping in a tent. We wore hats to bed. And hoods. That were tied tight under our chins. And several pairs of pants. And socks.

It was COLD.

This year, the weather cooperated. Other than a 10 minutes rain shower early Saturday morning, we had lovely weather.

We were able to light fires both nights, using only one match the first night and two matches the second. This is a record for us, folks.

Our campsite, while not as dramatically lovely as the one last year, was just a few yards from the lake shore and a good distance from traffic (both the vehicle kind and the kind that heads for the campground bathroom at 6 a.m.).

We rode the alpine slide for nearly 6 hours. There was only one major mishap where an old lady was going too slow, causing the boy behind her to have to go too slow. B came whizzing around a corner and, as it was too late and she was going too fast to stop, she bashed into the boy. She managed to flag me down so I slowed down without the crashing, but the guy behind me smashed into me pretty darned hard. Whiplash for everyone!

We did some walking along the lakeshore and some hiking in Gooseberry State Park.

It was a lovely weekend.

Now for the mishaps:

While wading in the Gooseberry River a leech attached itself to B’s foot, right between her toes. When she discovered said blood-sucking parasite, she bellowed, in the crispest, most precise pronunciation I’ve ever heard, “Fucking leech!”

I backed the mister’s truck into a picnic table. It’s a big truck and we had a relatively small campsite and just as I was congratulating myself on how good I’ve gotten at driving the beast…THUNK. There’s a small dent and some red paint transfer from the table.

I wasn’t too worried about his reaction since (1) he loves me, (2) it’s not a Ferrari nor a vehicle he has spent hours restoring, and (3) he put the first scratch on my motorcycle, but I was a little nervous.

His response was priceless. I brought him over to the truck, he looked at the boo-boo, shrugged his shoulders and said, “do you need any help unpacking?”

That was it.

When I pressed him, he goes, “Honey, it’s a truck. Most of it will buff out and for the rest of it, trucks get scratches. It’s what they’re for. Who cares?”

The mister had his own mishaps while I was out of town. He scored some freebie tickets to a musical thinking I’d want to go. When he figured out that I’d be gone, he took his mom. That’s right, my nearly-30 year old husband took his mom on a date on Friday night. And he managed to run into one of my bosses at the restaurant they had dinner at. I think he was debating flinging himself in front of traffic when he ran into my boss, so I guess that part is good.

Then, after dropping his mom off at home, he managed to forget his house keys down there, so, upon arriving back at our house, he tried to break in. If you come over and think the window in my kitchen is all fucked up, you’d be right.

The mister, after realizing his juvenile delinquent days are too far gone, couldn’t break in without breaking a window, so he called my brother, who has a spare key. Brother was drinking, however, and was in no shape to drive, so the mister headed up there to pick up the spare key and ended up staying for a drink or ten.

So, an interesting weekend all around.