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This fiendish creature kept me up all Friday night. We were camping out back by the pond (can anyone say brrrrr? It got down to the low thirties!).
For the first time in our long history of family campouts, our beloved kitty
(alternately known as Chloe or Killer the Destroyer) joined us by the fire. A
pleasant surprise, especially since she’s a warm littler bugger and snuggled my
kids.
When I crawled into my tent at bedtime (by the way, the
stars were stunning—glittery points marching in formation across the wide sky,
making me feel small and infinite at the same time), I had no idea that Killer
was hiding out under my cot, waiting to terrorize me. Me, the source of all things good—food, water, a vaguely clean
litter box.
While my dream self wandered an arctic wasteland (thirty
degrees, remember?), the kitty struck. She tore back and forth through the
tent, bouncing off the fabric walls, jumping from cot to cot, prompting a
shrieking contest between my husband, my son and me. I won’t mention who won. Not wanting to deprive Killer of a night of hunting, we
tossed her outside. Unfortunately, she persisted in hunting us, attacking through the tent walls. As
the night progressed, the little monster snuck back in the tent whenever someone stepped
outside for a potty break.
Boom! She’s on the foot of my cot. Pitter patter,
she runs along the side of my body, pounces on my head, then leaps to the floor—I’m
sure she’s laughing—to start it all again. Apparently she also terrorized our other sons and their friends
who slept in a different tent. One woke, poked his head out of his sleeping bag
only to have the cat dart in before he could figure out what she was. Needless
to say, darling Chloe will hunt in the house the next time we camp out!
What funny or crazy things have happened to you while enjoying the great outdoors?
Man, what hasn't happened to me outside? One great story would have to be the year it rained every day of scout camp. It didn't drizzle, mist, or shower. It alternated a soaking rain with pounding buckets, with brief intervals of cats and dogs thrown in for good measure. The most memorable thing about this was the first morning, when I woke up late, but still before the rest of my troop. We had the campsite highest on the mountain. Since I was the first one up in the campsite, I started a fire, and since I was a boy scout, I did it from the coals from the previous night's fire. We then rolled out of wet tents, put on wet clothes, shivered around the fire, and went down to the central flagpole - to discover that they were about to send a search party for us. Not only were we an hour late, but the ranger had spotted a lightning strike in our camp during the night, and they were worried. When we got to camp, we look to see where the lightning could have hit, when I realized I had started the fire from coals after a thunderstorm that had washed tents away all down the mountain. You want to guess where that lightning hit?
ReplyDeleteWow, that sounds like a crazy experience and a close call! Thanks so much for the follow and I hope you'll enjoy my blog!
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