I get tired of cramped-up city life

So it's back to the country with me! Here is a photo story of my weekend in DC. It was really hot. I didn't do much.


Tourist watching never ceases to be entertaining. I love pretending to take pictures of the Washington Monument while actually photographing tourists being touristy.

One exciting and new experience was getting a behind-the-scenes tour of the Natural History Museum's mammal collection! Escort required!

I saw some... sunflowers! Nature!

I got some Thai iced tea and drank it on a bus. Also exciting! The bus driver let us on fo free.

Fro yo got eaten. Lots. 

Poop on fries. Oh... I mean.. chili fries! They were very yummy

People watching in the metro wins all the prizes. Hat!!! Look at it!

Aaaand that was pretty much all I did at home. More exciting blog posts later, I promise.

Seeing HP 7.2... the camp way

Seeing a movie with camp is probably different than any other way you could ever go watch a movie. Well, any way that I've ever experienced at least.


Jessie and I (+Sarah) took our burn-out day to go see Harry Potter on opening night in Winchester. Though being Winchester, there was no line to wait in so we ended up getting there ridiculously early and sitting in the theater. On the plus side, we each got 2 pairs of 3D glasses by going in twice (once in normal clothing, once in our house-elf attire)!

We needed a nap before it started.

Just a coupla Harry Potters!

When 2nd session ended, we discovered the HP 7.2 was playing in the drive-in! A trip to the drive-in (or anywhere) with camp involves costumes!

And sitting in the backseat of Ellie's car with D-rod involves insane pictures and many Harry Potter-ized songs.

 

"Act like you are Voldemort and you just found out that Harry destroyed four of your horcruxes"

Here is our Harry Potter-ized version of 'Thank God I'm A Country Boy':

Well life at Hogwarts is pretty laid back

ain't nothing a wizard like me can't hack.

Going to Hogsmeade through the witch's back!

Thank God I'm a magic boy!

Well a wizarding life here at Hogwarts,

learning how to live and fight the Dark Arts.

I just can't wait til school starts!

T-G-I-A-M-B!

Chorus: Well I got me a firebolt and damn I'm British,

when the sun's coming up I'm out playing quidditch.

I'm chasin' down horcruxes,

they're hard to finish!

T-G-I-A-M-B!

Well the cloak was my Daddy's til the day he died

Dumbledore took my hand and held me close to his side

He said 'fight the Dark Arts and vanish with pride!'

T-G-Y-A-M-B!

Using my wand to fend off a curse,

got knuts, sickles, galleons fillin' up my purse.

Got hit with cruciatus, 

nothin' hurts worse!

T-G-I-A-M-B!

See, Harry Potter is never over!!

Salamanderz

I thought I should have some sort of nature blog post, since I do work at nature camp/ bug camp. Plus, I cicada nature!


On a slightly nature-related note, here is my favorite picture from 2nd session's final exam: The Great Race! Staph vs. Campers. We prepared for it with quite the rigorous training regimen (intimidation + lunges with biology textbooks + flexing zee gunz).

Pulling chara and WINNING!

Anyway, back to nature. Salamanders! I've been having a great time searching for them in our stream this summer after taking herpetology. 1st session I had camper projects about salamanders, and I am siked to teach about them at 3rd session as well.

This is a long-tailed. Except that you can't see the tail. But I swear it's there!

I believe this is a northern red, but a juvenile because it's not super dark yet.

This is not a salamander, but a pic of The Bald at final ceremony! It was a gorgeous night.

Stay tuned for more salamander pics! I maybe take too many. But they are sooooo cuuute!

Why you so stupid??

You should get fired right now! How do you do this? You so stupid!


... these are basically the only words we've been saying in the kitchen lately (besides songs). I'm not sure how it started, but every time we drop something or mess up in some way, Maia and I start calling each other "Stuuupiid! Why you so stupid?" And when other staff come in to help cook, we started berating them for being stupid too. They don't take it as well, somehow.


Last night was the last night of the session and we stayed up til 3 am making cinnamon rolls. Needless to say, there was a lot of stupid name calling given that we were falling over with exhaustion.

This is us at the end of our night. It took us a while to get this picture... we were not functioning very well.

Besides being stupid, we've been taking many gimpy pictures.

Here we are dressed for backwards day earlier in the session, serving up some pizza at 7 am.
Step one of confusing the campers as much as possible.

We have to leave the kitchen shutters open or else we will boil to death, so we had to put 
up tape and signs to stop everyone from asking us what's for dinner. 
BEANS! That is all.

Anyways, that was just a brief glimpse into the exciting camp cookin' life. The session is over now and we're done cooking for the next few weeks. The two weeks went by extremely fast, probably helped by our 3 day backpacking trip in Monongahela/ break from cooking.

Next up: a nap!! followed by HP 7.2 at the drive-in with camp tomorrow!

On zee ball, all zee time!

That is our kitchen motto/ chant that we use most every meal. Especially when things are not going according to plan, which seems to be happening more often than not. But it's ok, because we are on zee ball all zee time! It's no problem!

Even at 2 am the night before leaving for our backpacking trips in Monongahela Nat'l Forest, we are on zee ball! See how we've come up with ingenious ways to balance meatball trays in the freezer?

The other common practice of cooking in a sweltering kitchen is to be at the pond instead.  It's a tough switch to go from a session where I basically lived outside to a session where I barely see the sun and live in a winterized cabin. So swimming during/ after meals is required for our sanity. Vitamin D! Yeah!

We're so happy...

CAKE FOR LUNCH!
Truth be told, this is not a baking/food blog, though I most likely will have posts about food. "Cake for lunch" is a song written at 2 am while trying to persuade the cook to let us use the oven for a camper project during my first year working at camp.
It's sung to the tune of the good ol' Barney song...

I love cake, you love cake

We're so happy... CAKE FOR LUNCH!

With a great big CAKE,

and a cake for me and you

Won't you say you love cake too?

Lunch cake lunch!

Anyways as that night was one of my first and best memories of working at the Cove, so it seemed like an appropriate blog title. 
Also, we also made cake for lunch during staff week. 

Also, whenever Maia and I are wondering what to make for lunch, dinner, or bekfart (breakfast), we always get told to make cake. For lunch.
Also, I can't think of anything better.