jere7my | Jul. 31st, 2011

Photos, finally, plus a few more highlights of Pinewoods, before they fade from my mind:

I got to play fetch with Sophie, black lab / camp security officer! She jumped into the pond and paddled very diligently out to fetch the toy I threw, then shook herself dry in a great scintillating explosion of water on the camp house porch. Also, she rolled around on her back in the wood chips, and we played "I'm-gonna-get-yer-stick!" I so miss having a dog.

kdsorceress and I went on a fabulous two-mile hike through the Conant-Storrow Nature Preserve, which is about a half mile from camp. (This was, I think, the second time I'd ever left camp during Pinewoods.) We saw a rushing stream with fish in, gorgeous metallic green damselflies called ebony jewelwings, Halfway Pond and its island, bright green cranberry bogs beneath a bright blue sky, and unexpected beehives. I did not get us lost, despite making a wrong turn, and despite turning around to see we'd left a big "NO TRESPASSING" sign behind us. Oops. (It was more generally very nice to have Kat there; it was her first time at camp, and I love playing tour guide, especially for a place that I love and know like the back of my hand.)

I met and danced with a very nice young volunteer named Robin, who is a burlesque dancer. Actually, I danced with a lot of people, and had a nice time with them all.

I lost my crown as Feelies champion. Feelies is a game of identifying little objects in little blue bags by touch alone; I won last time, but was robbed this year because I didn't recognize a Boggle cube, despite having the brainstorm of using the power of magnetism to identify the fridge magnet, which was otherwise a heavy little disk. Next year, the tiebreaker!

It was wonderful mushroom weather — heavy rains (just before we arrived) followed by hot, humid air made for dozens of brawny little mushrooms shoving up through the pine needles. One the size of a dinner plate was growing from a log outside the dining hall; a half dozen people made sure I knew about it.

I had several good conversations with David Grubb, who is rapidly turning into one of my favorite Pinewoods-goers. He is British, and appropriately dry-humoured, and always reading an Iain M. Banks novel.

I wore my red British military jacket, loud Macleod tam o' shanter, and Utilikilt to the Friday ball, and looked either ridiculous or dashing.

I enjoyed a lot of ice cream and birch-or-ginger beer on the camphouse porch, played with many bathroom marble machines, ate delicious food in the dining hall (the roast chicken was amazing), hugged a lot of people, laughed a lot, skulked and sulked some, used an outhouse, made new friends, saw old ones (old friends — nothing Lovecraftian), played guitar on the dock, and generally had a Pinewoods.