Manda Gets Wood

My Dear Princess and Dear Fellow,

I was not in a good way at the start of day two at Camp Shrinkyballs. I had pretty much convinced myself that I would be buggering off early and leaving Jefe and Manda to themselves.

They had a BUNCH of other people coming anyway, I told myself. Shenée and Craig, Mo and a couple of Jefe's poker buddies. 

But by about 8am, the sun warmed my old bones and I began to relent. I didn't want to miss out on the fun and anyway, Manda made a great breakfast that we ate as the river sang in the background. There were ducks everywhere and I started feeling better. 

I was glad I did. Jefe and Manda clearly LOVE being outdoors. They took me to where Peter Jackson filmed the Rivendell scenes for Lord of the Rings. 

To be honest, it is a forest. You have to use your imagination and try to superimpose CGI around yourselves to get any sense of it at all. But the forest IS beautiful and the day was lovely.

When we got back to camp, Jefe took a nap and Manda played guitar and sang. That was maybe my favourite part of the day. But then the day two arrivals began including Shenée and Craig. She was FIZZING with excitement and everyone got hugs. 

"Calm down, calm down Squirt," said Craig. 

(This is her nickname and is short for "Squirty-Bum-Bum" as you may recall). 

He regaled us with tales of trying to work at home with Shenée alongside. She HOWLED when she thought her laptop screen was damaged (it was just the screensaver) then LAUGHED when she realised her mistake then SCREAMED when she opened the laptop screen and trapped her skin in the hinges.

"It's true," said Shenée happily. "I'm a PEST."

She isn't, of course. She lit up the camp instantly and greeted the newly arrived Mo with a big hug. Then she and Craig went to get "Dirty Burger" for everybody. 

As for Manda, she was busy with her wood pile. She had been gathering wood all day and had prepared an impressive bonfire in the firepit. But then came the problem of guarding it from other campers. She was on her feet all afternoon, walking to the river and back again to glower at the envious eyes of other campers. 

"Touch my wood and I will cut you, b*tch," she hissed to me as a twelve year old boy admired her construct.

But her wood went untouched and in the evening we gathered around to play "Secret Hitler" again and this time the play was a lot more interesting as we attempted to find out who was the Secret Hit-

IT WAS ME! IT WAS MEEEEEEE!!! HAHAHAHAHAAAAA!!

I undermined democracy and plunged the world into a near-apocalypse.
 
But more importantly I won the game. 

Then Shenée made s'mores* (pictured above) as we looked into the flames or "bush tv" as Mo called it.

So it was a fun evening under the stars, watching the wind ruffle the trees and listening to the calls of nearby rurus. 

The evening was not so cold this time, and I was hopeful my sleep would be better. And indeed it was although nothing like as comfortable or deep as my little pit back in Paraparaumu.

I was glad I came to help Jefe celebrate. I was delighted to spend time with  Shenée and Craig and Mo and Manda again. But as I flip-flip-flip-flip-flip-flip-EFFING-flipped myself for the seventh time in one night, I was happy to be going home soon.

S. 

* I had never had these before. Jefe confirmed that they were indeed nearly authentic, compared to the American version.