Ups and Downs

It's been another couple of long weeks. But as of tomorrow everyone will be in camp! Last week we had some people in the mountains and one on vacation in Hawaii, so we've finally got almost everyone back. :) So nice.

Let's see what's happened lately. Some not so good things...
   I got the Expedition stuck in the mud on the way into Two Harbors
   I was almost the only MSA staff member to stay on the island last weekend (thankfully
   Mary & Marcus stayed too)
   I cleaned a dirty microwave

And some great things..!
   I taught another Vert/Invert lab (and no one collapsed!!!)
   I watched Disney's Peter Pan with Melodie
   I listened to some good choir music and soothed my soul (thank you Eric Whitacre)
   I did laundry with Mary and we sang "Matchmaker" from Fiddler on the Roof
   Fran let me drive Zalophus (MSA's boat) - totally the best part of my week. :)


This place is crazy. And exhausting. And when you are exhausted, it's really easy to be crabby. Toward the end of the week, everyone is dying for the weekend, and Friday lunch is so silent because everyone's energy crashes as soon as the kids leave. Speaking of energy crashing, David took Nyquil or some similar product after dinner tonight and then was trying to get a sugar high so he could make it through the trust walk. I felt bad for laughing, but he was so sadly pathetic (I'm using the word in the best possible sense: that it was evoking pity/sympathetic sadness) that I couldn't help it. I've definitely made that mistake before and it SUCKS. Anyway, back to the subject at hand. We have a high school group coming in this weekend. So some people won't get to rest...and next week is going to be loooonnnnng. I haven't been told if I'm working at all yet or not, but my fingers are crossed. I need the weekend.

Anyway, that's about all I have. Apart from the fact that it's supposed to be 80 degrees tomorrow!! (Don't worry, it goes back to about 65 for the next week.) I miss you all and hope you are doing well. Can't wait to hear from the midwest!!

Another Island Weekend

I suppose it's time to update people on my life since it's been almost two weeks. I probably shouldn't have waited until now, especially since I'm having a hard time remembering exactly what I did last week. And I only know it's Friday today because our kids left on the boat today. It's really hard to keep track of time here. 

Let's see. Last week I spent a couple of days in the office (still trying to get my bearings) and the rest of the time running around camp trying to help out everyone that needed help. I actually spend a lot of time in the camp store when it's open. The more help the better when there's a mob of kids rushing to get candy. Melodie and I also spent a lot of time last week working on the store display. It looked a little dismal before we decorated. We added the sea, sun, Garibaldi and the sea star...plus some birds at the top. (The sun and the sea star were my fabulous handiwork.)

Friday we left on the boat with the kids, and I was at Mary's again. Her sister Sarah was in a play called "The Reluctant Debutante" which was a lot of fun. I also went to see "The Eagle" and "Beastly." Definitely a weekend full of entertainment for me. 

Sunday night we were back in San Pedro and we did some "training" on Monday and Tuesday. I honestly think they were just trying to keep us paid while we didn't have any campers in. We really didn't do a whole lot those days. 

As for the rest of the week, we had two more schools come in, and I had the opportunity to teach my first class - Vertebrate/Invertebrate Lab. It was actually a ton of fun...despite the fact that a kid collapsed because of dehydration. In the middle of the lab, when the kids were looking at fish in a couple different tanks, one came up to me and said "I feel dizzy." So I told him to go sit down, and he didn't even make it to the chair 20 feet away. Once he got onto the chair, I asked him how much water he'd had, and apparently it hadn't been that much. So one of their chaperons went to get water, and I went on with the class. 15 minutes later he was totally fine and back involved for the rest of the class. Between this and the bird lab where I fell in, I'm starting to get a lot of stories. Apparently everything happens when I am part of it. Anyway, the chaperons wanted to get a picture with me and the kids, so I asked if they would take one with my camera too. Here it is. :) They were so much fun!

As for this weekend, I'm planning on reading, sleeping, and playing guitar. It's supposed to rain tomorrow, which stinks since I was planning on kayaking and a possible hike to Parson's, but we'll see. Also, if it's cloudy tomorrow night and I miss the super-moon, I'm gonna be all sorts of upset. :) It's already ridiculously bright. Anyway, I'll close with a couple more pictures. Have a great weekend!

My bed...complete with ridiculously lumpy mattress and towel wind-screens. 

The rest of the Poly. (Short for Polynesian) We haven't had much time to decorate.

Our bathroom!

This is the road to Two Harbors. So much fun when another car comes. 

Another view of the road. You wind around a lot of small harbors, so this is from one side looking over to the other. 

A Perfect Day

Ok, I think it's about time to make you mid-westerners jealous. Just kidding (kind of). It really is unintentional, and I must preface this by saying that God has TOTALLY blessed me with being able to spend my year on Catalina. Without Him, I wouldn't be here and so I am utterly grateful.

In case I haven't mentioned this before, MSA rents out Emerald Bay from the Boy Scouts. So there are people representing the Boy Scouts here all the time (not necessarily Scouts themselves - right now they just come on weekends), but there are staff here all the time. And this weekend, they had a bunch of arborists come out to trim and plant trees. So we had a flurry of activity today.

I slept in (ok, only until 7:30, but it's still a half an hour), got up, and sat in the sunshine ALL MORNING. Melodie and I sat and just watched the activity until lunch. It was so warm and sunny today that it was all I wanted to do. She eventually busted out her ukulele and egg shaker. Lunch was a cookout with amazing watermelon and cookies...it seriously felt like summer! And then there were a bunch of us that kayaked to Sandy Beach and laid out for awhile. I am definitely a lot more pink/reddish than I was this morning.

And if I thought breakfast was a feast, dinner was a banquet. (Is a banquet higher up than a feast? Because dinner blew lunch out of the water...) The kitchen staff started roasting a pig and a goat around 6 this morning, so by 5:30 it was succulent. Here's what was on the menu. Chicken thighs and drumsticks, fish filets with seasonings and lemon, rice, goat, pork, rolls, cookies, and fruit platters with pineapple, strawberries and kiwis. I may have totally overdone my protein limit for today, but it was totally worth it. It was basically a luau on the beach. :)

Anyway - island life on the weekends is incredible. I wish I could share it with you all. But you'll have to be ok with pictures for now. If you ever get a chance to come to Catalina, you should take it. :) Love you all!

The front of camp from the pier

Island Hair

Yes. I have island hair. And yes, it is awesome. For those of you who don't know what island hair is...my hair is starting to curl slightly from the ocean water. Finally, a little body! Although I do feel like I will forever have pruny fingers with the amount of time I've spent in the water over the last few days. I'll give you a little recap of life since Monday.

Mary and I got up on Monday morning at 5 and left Riverside at 6 in order to make sure we made it to the boat at 8:30. And if it hadn't been for the carpool lanes, we would've missed the boat (even with it leaving well over an hour late). Anyway, we enjoyed a breakfast of yogurt and tabbouleh in the car...found my parking spot and made it out to the boat in plenty of time. 

On the way over to Catalina, we saw dolphins swimming on the side of the boat, and we also passed a buoy with a bunch of California Sea Lions around it. And then we got to Catalina. [Commence chaotic afternoon.] Since the boat was so late, we dumped our stuff and jumped into labs. I was shadowing Fran with the other "trainees" and we started Bird lab. This lab includes a kayak around Indian Rock...

 ...which started out great. But, we had a couple stragglers, and so the other trainees and I were sent to help them along. One of the kids I was trying to help got too tired to paddle, and he kept drifting farther and farther away from the group. So after trying to encourage him to paddle and having no way to get anyone to help since I had no radio, I ended up towing him over halfway back to the group. And that is not easy when you are paddling against the current with a huge drag behind you....I had no idea how to lash him to my kayak, so he was just holding on to the back handle, forming a T with our kayaks. Fran finally came over and as he was going to lash the boy to my kayak, mine happened to flip, thus dumping me into 53 degree salty ocean water. Ugh. I spent the rest of the day/night freezing. I seriously felt like an icicle. 

Yesterday was better. We started out with squid dissection, and then headed back into the water for a fish lab snorkel. This was also my first time snorkeling (what a week for firsts...not my fave...) my mask was a little loose and kept getting water in it, which was a total downer. But I did get to see some sweet fish. We then got to stay dry for the rest of the day. We also got a heater in our cabin, so it isn't 40 degrees in there at night anymore. :) These kids were really tough to work with though. We had 107 kids from 5 different schools within a charter system, and they seriously would not shut up. Every time there was a pause in the lesson (and even when there wasn't) they were jabbering away. We yelled at them quite a few times, and they didn't care. They were also pretty disrespectful. I told a couple students to hurry, and they just looked at me and kept walking slowly. Ugh. I wanted to slap them all. Thankfully, there were a couple kids that made it worth it, and they are gone now. Which means I get to start my real job tomorrow!! Although I must say that I did enjoy this week's activities. We went on another snorkel today and I saw a lot more fish. 

Anyway, that's about all I've got. I'll leave you all with a few pictures that I've managed to snap so far on our minimal breaks. Love you all!

View of the courtyard and ocean from the dining hall patio

Beach with the kayaks

Whale's Tale and the ocean

Melodie, Mary and me (wearing David's hat)