The following is part of an e-mail I sent to cousin Steph. Rather than re-word all of this, I decided to simply cut and paste. Makes life easier, saves time.
Had an interesting day at work today. Whilst cleaning one of the cabins this morning (the “Misty” – they all have names) I heard a fire alarm go off. Took a few minutes for my brain to register it. I stepped out the door to investigate and was greeted by Simon, the extremely adorable, friendly, and intelligent (but not as nice of Hunter, of course – oh, how I miss her) dog staying with his people in the Ada cabin, looking frightened and worried. He stopped for a moment, and continued on his way up the hill, away from his cabin. Putting two and two together, I headed down to the Ada where the fire alarm was still screaming. I climbed up the steps to see smoke billowing out the windows, and a very frightened boy, probably around 11, running about the kitchen waving a pillow (I assume he was attempting to clear the air). I knocked, he answered, I said “Hey there! Your dog just ran up the hill. You’re having trouble, eh? Want some help?” The poor kid took off after Simon, and I busied myself inside the cabin, opening all windows and doors, waving the kid’s pillow at the smoke alarm to shut it off. Turns out the kid’s mum left him for an hour to visit with someone at another cabin, telling him to keep an eye on the dog and to make himself some pop-tarts. Well, the toaster apparently doesn’t pop up automatically, so the pop-tarts burned to a bloody crisp, and oozed their gross sticky insides (yuck, who eats pop-tarts??) down into the belly of the toaster, causing the cabin to fill with smoke. It was quite the adventure. I felt like a hero – Hollis the brave enters the burning cabin, rescuing the children within from certain death, risking her life for the welfare of innocent souls (bluck, smelly children)  Actually, the kid was pretty cool, and he looked so upset, made my heart ache.  His older sister SLEPT through the whole incident!! The cabins aren’t big, and her room was right beside the alarm. I thought to myself, “she must be 14” – sure enough, she is. So that was an adventure, and no lasting harm done. Dan managed to clean the toaster out once it cooled.
This afternoon I helped the boys gravel the road. We’ve had an insane amount of rain here over the past few days. The rafts and docks have practically sunk.  The roads have washed away. Dan ordered a truck load of gravel to fix the huge gullies in the driveway and road.  He had Greg and Zack (Zack’s the grandson of a neighbour – he’s working here for the summer too – great guy, I like him, he laughs like Scooby-Doo) down at one end of the drive raking out a pile of the gravel and creating “trenches” for water run-off, and I was up on the hill helping him with another pile of gravel. My helping consisted mainly of standing and watching him try to smooth out the gravel using his kubota with a blade attached.  Once it became apparent that this wasn’t working, Dan handed me a big rake, instructed me on how to create the trench and smooth out the gravel, and then disappeared. I worked away for about half an hour, sweating, trying to avoid the ankle-biting rain flies, and feeling a little uneasy with the look of my trench. Dan returned suddenly with a new plan. “Have you ever operated a four-wheeler?” asks Dan. Hmmm. I thought about the hours I spent as a kid driving about Grandpa’s property on The Bear, and tried to decide quickly whether or not I a) remembered how in hell to “operate” such a thing, and b) whether or not my experience with Grandpa’s could be considered “operating” in any useful, work-oriented sense. I answered, “well, yeeees, I have driven a four-wheeler before….” Dan smiled, “Great! Follow me!” Off we went to the neighbour’s to borrow their four-wheeler. Their four-wheeler is a little different from Grandpa’s – the gear shifting and such in different spots – but I adapted. Had a few moments of panic trying to reverse, but otherwise I felt pretty confident. Dan had me drive up the hill towards our place. Halfway there he attached a large, square metal frame type thing to the back of the four-wheeler which I would be dragging back and forth over the new gravel to smooth it. I felt a little silly dragging the thing around – it made a horrible racket, and I just KNEW what Greg’s reaction would be. (bloody greg) It worked amazingly well, though, and Dan was pleased. There wasn’t enough room for me to circle around, so I had to reverse the four-wheeler. Greg had to drag the metal thingy back as I reversed. (haha, making him work) It was alarmingly similar to the scene in Austin Powers where he gets stuck on that truck in the hall. The whole experience also reminded me of the fun times with Steph babysitting Owen and Jamie. We drove around the camp roads with their Grandpa, dragging the make-shift road grater, listening to Disney music tapes (“There’s a hole in my bucket, dear Goofy, dear Goofy….!”)  We thought the Grandpa was insane. Those memories kept surfacing, so what with that and sensing the possibility of mayhem and madness, I couldn’t stop giggling nervously as I worked away.
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