Camping: The Entertainment (Taskmaster Sandbanks)

 Nicole's latest post reminded me that our site this year was only one road over from the comfort station, and there was a cut-through so you didn't even have to walk all the way to the end of the forest-median thing, you could just walk across the cut-through. The good part of this was that I didn't have to go to the outhouse in the middle of the night, which I generally do because the comfort station is just a little too far at 3 a.m. The bad part was that it was a gentle slope up and a flat path, but then a fairly steep step down on the other end with some roots. I was perpetually terrified that I was going to take a header in the middle of the night and be found unconscious in the morning. Fortunately it didn't happen.

Aside from the reading, we sometimes have an activity at the campfire before and/or after dinner. There's a running charades game, where anyone can get up and do something and whoever guesses then goes next. One year we played giant hangman where the puzzle was scratched into the sand instead of on a paper, which was bad because it was hard to keep track of the letters and words and also good because it was really funny that no one could keep track of the letters and words. Also Collette meant to do "A Lannister Always Pays His Debts" and accidentally did "A Lannister Never Forgets" (confusing Lannisters with elephants, I guess?) instead, so everyone was really confused and then both outraged and amused.

The most involved and impressive activity was after our dinner, when we did Collette's Taskmaster activities. I know a few blog friends are big Taskmaster fans. For me it's the best show I can never remember to watch, but the stuff Collette set up was highly entertaining. It was mostly the kids (young adults) who ended up participating - I was documenting and some people were judging and I guess the rest of the old people were content to sit and observe.

The first task was to - I can't remember the exact wording, but it was to 'represent' Michael somehow. Michael was appointed the judge of this, which some might call poor judgment on Collette's part but whatever, I had no skin in the game.

Jacob drew a picture of Michael with a thought balloon saying "this music is uninspiring" (more on this later). Melanie sculpted his face out of tinfoil. There were a couple of impersonations, but Meghan - his daughter- blew it out of the water effortlessly. Was there nepotism involved? Probably, but no one said there couldn't be.

The next task was to be wearing the most articles of clothing out of everyone, without taking any clothing from your own family. This resulted in all the participants begging for clothing for everyone who wasn't a direct blood relative

except Matthew, who very intelligently raided our clothesline.

Jared thought he had to take off every article of clothing to count it, and there was a rush of panic when we were all afraid he might not stop in time.

There was some tussling over the last pink flip-flop, and I think whoever stole it last ended up winning, but I was laughing too hard to really pay attention.

Then there was the counting by increasingly large sequences with increasingly complicated instructions attached to every odd or even number - squat down, jump up, salute, spin around, mispronounce the number, etc. It was really hard. 

There was something about instructions on a sheet of paper that someone who shall not be named (Ben) read and then tried to eat and then burn, in the spirit of "do whatever it takes to win" - I can't even remember what the instructions were. Oh, something about naming birds without repeating any within five seconds. And eating licorice maybe? 

It was awesome. 

Aside from that there was washers.

Beach bocce

Chasing Margot with a super-soaker

Beach napping

Beach gymnastics

Sand castling

 Burying Rose in the sand (a classic)

And...whatever this is?