Camp Phil - Episode II - Revenge of the Pirates

This is the blog of what I remember of camp. Given that it's a couple of weeks ago and I have a terrible memory you'll only get a brief summary. Dr-dyb said I should have been writing a daily blog so that I could just copy and paste it in once I got internet access but I had no time to be doing that as everything was so hectic.

The main thing I noticed from camp was that I was much more confident this year. I pretty much knew what I was meant to be doing and didn't feel nervous about getting on with it. Knowing all of the team from the previous year was a bonus... especially given that I was in charge of them again and this year was ready to exert my authority ;-)

Camp was great at first... but then the kids arrived. We had some ice-breaker games and then a barbecue. Last year the barbecue was pretty rained off and one general helper kept trying to get the barbecue going despite all the rain by just using a hair-dryer... unsuccesfully obviously.

The theme for camp was 'Pirates'. When I came up with it I wasn't quite sure that it passed on the right message of God's love for us all and how we should treat our neighbours but we went with it anyway and the team and kids seemed to enjoy it. Some of us just went around shouting 'arrrrrrrrrrr' the whole week.

On Sunday we went to church in North Berwick who showed a video (15) of James Bond chasing a bad guy and the baddie getting away and thus winning so the message I got from that was that no matter how hard you try the baddie will always beat you... I'm not entirely sure that's the message the minister wanted to get accross but that's what he got accross.

I was running the tuch shop this year and I got a large amount of stock which Dorothy said I would never shift. One of the key rules of retail is buying at the right price, that's often more important than the price you sell at. I was told that Freddos were a really popular seller but I decided against buying them when the unit price cost slightly more than I could sell them at which meant the more I was able to sell the more of a loss I'd be making. You need the right balance between popular items and the mark-up you can put on them. A couple of the older leaders were shocked at my blatant capatlism especially once I started link selling and making special offers and megadeals to encourage the kids to buy more. Some leaders didn't have so much of a problem with that but more of a problem with how hyper all the kids were from the masses of sugar they were getting... it was for the greater good though as all the profits went back to SU.

On Monday a couple of the groups made videos. Stephen starred in one and played himself brilliantly. When Donald gets the right cable I'll download it and stick it on the interwebnet.

On Tuesday afternoon we went to the flight museum which was boring and involved a lot of walking.. I was more interested in looking for a seat than for classic planes.

Every day I did a modern bible study which was optional for the kids unless your name was 'David'. It was called "The Wide Awake Club" and generally David wasn't wide awake which meant that Stephen had to go into his room and shout "Wide Awake Club" before carrying (usually helped by Tim) David and his duvet outside and back in the other door. Generally somebody would have to sit on David or somehow otherwise restrain him without being kicked or bitten too much. Very often he needed gagged to prevent him shouting "I hate the Wide Awake Club" too loudly and distracting us from our bible study.

On Thursday we went to Blair Drummong Safari Park. I was dreading it because last year I hit the wall on the Thursday and was feeling exhausted and grumpy and really didn't have a very good time at all. This year I had a much better time. I led a sing-song on the minibus all the way there and when we were there the leaders all got the dodgems to themselves at first and we had a great dodgem fight. Why does it tell you to avoid head-on collisions when the people know that's exactly what the signs are going to make you want to do all the more? I love dodgems and coul dhave stayed on them all day if it wasn't for the fact that I had kids to look after... that and I was drawn my the wofting aroma of freshly cooked doughnuts. Mmmmm, doughnuts ::drool::

We had a drive round the safari park and I was able to see quite well as Raymond leant me a pair of binoculars and after that I went on a peddle boat... which I didn't pedal. Donald and I sat as passengers in the back as our man-slaves peddled us.

On Thursday night I was having a lovely wee chat with James in the kitchen when Donald interrupted us and gave us a row for being up too late... it was only 3am. Generally I call everyone who goes to bed before 5am and doesn't get up by 7am a light-weight but Donald wasn't amused. He was more angry with me as I'm meant to be the one who tels leaders to go to bed if they're up too late.

On Friday there was team sports day and a lot of people got very wet. I wasn't planning on being one of them until right at the end Fraser had the cheek to throw a whole bucket of water over me. I was... nae... I am... totally livid and vowed revenge on him. He was very fortunate that his belongings didn't all end up in the Peffer that night but I could see the look of fear in his eyes due to my impending revenge and I really thought that I would like him to constantly be looking over his shoulders and I could draw his suffering out longer and longer. I know his address and the trains are free for me... so, I'll be seeing you soon Fraser, mu ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha

Arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr, we also sang some great songs all week, arrrrrrrrrrrrrr

I feel I should thank the rest of the team for making camp such an enjoyable experience but as I pride myself in my levels of ingrattitude I won't.