Better Late Than Never

I took a few weeks off from writing because 1. I was very busy and 2. I was getting a little burned out on writing these every week. It will probably take me 2 or 3 posts to get back up to date but I am going to attempt to do that this week.

I will start where I left off which I believe was the Jr. High Olympics. On the first day of the Olympics we had a few work groups create signs for each of the five teams. Each of the interns was assigned to a team and given a work group to watch over. My team was called the Black Bus (team names were assigned). We were instructed to create a banner for our team and to pick a Bible verse that would encourage team work or working together or something along those lines. Given my competitive nature, I suggested that our sign be a black bus running over the other team mascots and our verse be Revelations 6:8 which says, "And I saw a pale horse (pale horse was of course changed to black bus) and the man who sat on it was death, and Hell followed with him". The work group, not knowing any better, took my advice and created the a pretty sweet banner. Next, I took a sharpie and wrote black bus across my knuckles as if it were a tattoo, which immediately made all of my kids want to be on our team. Once the kids were placed on teams, I helped all the black bus kids follow suite with temporary knuckle tattoos. After the kids were on their teams and had their tattoos, we had the kids design a team flag and write a team song.

Our Banner

For the second day of the Olympics, we headed to Camp Grace in north Camden. We had a full day of events in the Basement of their camp and as we were leaving one of the 5th graders from my camp came up to me and said, "Matt, you are the kid best a friend can have". He then tilted his head to the side like a confused dog, realizing that what he had just said was jibberish, and ran to the bus. I have absolutely no idea what he was trying to say but I was touched none the less.

The third day of the Olympics was the day with all of the athletics. I knew that we had an advantage on this day because we had many of the athletic kids. The first event was knockout (for those who don't know, this is a basketball game). They announced that one staff or work group member was aloud to participate in this event. I of course told all of the other staff and work group on my team that they weren't aloud to compete since this was MY event. I won the knockout competition and then my team preceded to win the relay and other athletic games of the day.

The last day was the closing ceremonies. We ate pizza and they announced the winner of the Olympics. The black bus finished second. I don't see any way that another team could possibly have had more points than us. I think we got robbed but pretended that I was happy with second place for the sake of the kids.

Some other interns and I had planned to go on a road trip to Buffalo after the Olympics. Though originally about 10 inters had planned to go, by the time the actual day came around, everyone but me, Chad, Mike and Charlotte had bailed. My camp ended up having our staff night out after the Olympics and so we did not get on the road to Buffalo until about 11 pm. We drove through the night, drinking energy drinks and blasting music to keep ourselves awake, and arrived at Mikes aunts house in Buffalo at about 6am. We got about 4 hours of sleep (I only got about a half hour because of the energy drinks) and headed to Niagara Falls at about 10am.

We ate breakfast at Tim Horton's and arrived at Niagara Falls around 11am. After wondering around a bit, we decided to check out the Canadian side of the Falls. When we got to Canada we were sent to a long line in customs. When we got to the front of the line, the customs women started interrogating me about something I had been arrested for when I was 19. I told her it had been expunged from my record. She did not know what that meant. The customs woman was a bitch and kind of incompetent. When I explained these things too her, she sent us back to United States.

Despite what the sign says, the falls were not in that dumpster

We went through those turnstiles

When we got back to the U.S., we went to a bar for some buffalo wings, then to an ice cream place for desert, and finally to a hot dog place for a night cap. After a full day of eating, we returned to Mike's aunts house and went to sleep. The next day we got up and went to a Greek diner for lunch where I had the most amazing burger I have ever had in my life. We then took a walk on some river walk trail that was in the river between the United States and Canada, threw rocks at a dead fish, and piled back in the car to head home.

The Falls

The next week we had a fairly typical week of camp. Wednesday night we went to the karaoke bar in Philly that we had discovered a couple of months ago. It was possibly even more fun than the first time. On Friday we had our Math Dare competition. Math Dare is a competition where the kids have to compete in math related events that also include gross tasks. There was all kinds of slime and different things that a work group set up for the kids. It was great and camp spirit (my camp) dominated the math portion of the contest. We did not, however, win the title. A lot of the points awarded were dependent on athletic activities and our kids were at a slight disadvantage when it came to this portion of the event.

Pookie outside of the karaoke bar. Not sure what a shaved noodle is.

On Saturday, Chad and I took about 11 kids to the skate park under the overpass in Philadelphia next to FDR park. Pretty soon after we got there, one of our kids sprained his ankle and had to be taken to the emergency room. Chad took him in his car. Realizing that we might be stuck at the skate park for longer that anticipated, I went and bought us all some McDonald's. At some point during the day I fell on my elbow (I fall often and can not remember any one specific fall). I realized this when I took off my sweatshirt and one of my kids pointed out that I was bleeding. I put my sweatshirt back on and skated the rest of the day. When I got home I noticed that the elbow of my sweatshirt was soaked in blood. I took off my sweatshirt and as I was looking at the cut on my elbow in the mirror, my room mate came in and asked what the white was that was bulging out of the cut. As I examined it, I quickly realized that it was the bone. I drove to the store and bought some peroxide to clean it, some butterflies to close it, and some gauze to wrap it. After I bandaged it up, I spent the next couple days being extra careful not to let it split open again. The following Tuesday, I got on a plane to California for an interview with the Contra Costa Probation department and to prepare for our kids to come out for spring break.

My bone sticking out before I knew it was sticking out.

I thought Jeffery had this.

And then this happened.

Spring Break Post Coming Soon.