Went camping the other weekend, and I swear that's where we stayed. It was a state park, but I really think it was Mosquito Falls. I've never seen so many mosquitos in my life. There was a lake there, and it hadn't rained much in a while, which made it perfect conditions for evil bugs. The surface of the lake was covered in larvae. I really can't believe the fish weren't gorging on them. Must not have been enough fish. Or maybe the mosquitos ate them.

Anyway, I'm thankful my father-in-law was there, because the mosquitos went for him over me. Usually I'm the one the bugs go for; they tap on my windows and ask if I can come out and play. But they just tore him up. I didn't do great; I probably had 30+ bites by the end of the weekend, but he had that many on EACH LEG. It was horrible. We went through at least five bottles of bug spray between nine of us, and we had to buy Cortaid spray and Benadryl gel when we got home. I still itch.

We took the dog camping. Our dog is not really a "roughing it" kind of dog; he sleeps on a pile of comforters and blankets in my closet and spends most of his days indoors. He gets walked 2-3 times a day. So this was an adventure. We wanted to try to it see if he could survive and do well; since we camp so frequently it is a real pain to have to find a dog-sitter every weekend--maybe if he did well we could take him along more often. Sadly, this is not to be. The first night he was OK, although he didn't really understand the whole concept of the tent. He didn't sleep on the bed prepared for him in the tent. Instead, after circling the tent five or ten times, he laid on my clean clothes and got hair all over them. The next day he started out having a great day. We took a walk around the lake and he got to pee on every plant in the state park. Very exciting. But then we gathered our stuff and headed for the swimming beach on the other side of the campground. This necessitated putting two adults, two small children (4 and 6), and two non-water dogs (our Shiba Inu and my sister-in-law's Sheltie) in a raft and paddling that raft around a small point of land. My husband, my brother-in-law, and I all paddled our kayaks next to the raft. The dogs contemplated their potential escape the entire journey, hanging over the sides of the raft and patting the water with their paws. I think they were estimating the depth and their chances. When we got to the beach, my husband climbed out of his boat and waded out to the raft, in about chest-deep water. He then called to our dog, who wiggled a moment on the wale of the raft and then leapt into the water. Well, it didn't go as well as he hoped--he came up frantically paddling and sputtering and made his way to my husband. He tried to climb my husband to get out of the water, so my husband tossed him back in the raft. He stayed in the raft until the boat got close enough to the shore to jump to the beach without hitting any water. That was pretty much the turning point of his day. We stayed at the beach for several hours, but a storm blew up. We headed back to the campsites (this time by truck instead of by boat, because we thought the storm was going to make the paddle back ugly) and started on dinner. Then, it began to pour. And pour. And thunder. And lightning. It was a heck of a storm. With a little camp creativity (a tarp draped between two big storage boxes and held up with a kayak paddle and some rope, all over our fire pit with a dutch oven in it) we managed to get dinner cooked and eaten, but the rain made for a early night for everyone. It rained off and on the entire night. This second night did not go well for the dog. We thought at the time it might be bugs (which he hates), but on reflection may have just been the noise of the rain hitting the tent, but the dog would not settle down all night. He whined and cried, and fussed around, and would lay down for half an hour or so and then get up and circle the tent again. We didn't get much sleep since he was so active. Little did we realize, he was searching for a way out. He found it at about five in the morning. He discovered that the two zipper pulls on one of the tent doors were not quite touching. He put his nose in the fresh air between them and pushed. He managed to work them open enough to fit between them, and made a break for it. We were both dozing at that point and didn't realize he was on his way out until it was too late. The dog was loose in a state park 200 miles from home in the pitch black pouring rain. Great. There was nothing we could do; we certainly couldn't chase him down. My husband went back into the tent to wait until it was light. I stayed out under the dining fly; I figured if the dog knew I was there he would be less likely to run away in terror if the thunder rumbled. Sure enough, I was only outside for about five minutes before he came sidling up. Clearly running loose in the dark rain wasn't nearly as much fun as he thought it would be. I walked over to the cooler as if I was going to get something out, and the dog came right up and sat down, hoping for a handout. Instead, I grabbed him by the collar and threw him back in the tent. He circled the tent a few more times, checking for weaknesses, and then gave up for the night. The next day, he was so tired, he just laid around the campsite until we were packed and ready to leave, and then he fell asleep on my lap on the drive home (something he NEVER does--he's not a lap dog in any way).

So, we left some blood at the state park, and learned a valuable lesson about our dog: until we have a camper/trailer that has a locking door, he should be left at home.

I've been tired ever since. Could be because I'm so horribly out of shape (made it to the gym today for the first time in forever; hooray for me!), but I think it's because of the anemia. Or the West Nile virus.