ed ponders the pumpkin

The rest of our gang has arrived. They weren’t able to get a cabin so they’ve set up a tent site on the other side of the canyon.

Ed, obviously, has brought every cooking gadget known to man and has configured half of their site into a commercial kitchen. The Four-burner, incredibly hight BTU cooking grill looked somehow appropriate on the picnic table they snagged and drug into their site to serve as a workstation.

In the following days, Ed will make some incredible meals.

Part of the activities for the Driller Bear’s run is a Haloween Costume and jack-o-lantern carving contest. We nab our pumpkins and go to the dining pavilion and get cracking. There’s this funky “craft-time” feeling to the activity that sets off memories of enduring different day camps as a child.

For a fun activity, the guys get awfully consumed by the task at hand. We’re all ferociously competitive.

We decide that “carving pumpkins” sounds too arcane and coin the term “Squash Styling”.

Bouvier, the designated “cub scout mom” of our group, tends the fire and holds court. Between giggling and recounting stories, he barks placement orders for the carved pumpkins which we placed in the woods around their campsite.

The other campers are starting to refer to us as “the over-the-top nuts from St. Louis”.

I still haven’t touched my laptop.. I still couldn’t not not-blog.