The Story of CSI Camp 2009

Never gonna give you up; never gonna say goodbye. Never gonna tell a lie and hurt you…
Yeah, I just got rick rolled and thought I would share that with you…

Anyway, back to the business at hand…

The story of CSI Camp 2009 as told by Jonathan Stanley:

We stayed at North Park Quads this year, which meant that the showers were much better, and the bed, and the a/c, and pretty much everything, except we did have to walk a little further everyday. It also meant I would have to share a quad with three snot-nosed campers. Anyway, after a long wait to get my keys, food card, parking tag, and some basic instructions about not playing with the sprinkler system, I got moved into my quad, and then we had to meet in LSW 444 for Orientation, of course. They gave us free food for lunch and then we had our typical boring orientation and, once again, they forgot to color code the name tags by group. Is it really that hard?

Well, I ended up working in the same class room as last year, which I hated because it has really uncomfortable stools instead of chairs, and it’s the only room CSI has class in that I don’t have a key to. Anyway, the other counselors for that group were Jerry Dickson (a teacher), Michelle Crain (another teacher), and Jessie Green (works in the molecular ecology lab with Andy and Dave). We head over to pick up our bin full of useless crap to give away as prizes and then go to our classrooms and meet our teachers. I walk in with the bin and say to the teachers, “Greetings! We come bearing gifts!” They just kind of look at me, no doubt thinking I’m an idiot. One of the teachers, Ms. Skelton, was in my class last year. She’s okay, I guess. Another teacher is Mr. Magee; he’s okay. Mrs. Staynor was pretty cool, a bit odd at times, but cool. And then there is Mrs. Young. Why it’s Mrs. Young and not Miss Young I’ll never know. There’s some poor sap out there either realizing he made the biggest mistake of his life…or he’s just a moron.

Mrs. Young (hereafter referred to as either she-devil or crazy-teacher) just sat there going over the schedule and making notes about each lesson. Of course, she had her glasses down on the end of her nose so she could look even more like the kind of teacher you hate. The other teachers looked through the prize bin for a bit. We counselors just kind of sat around. I remember last year the teachers asking us questions and getting to know us. Not this year. They pretty much ignored us. One of them mentioned something about decorating the room. So a few basic decorations went up and then a discussion ensued about the difference between how a male Jr. or Sr. high teacher decorates compared to a female primary school teacher. Exhilarating.

And then we sat there. Jessie was getting quite bored and asked if there was anything we needed to do. Crazy-teacher made a comment about how this would be the most relaxing part of the week. Yeah, but it’s pretty boring right now. So we sat there.

After a while I asked how much they wanted us to be involved. Crazy-teacher said we should help out as much as we could after they go over the presentation. You know, they could take a break while we help the students do the work. Whatever. Well, that was pretty much it. Still not as interested in us as the teachers last year were. So I said that last year I had taught the GPS stuff since I am a biology grad student and some of my friends taught about how to use microscopes; would there be any topics that they didn’t feel confident enough to cover that we could help with? Mrs. Staynor said we could feel free to add anything we wanted and she was pretty much unoffendable so it wouldn’t bother her. Great! Then Crazy-teacher just said that if they left anything out that we could add our input. Okay, I guess I’m going to sit back and not do anything. Crazy-teacher basically said it was really easy stuff and they would do most of it (i.e. she would do most of it). The other teachers mentioned that she was the most OCD and they were just letting her do the work and were following her lead. And then we sat there.

Jessie was getting bored again and asked if we needed to run any errands or anything. No. And then we sat there. The teachers mentioned that everyone was supposed to stay there until 4 pm. So we had a lot of boredom ahead of us. Jessie finally said she was going to go write the ransom note that Dave had asked her to write for the parrot. So she left. The rest of us sat there. Somewhere in all this boredom (I don’t remember when; it’s mostly a blur) we each got t-shirts. That didn’t happen last year. And then we sat there. One of the teachers went to another classroom and found the teachers there making assigned seats for the students and asked them about it. That teacher said, “You’re not doing that in your room?” And our teacher said, “No, we don’t have kindergartners.” Later I found out that the counselors also had assigned seats in that classroom. During the entire week I made fun of one of them for having to sit in an assigned seat. He probably got tired of that. Oh, well.

Michelle had been sending text messages to her husband (also a school teacher and a counselor for another group) and she found out that his group was leaving. She asked him about how long they had to stay and he said their teachers said it didn’t matter; they could leave early if there was nothing to do. So we finally left, too. Hallelujah!

I chilled at my office for a while and then went to talk to Dave. I found out where our class had to go for the GPS course this year, and wouldn’t you know that my class got the longest route. More about that later. Jessie was in the lab finishing the note writing and Dave noticed that she misspelled porridge (left out an ‘r’). Not that big of a deal (more about the note later). So we made fun of her and joked that we would just tell everyone the criminal wasn’t that smart.

At some point I decide to head back to the quad and then go eat supper. Most of the counselors lived nearby and were going home for the night so there were only a few of us left around. I was definitely staying because it meant free a/c. Oh, yeah! But by this point I’m getting a headache and just thinking about my stash of Excedrin in my dorm room. When I get to the Quads, though, I can’t get in. I go to see if there is anyone around that can help and then I hear something and I turn around. It’s Mauricio and Mark. They can’t get in either. There was a mix-up earlier on which building we would be in so we try the other building, but still nothing. So we’re stuck outside. We don’t know who to call. I have a headache. My Excedrin is inside. We haven’t eaten supper. And it’s about to come up a storm.

Mark asks me if I want to eat with them at McDonald’s. I say sure. We have to wait on his wife (and maybe Mau’s family, too) to get there. Don’t know when that will be. In the meantime, we notice a campus police car nearby and we think if we wait there eventually he will come out and we’ll get something done about the locked doors. (I took a break from writing just now and got rick rolled again…this time by the Muppets) Well, he comes out of the common building and we tell him our predicament. He gets on the phone with someone to see where we should go in case of a tornado and lets us in the building in the meantime. Funny, but he never told us where to go in case of a tornado. Oh, well.

Now Mark and Mauricio are about to go to McDonald’s and ask if I still plan to go. By this time I’m thinking Excedrin is my top priority and I’ll skip McD’s this time. So they leave and I head up to my room. I take some med’s and wait for the storm to hit. It hits…hard. The fury of the clouds has just been unleashed. I’m not about to go out to my truck to go eat. I’ll get drenched just on the way to my truck. I check the weather on my computer and the storm should be a quick one. I’ll wait it out. So I kill some time on the internet while lightening is striking all around me, and hoping it doesn’t hit my computer. But I was so bored earlier in the day that a lightening strike to my computer was a risk that I was willing to take to occupy my time. At one point I look out the window and see a brown river of mud flowing through the parking lot and down the storm drain. These construction workers really need to learn about silt fencing. Seriously.

Well, eventually the storm pretty much passes and I decide to go get supper. I go out to my truck to realize I left my window cracked and the seat is a bit wet. And by a bit wet I mean it is really wet…as well as the dash…and the armrest on the door. When I go into Subway I’m glad there aren’t many people around to see my wet shorts from sitting on a wet seat.

I go back to my dorm and hang around. Nobody is around because most of the counselors went home for the night instead. There’s only a few guys on my floor: Mark, Mau, Roland maybe, and me. I didn’t know if they were in or not so I just hung out in my room watching YouTube videos. I put up some aluminum foil to keep the street lights out at night. I like it dark! I planned to go to bed early that night since I had stayed up late the night before, and I knew I would need the sleep later in the week. Well, that didn’t happen. Sometime, a little after 11 pm, I decided I should watch Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory since I had been looking up all of the literary allusions in the original movie. So I watched it and went to bed sometime after midnight.

My alarm goes off way too early for my liking, but I get up, take a shower, eat a pop-tart (two actually), and go down to help kids get registered. The residence life folks are ready and waiting to give out keys, but of course, the CSI people are not ready. So a few students get keys and food cards and go to get the instructions about not playing with sprinklers, having to pay $135 for lost keys, etc. (why do keys cost so much?) Meanwhile, one of the CSI admins comes in with a box of jumbled up nametags that we have to sort out alphabetically. Yay. We get things sorted and I have to go tell the other group not to leave until they go back through the line to get a nametag and something else that I don’t remember. Unfortunately, some folks left for their rooms before they heard my announcement so I have to go track them down. Since I don’t know their names, I’m given a list of them and have to track everyone down…whether they heard my original announcement or not.

Well, we get that cleared up and people start moving in. We had been told to help people carry things. Apparently some counselors got in trouble last year for not helping carry things. I told them they should have been smart enough to help register kids so that they wouldn’t have to carry stuff. Unfortunately this year I didn’t get one of the prized positions registering kids. So I went out to help carry stuff. There were about six or eight counselors lined up along the walk to the dorm talking. Once I saw someone carrying several items and asked if they needed any help. They said no, but I still get credit for asking right? Next, Mark asks someone the same question and they take him up on it. So he has to carry something up the stairs. We go back to talking and later I ask someone else if they need help. Again they say no. Then people start joking that I’m only asking people with light loads who don’t need help. Hey, if it works! Mostly I think people didn’t want to bother us, because a few other people asked to help and no one took them up on it.

I go up to see if there’s anyone in my quad yet. I meet Tucker, the son of Michelle the counselor in my room, and his dad (another counselor) is there. I introduce myself and explain that if there are any problems I’ll be knocking his head around. As the words came out of my mouth I hoped that I said it jokingly enough for them to realize that it was a joke. Too many people never seem to realize when I’m joking and when I’m serious. Tucker’s pretty quiet, but his dad, Eddie, got the joke and wasn’t offended. Sometime later I meet Hunter Andersen who is also in my quad. He was a student last year and I recognized him. I asked him if he was in Josh and Melissa’s group last year and he said he was. I said I would have to email them and ask about him, but I forgot. The third person in my quad wasn’t there yet.

Some of the parents are getting restless and waiting to head to the Student Union for the stuff they do in the auditorium. Some of us counselors decide to start getting groups of parents together to take to the Student Union. I take the first group along with another counselor. We get to where the new nursing building is being built, which is quite strange by the way. On the ground floor is a locker room and on the second floor are some examining rooms. I didn’t go inside, so how do I know this you ask? There are windows on the entire outside wall of the locker room and the examination rooms. I don’t know about you but I prefer to have a little privacy if I’m changing into either scrubs or a paper gown, but then maybe I’m weird. Although, recently I've noticed they are tinting the windows pretty dark, so maybe they like privacy, too. Anyway, my group of teachers gets to that building and we meet up with a man looking for the North Park Quads. He’s complaining about the lack of signs. The CSI admins fail again, go figure. I try to direct him and the group of parents is stopped now while I give directions. Another counselor comes up and says they’ll take him to the quads, so we move on. I get them to the auditorium and tell them to have a seat anywhere. Then I go back into the hallway in case there are others who don’t know their way.

Other groups are starting to arrive with their counselors and I help direct them when they get there. They started the program even before all of the parents got there. I really don’t want to go in to hear a boring presentation about how the students are going to be in a Mad Scientists Club at Proximity Parish so I just stayed outside and directed the stragglers. Jessie didn’t want to go in either so she stayed outside. Eventually all of the latecomers made it in, but we stayed outside anyway and either made fun of people or complained about them or something. I don’t really remember. I do remember telling her about how some of the students last year had never been away from home and how funny it was to watch the tearful goodbye’s and seeing a mother and daughter holding hands until the last possible second as they went their separate ways. Good stuff.

Eventually they were ready to divide up into groups and head to the classrooms so we had to go inside for that. We were the last group to go. Yellow this time; no more pink for me, thank you. Still Jr. High kids. We got the kids to the room and they all found a seat. We counselors just sat off in the corner. I carried my GPS unit around all day because we were supposed to do that activity that day, but due to the possibility of afternoon thunderstorms we postponed it. We, of course, were given a fake bird to be our class mascot and the teachers have the students give it a name. Jessie says to me, “I wrote Polly on all of the notes!” So we don’t really know what to do. One of the students suggests Polly and us counselors are all off to the side saying things like, “That’s a great name”, “A traditional name. I like it!” Unfortunately, the students decide to name our parrot ‘Fish’. Yep, that’s right. Since we weren’t doing the GPS course that day it meant Jessie had time to get new notes without the name Polly.

The counselors didn’t really have anything to do most of the day so we sat there and listened some to the presentation by the crazy-teacher and also talked some…quietly. After a while, Jerry and Michelle were talking a little bit louder and the crazy-teacher turned around and shushed our table. We all started laughing quietly since we were counselors and we got in trouble. Crazy-teacher just needs to take the stick out of her butt. Of course, later in the week some of the teachers were talking just as loud, but didn’t get shushed. I smell a double standard.

Jerry and I were both getting pretty hungry so we were glad when it was lunch time. We get to the cafeteria and get some great lunch. And by great I mean not great…it’s cafeteria food after all. But it’s edible and free so who cares. We eat lunch and head back to the classroom. Eddie’s group has already left. They seemed to have a habit of leaving early for every meal. On one occasion they were leaving the cafeteria when we were arriving.

When we get back to the classroom we start on the fly experiment instead of the GPS course. As it turns out it rained just before lunch and not after. So we would have been fine to do the GPS course and it wouldn’t have been as hot. But we had already changed our schedule by that point. So we get flies and put them in with the jello. We did something else that afternoon but I don’t remember what it was. Maybe we went to the apartment crime scene.

At some point Jessie was standing near Crazy-teacher and Crazy-teacher looked at her and said, “Can I help you?” with a tone that basically meant, “You aren’t allowed to stand here.” Wow, what a witch (notice the alliteration). Jessie just said no and walked away. Sometime that afternoon I was telling Dave about Crazy-teacher being crazy and he said Jessie had already be complaining about her, too. She even told Ryan about her and before she mentioned who it was he already knew. Apparently the counselors last year didn’t like her either. I think it was sometime that afternoon that she was teaching and then turned to us and said, “Now would be a good time for the counselors to help out.” Okay, tell us what we’re doing and we’ll help out. Oh, yeah, and don’t talk down to us in the process. Thanks.

Well, we get through the afternoon and head over to eat supper. I think by this meal we realized that we didn’t have to watch the door as closely as we did last year. The kids this year just didn’t have the desire to sneak off. So that made meal times a little nicer. I think it was during supper that Michelle said that last year all of the students she suggested should be accepted to the program were rejected and all of the students she suggested should be rejected were accepted. She mentioned one of their names and I remembered it as the student that I never really cared for and even had to get on to the last night because he was so loud and keeping me awake. Later, I heard some stories about him from Eddie and also found out that the reason for having all of the bad kids last year was because they had gotten the stacks of applications confused. Great job, CSI admins.

After supper Jerry asks if I thought Crazy-teacher seemed to not want our help. I said yeah, pretty much. He said he was getting bored just sitting there and tomorrow he would just ask what we needed to do. I’m not sure he ever got around to asking about that. There was probably no need. Crazy-teacher was just crazy.

After supper we go back to the dorms to get ready to go to HPESS for the first of two nights there. While in the dorms I meet the third student in my quad: Demetrius. Turns out he has Tourette Syndrome, but you would never know it. He was nothing like Tourettes Guy…otherwise I would have caught and released a bird in our quad. Anyway, I introduce myself and then get them all together to give them my rules: #1 Don’t wake me up. That’s pretty much it. Little did I know that I wouldn’t have to worry about that.

I change clothes and get ready to play some basketball. I put on some gym shorts and a t-shirt with the sleeves ripped out. I go downstairs to wait for the rest of my group. I’m the only counselor that’s dressed for physical activity. Everyone else is dressed to watch. I asked Logan, another counselor, if I would be the only one playing. He said he was bringing clothes to change into there.

So we take the kids over to HPESS and do that thing for a while. We were scheduled to be there for 4 hours. I played basketball with some short kids for a while and then Logan, who is taller than I am, joined in. It was me and Logan against the short kids. Eventually the short kids got tired and quit. So I wandered around for a while. Some of the kids were going crazy playing in the racquetball courts, some were swimming, playing volleyball, throwing a football, etc. The ping-pong tables were broke and no weight room this year. Some kids were just talking.

After a while the counselors were tired of watching kids and the kids were begging to go back to the dorms. Some of the kids had to wake up at 3 or 4 am in order to make it to ASU in time for registration. So these kids were sleepy and didn’t care as much about playing at HPESS. It was definitely the wrong night for HPESS. People were asking Staria if we could go to the dorms early and she said she would catch it from Yanowitz if she let them leave early. Finally, she allowed the Jr. High kids to leave early, but the Sr. high had to stay until 10 pm.

Since I was with Jr. High kids I got to leave early. We got back to the dorms and just chilled out for a while. Jerry is taking a grad class in the education department and had some homework to work on so he did that. I hung around talking to Shad for a while and then the older kids got back. Staria also came back to the dorms for a while and I asked if she would be around for a few minutes; I wanted her to sign my copy of Adventures in the Wild. She did so and then I hung out for a while longer talking to Shad before heading up to my floor. There were a few counselors in the hall so I hung out with them. We were supposed to stay in the hall until midnight to make sure kids weren’t running around.

We stayed in the hall listening to Dan tell stories. Dan is in his 50’s and has traveled widely so he has a lot of stories. The thing is, he starts one story immediately after finishing another so there is no time for anyone else to take part in the conversation for the most part. Sometime around 11 pm or so, Jerry comes out looking for Michael, one of the students in his room. We checked all of the rooms and checked downstairs, but couldn’t find him. His door was locked and Jerry beat on the door for a while, but there was nothing. We checked the stairways and I noticed that one stairway had a door propped open. We thought that may have been his exit. Jerry got dressed and was about to go looking for him…and kill him, but then he tried beating on his door again. This time he beat extremely hard and heard someone say sleepily, “What?” Turns out he was so tired he slept through the first round of door knocking. I guess the door propped open was so the nurse could have a way back in after her cigarette breaks (her card to open the door still wasn’t working). About half an hour later one of the female counselors came up to our floor looking for a couple of girls. Then a few minutes later she came back and said they found them. They also had been sound asleep in their rooms with a locked door.

Finally at around 11:45 we decided to go to bed. None of the kids were up unless our talking and laughing in the hallway kept them up. I went to my room and all three kids were in bed and all the lights were turned out. I found my way through the dark to my room. I got on the computer for some email, etc. and like an idiot didn’t go to bed until about 1 am.

During the night I dreamed that Crazy-teacher was speaking down to us again and Michelle said something back to her. The strange thing is that I think Michelle was actually the least irritated with all of her crap so I don’t know why it was her in my dream. Anyway, the rest of the counselors backed Michelle up in my dream and then I don’t remember what happened after that.

I do remember waking up around 5:30 am being very cold. I just huddled under my sleeping bag and tried to get a little more sleep. But then 6:30 hit and my alarm went off. I got out of bed and it was freezing. I went to check the thermostat. I didn’t have my contacts in yet so I was standing about three inches away and thinking, “That’s not on seventy where I had it. It’s not eighty. Yep, it’s set on 52. No wonder I’m freezing. I’m going to have to talk to these kids later.” So I move it up to seventy and then go take a hot shower.

Demetrius also got up at 6:30; I’m not sure why. After I got dressed I headed downstairs and talked to Shad for a while. Then I went back up at 7:30 and yelled, “Gooooood morning, Campers! It’s time to wake up and get ready for breakfast!” Dave wasn’t around so somebody had to do it. I’m not sure how many people heard me. Not all of the rooms in the quads can hear things in the hallway very well. Then I went back downstairs and waited for students to come down to go to breakfast.

When our group finally gets downstairs around 8 am we head over to the cafeteria. I eat the safe food: biscuit and gravy and some of those toast sticks or whatever they are with syrup on them. I sit across from Lisa Anderson. I say, “Aren’t you Hunter’s mom?” She says yes and I ask, “Does he like to have the a/c turned really low?” She says yes, why? I said I woke up this morning and the thermostat was at 52. She said it was probably him, but he usually doesn’t like it that cold. Well, we get done eating breakfast in about 5 minutes and then kill the rest of the time just sitting and talking in the cafeteria. We decide that tomorrow we’ll wait until 8:15 to leave for breakfast. Too bad we forgot to tell the students that. Oops!

We get the students back to the classroom, but the teacher who is going to lead the next presentation isn’t there. We wait for a while before some others start without him. Crazy-teacher starts talking about radar and how it utilizes electromagnetic waves. She discusses things that could interfere with it and asks what other things use electromagnetic waves. Someone mentions the sun and she says yes, but by the time those rays reach the earth they aren’t strong enough to affect it. I’m thinking she must be an idiot since there is no electricity on the sun. (I was thinking about how you make an electromagnet, you know) So I made fun of her behind her back only to find out from Wikipedia that visible light actually is a type of electromagnetic radiation. I still think she is an idiot, only now I am also an idiot. But we already knew that. Then Mr. Magee shows up and takes over. He continues teaching about the Doppler Effect and Radar. He was late because he forgot to bring his Doppler ball, not because he experienced radar guns first hand.

We head outside for a few minutes and try out the Doppler balls. That lasted all of about five minutes and then we head back inside. We get ready to take some radar guns around campus and catch people speeding. They show the students how to use them and then we head out again. The person using the radar gun has to wear an orange vest. The rest of the students are expendable I guess. We had a third orange vest and the students decided Jessie should wear it. It was quite stylish I must say.

We go out in a big group and then split into two groups. I make sure I go in the group that doesn’t have Crazy-teacher. Our job is to clock vehicles, get their license plate, sex, relative age, and any other comments. We found out that most people speed, but then again that’s almost unavoidable when the speed limit is 20. We also found that the kids think anyone above the age of about 30 is middle-aged. Michelle wasn’t too happy about that. Whenever a 60-year old would go by, Michelle told the kids to write that the person was in the prime of life. We also found out that there is at least one person in Jonesboro who doesn’t mind flipping off a group of kids. Classy.

We finish up clocking the speeders on campus and head over to hear a presentation by a couple of campus police about how they use radar. Informative. Earlier in the day we told the kids that they would hear this presentation and that they better be good or they would get arrested. One kid said he always wanted to be arrested. We joked that he wasn’t setting his goals very high, but at least this one was attainable. So after the presentation we actually had them arrest this kid and put him in the back of the cruiser. When they were taking the cuffs off the key didn’t want to work. One of the officers joked that the other officer hasn’t used her cuffs in a while and they are getting rusty. They finally get the cuffs off and we head to lunch.

We have to eat fast and then head to the bookstore so the Jr. High kids can waste their money. I had to take something back to the classroom so I didn’t get started on lunch until a little later. So everyone is finished before me and they go to the bookstore without me. I tell them I’ll be finished in a minute or two, but I ended up talking to Mauricio until it was almost time to go back to class. So I rushed up to the bookstore. They are still there. They have some cookies and the mascot is there. I eat some cookies and I notice a half-eaten cookie sitting on top of the other cookies. I passed on that particular cookie. The mascot comes over and points at me and holds a thumbs up and rubs his tummy. I just smiled and nodded. I mean, what do you do in a situation like that? I just follow the advice of the penguins in Madagascar: “Just smile and wave, boys. Smile and wave.” We get ready to leave and I hear someone who set out the refreshments ask if the Sr. high kids would be coming early when they come later in the week, too. She said they were expecting people no earlier than 12:00 and there was a group that came at 11:45 and they weren’t quite ready. Ah, must be Eddie’s group that always leaves early for lunch. I laughed and said that was just that one group.

We head on back to the classroom and the kids start on some drug testing stuff. I’m watching as one group starts on the drug testing stuff and I offer a few tips along the way, but I mostly let them do it. Crazy-teacher comes over and says to me, “You’re the biology student right?” I said yes and she said, “Well then you should be able to do this stuff.” I almost kicked her in the throat. Yes, I could do it, but I thought the idea was that the students do it themselves. Then again I’m not a teacher. I guess one of the new teaching methods is to do the work for the students instead of them doing it themselves. Maybe it’s part of that every child left behind thing.

So I start helping out a little more, but not much more. Mrs. Staynor suggested one student record the results, one mix the stuff up, and another get things ready to be mixed up. I agreed. But, that group was getting a little behind. Of course, they only had three students compared to most groups’ four. Crazy-teacher comes by and tells them to divide and conquer. Two students should work on such and such drugs and the others should work on the other drugs. I guess Crazy-teacher can’t count, otherwise she would have known that there weren’t four students in that group. So I told the oddball, I mean the odd man out, that I would help him. I recorded the results while he did most of the other stuff. I hope he remembers how I helped him out because it turns out he has a dark side and may have a list of people to kill one day. Oh, well.

We also had to work with the flies again that afternoon. I think I took a break during this part because I don’t really remember it. They also came and stole the parrot that afternoon. The kids were pretty oblivious. Finally they noticed and the ransom note was brought out. The teachers didn’t immediately tell the students about the note. But Crazy-teacher started reading the note (that Jessie had written) and noticed that the writer had left out a word. She said, “Wow. Someone can’t write very well.” Jessie was standing right in front of her and her mouth just dropped open in surprise at what Crazy-teacher said. That was hilarious. Jessie didn’t know what the typo was so I went and looked at the note and noticed the word that was left out. No big deal, it happens to everybody…except Crazy-teacher of course. Well, the teachers tell the students about the note instead of waiting until tomorrow morning. The thing is, the weather really messed us up. We were supposed to do this on the first day and now we’re doing it on the third day, but the parrot gets stolen on the second day. The note says to pay the ransom money within 4 hours, but we can’t pay it until almost 24 hours later. I make more jokes about how terrible the note is: missing a word, misspelling another word, and getting the time limit wrong. Well, the kids are concerned that the fake bird is going to die. But Jessie or someone tells them that it is four business, hours and so everything would be okay.

So we go over to the cafeteria for supper. I like to sit down and not get up until we are ready to leave. Some other people like to clear the table as soon as they are done eating. So it happened that at every meal I would sit there with my tray in front of me even though I was finished. Michelle or Jessie would get up to get rid of their tray and offer to take everyone else’s tray also. After a while I started to feel bad about that. I took their trays once during the week and they took mine about ten times each.

After supper the Jr. High kids went out in front of the student union and did a ‘scavenger hunt’ which was really more of an ice-breaker type thing. One of the questions they had was “Who is the youngest staff member?” I knew it wasn’t me. People came up and asked me and Ryan who it was and we said probably either Jessie or Zoe. Turns out the answer was Logan. At one point, Ryan, Jessie, and I were all sitting together and one of the kids asked Ryan how old he was. 24. Then Jessie. 21. Then he looked at me for a second and said, “I’m not even gonna ask you.” And he left. Talk about bringing you down.

Sometime during this part of the evening Ryan, Jessie, Michelle, and I were sitting together and discussing different things. I tell them about how my teaching reviews often say I need to drink an energy drink and I’ve been told I have the personality of a log. They thought that was funny. I’m not sure why. Then on the other hand I’ve also been told I was the best TA the person has ever had. Later, Jessie mentioned to Ryan that Dave had gotten rid of all the Ivory-billed Woodpecker pens in the lab. Michelle said she would have liked to have one of those. Then she said her husband, Eddie, had hoped the new mascot for ASU would be an Ivory-billed Woodpecker. She said she just thought that he wanted to wear a hat that said peckerhead, though.

Well, the ‘scavenger hunt’ went by pretty fast and we were thinking of things to do. Someone asked me what we needed for the straw rocket thing and we didn’t have all the stuff. I mentioned we could do the straw tower thing if we could get straws from someone in the cafeteria. I said we could use the wrappers to tie the straws together. So we sent Jessie in to acquire some straws. She came out with a box full and we divided them into six groups and then divided the students into six groups. We gave them each a bunch of straws and told them whoever built the tallest free-standing tower would win a prize. We didn’t have a prize picked out and I’m not sure we even actually gave out a prize, anyway. Besides, some of the students I don’t think knew what free-standing meant. Well, that kept them busy for a while and then we cleaned up the mess and went to Centennial Hall for the Career Fair and game night.

I dreaded the Career Fair and game night because I remembered last year and how bad it turned out. We were told to make sure the kids took their time and didn’t rush through the career fair. Sounds really fun, yay. Then a couple of staffers could go bring the games over at 8:30. So Jerry and I help Ryan bring some games over from the science building. This fulfilled one of Jerry’s dreams. He got to drive up on the sidewalk by the science building without fear of being arrested. So we brought the games over and sat them outside the hall. Then we waste time in the career fair. They have the hissing cockroaches, a campus police brings some beer goggles and lets kids try to walk with them on, and of course the old woman that looks eerily like Johnny Depp in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is there. Freaky.

Finally its 8:30 and we can start playing games. Also, Snap Crow Legs is there to entertain. They were actually pretty good. Rich Grippo on bass, Tanja McKay on violin, Nate Gastineau on drums, Jerry Farris on guitar, and Greg Phillips on guitar. They played classic rock. Actually did a great job. And then the pizza is ready. No crazy toppings that kids don’t like, like last year. Just cheese, sausage, and pepperoni. Michelle, Jerry, and I help man the tables along with some dude who works for ASU I guess. Then we get to eat some pizza too. It was good. During one of the down times I mentioned to Jerry that I should get my picture taken on the Red Wolf statue in the cafeteria. He offers to do it on his cell phone, but I am suspect of the resolution. He says that Jessie has her camera so we go get Jessie to take a picture of me riding the Red Wolf. And my students think I have the personality of a log. Ppssshhh!

Now that one of the students has had his dream of being arrested fulfilled, and Jerry got to drive on the sidewalk, and now I’ve had my picture taken on the Red Wolf, we figured we were creating our own Make a Wish Foundation, only without it being a ‘good cause’. We asked Ryan if there was any dream we could make happen for him since we were on a roll that day. He declined to offer up any dreams in need of fulfillment. Well, it’s the thought that counts.

On the way back we notice someone in a green gown. She turns out to be Eddie and Michelle’s daughter who brought them some stuff, including some blueberry muffins which I sampled. She recently got a job writing a column for their local newspaper. She plans to come to ASU next year. Hopefully she’ll be better than most of the staff writers for the Herald. Well, then Jerry, Jessie, and I got a few kids together to play Buzzword. It was a fun game. The night really turned out to be fun. Much better than last year. Not a single race across Centennial Hall.

Then, I help Jerry, Ryan, and Roland carry the games back to the truck, but there isn’t enough room for me to ride so I just said I would go back and walk to the dorms with the kids. Only when I get back to the door of the student union it was locked. So I had to walk around the student union and everybody had already left, but I caught up to them just as we were getting to the dorm. Come to find out that when Jerry drove up on the sidewalk this time to drop the games off there was a campus policeman there. Jerry was nervous, but since they were dropping stuff off instead of stealing stuff the cop didn’t care. Plus, Ryan had his keys, so the cop didn’t ask any questions.

We kill some time at the dorm before the kids have to be in bed. I make sure that Hunter is aware that 52 is not an appropriate temperature for my quad. Then I went out to the hallway with the other counselors. I was going to go down to the lobby and see what was going on down there. I asked Roland if anyone was down there and he said, “No!” I said, “Really?” He said I did NOT want to go down there. He was just there and it’s all women. There was too much estrogen and he called someone fat and then came upstairs. He was joking, I think. He said it wasn’t Dr. Yanowitz he called fat, though. I looked at him and said, “Staria?” Everyone laughed at that. So I stayed upstairs and waited for the other counselors to get there. This time we stayed up until almost 1 am listening to Dan tell story after story with no breaks in the conversation for anyone else.

I go to my quad to again find everyone in bed and I have to find my way to my room in the dark. I go to bed and have a crazy dream about Jacob getting bit by the big timber that Mauricio had (which in real life had already been killed). It latched onto his arm and wouldn’t let go. He asked what to do and I told him to get it off. Then we are about to head to the ER and someone else thinks we should wait to see how bad of a bite it is before going to the ER. But I know it is bad, and I’m worried about irreversible tissue damage and necrosis so I insist that we take him to the ER immediately. But then I wake up and don’t know how it turns out.

I don’t want to wake up, but I get my shower and get ready. I make sure to bring my GPS unit since we are doing that today. At 7:30 I go into the hallway and yell, “Goooood morning, Campers! It’s time to wake up and get ready for breakfast!” Then I head downstairs and wait around. We forgot to tell our group that we weren’t going to leave until 8:15 so around 8:00 they were wondering where everybody was. I told them that we were going to go a little later and if they wanted to go back upstairs they could. But everyone is back by 8:15 and we go to breakfast, then to class.

I don’t remember what we did this morning. Maybe it was the fingerprints. Also, I think during this time we fit in some time to write letters to the editor about what the kids thought their perfect day would be like. That can be a very revealing activity. One kid asked Michelle what she thought of his letter. She thought he was just trying to get a reaction out of her, so she didn’t give him one.

We went for lunch. I don’t suppose anything exciting happened. At least I don’t remember it if it did. We did discuss Crazy-teacher some. Jessie said she planned to kill her with kindness. I observed that that wasn’t my preferred method. I jokingly said that she could go on the GPS course with Crazy-teacher. I don’t think she liked that idea.

After lunch we come back to the classroom and get ready to go on the GPS course. Jessie wore her purple sequin fanny-pack. Man, she is really on the cutting edge of fashion. Mr. Magee tells them how to use the GPS units. The kids all understand what to do. We go in four groups, each group leaving about 10 minutes after the previous group. Jessie gets the first group ready and they make a stop by the bathroom first. I see Crazy-teacher going with the first group and wonder why Jessie would put herself through that. She’s going to kill herself while trying to kill Crazy-teacher with kindness. Anyway, they head out and the rest of us wait a little while.

The second group gets ready to go and Jerry wants to know which one of us will take that group. I said it didn’t matter to me, so he took it. The third group was another group of guys, so I went with them. Mr. Magee was with us. I think we had an unfair advantage. Mr. Magee and myself both new perfectly how to use the GPS units and the boys picked right up on how to use them as well. So we go out and immediately see Jerry’s group at the Arch. Jerry said he saw the first group leaving the Arch when they arrived. But Jerry’s group is having some problems with their GPS unit so we end up passing them on the way to the dumpsters at Ecotox.

Along the way I talk with Mr. Magee. He got his BS at ASU, then went to Charleston for a MS in Marine Biology, and then came back to ASU for another MS with RonJohn. He mentioned how courses were much easier at ASU than at Charleston and the quality of instruction at ASU wasn’t that great. I agreed. We talked about that sort of stuff along the way while the boys find our next spots. They really didn’t need our assistance.

We made it to the dumpsters at Ecotox. I didn’t look inside. If I had been with Crazy-teacher’s group I would have killed her with other means and then dumped the body in the dumpsters. But that’s just me. We do our thing there and then set off for the Convocation Center. The boys are getting ahead of us and we are just following behind. They take a short cut through the Fowler Center. That’s not the only short cut they took. They didn’t get in trouble for this one, though. We make it to the Convocation Center in time to see the first group leaving. Mr. Magee mentions to them that we have already passed one group and we’re getting ready to pass another.

After we leave the Convo, we get within about 75 yards of the first group and Mr. Magee says to the guys, "Are you ready to run and pass them? Let’s go!" So we take off and sprint ahead of them. Some of the girls in the first group notice and make a valiant effort to not be surpassed. But we get ahead of them. I hear Crazy-teacher along the way telling us that it isn’t a race. Then she starts complaining that the boys are getting too far ahead of Mr. Magee and me. Then she starts complaining about the short cut that they are taking. Seriously, grab the stick and remove it from your rear end. Life will be much happier for you.

We get back to the science building and to our last spot. We’re all sweaty now from the long course and running to pass the girls. But the third group came back first. As we head back to the classroom, we see the first group arrive and one of the boys waves to them. Crazy-teacher glares at him through the window. Really, just chill out.

We make it back to the classroom and the boys are happy to be first. Mr. Magee goes to the bathroom and the first group returns. Crazy-teacher tells them to work some more on their fingerprinting and shoe-print analysis. Then Crazy-teacher comes over to my group while I’m standing there. She says, “I know Mr. Magee isn’t here, but that wasn’t a smart thing to do to cross through a construction zone.” She says something about it being dangerous or something. I’ve got a look on my face like, “Woman, get over it.” She walks away and the boys look at me as if their feelings have been hurt. I wanted to roll my eyes and say something about her being a sore-loser. But I didn’t. I just told them not to worry about it and keep working on their fingerprints. The thing is, it wasn’t a construction zone! It was a little strip of land between two separate construction zones. We didn’t cross any fences or orange cones. Jerry’s group went the same way.

Turns out the course was 2.4 miles according to the path of Crazy-teacher, 2.2 miles for my group, and somehow Jerry’s group got it down to 2.1 miles. Not bad.

Jessie came back in and I facetiously said, “How was your trip?” Her eyes got big and she said, “Mrs. Young is a She-Devil! She is a b****!”

It’s still funny to me! She-Devil didn’t know how to use the GPS unit and complained about my group having two GPS gurus and they didn’t have one. The thing is, though, that Jessie knows how to use the GPS unit, but She-Devil wouldn’t let her help. She didn’t know how to make the cursor move up or down and Jessie was thinking, “Maybe you should try the up or down buttons.” She also wouldn’t let the students try to figure out the unit and she would just tell them where the next spot was at. She also complained that they were crossing through people’s back yards. Hey, it’s campus housing, get over it.

Eventually the last group with Mrs. Staynor and Michelle made it back. They were the last group to leave and the last group back. I have no idea how far they traveled. I don’t think they took the short cuts we did. I guess they were smart enough not to travel through a construction zone which really isn’t a construction zone.

After we rested a bit we got ready for the interviews of the witnesses. The witnesses are Charlie Owens, Jr. played by someone that I’ve met a couple of times before but cannot remember his name for the life of me, Albert Mahone played by Chuck Vaughan, Susan Eggbert played by Tracy Bianco, and Lillian Schmitz played by Redneck Amy. I only recently found out her nickname is Redneck Amy, but that works since I can’t remember her last name.

During the interview Chuck got bored and decided to check his facebook on the computer at the front desk. He didn’t realize the projector was on. The screen showed it as he typed in facebook in the address bar. Charlie Owens, Jr. nudged him and pointed to the screen. Chuck stopped and started hitting backspace. Maybe you just had to be there. It was funnier than it sounds.

Redneck Amy was wearing red high heels, a denim miniskirt, and had her hair and make-up done up to give her somewhat of a trashy look. At one point, a student got her confused with Tracy’s character who is the daughter of a millionaire. Amy said, “I’m not rich. Look at me; I’m trailer trash!” I thought that was funny, but wondered how many students there lived in trailers. Oh, well, they probably weren’t offended! Later Mr. Magee told some of the boys to go ask Lillian (Redneck Amy) what she was doing later. After all, she is all dressed up and is trashy. I don’t know if they actually asked her.

After the interviews, Jerry gets a computer to start typing up the articles and letters to the editor for our newspaper. Meanwhile the rest of us go to hear a presentation by the ASU police chief. Would you believe the ASU police chief used to work for the Los Angeles county police. No wonder OJ was found not guilty. Anyway, it was informative. The counselors all sit on the back row so we can see which kids need to be slapped upside the head. They turn the lights out which was a bad mistake. Now we have to watch for kids that are sleeping…plus we have to stay awake ourselves.

At one point he shows a drawing of a DNA electrophoresis gel and asked which person did it: A, B, C, or D. Somebody says A. No. C. No. D. No. Jessie says to herself, “B”. None of the students got it so the chief says B did it. Then one of the kids in our class heard Jessie say B and had been sleeping, kind of, so he didn’t realize the chief just said B also, so he pipes up and says, “B!” Everyone laughs and he doesn’t know why. That was funny.

We have to wake up a few kids who swear they were just resting their eyes. Right. Remember to wipe the drool off of your chin before you leave. We go back to the classroom just for a little while before going to the museum. We get to the museum early but they let us in anyway. We start to look around and then I hear Jessie, Michelle, and Sheena (?) scream. I go to see why they were causing a ruckus in the museum. They tell me to stick my hand in some hole in the wall and see what happens. It’s part of the display. There’s a sign that says something about venomous spiders and snakes, but I don’t trust ASU not to cause some sort of tissue damage so I’m reluctant, especially given the Ladies’ strong reaction to it. Finally I stick my left hand in (I value my right hand too much to risk it). Nothing happens since my watch gets in the way and I can’t stick my hand in far enough. I have to switch to my right hand. I stick my hand way in there and finally a burst of air hits my hands. It somewhat surprised me, but I didn’t scream. A student comes over and we get them to stick their hand in. They didn’t scream. Eddie comes over and sticks his hand in. He doesn’t scream. See what I’m getting at here.

Anyway, we tour the museum for a while. It’s actually more interesting than you would think ASU’s museum would be. I spent the majority of my time looking at the weapons of the Civil War, WWI, WWII, Korean War, and Vietnam War. Eventually we head back to the classroom where Jerry is finishing up the letters and articles. He mentions he had to edit Timmy’s letter (name changed to protect the deranged). He says something about bodies exploding out of buildings. I thought he was joking.

We have some time left that afternoon before supper so we do some more work with the flies and then maybe we finished up the drug analysis, fingerprints, shoeprints, or something. I don’t really remember now. At some point Jerry has me proofread the articles and letters to the editor. We don’t change too much because we want it to be the kids’ newspaper. And, frankly, if we changed everything that needed to be changed to make it better we would have had to completely rewrite it. But hey, these are Jr. High kids so we left it. When I got to Timmy’s letter, I was quite surprised. Jerry says, “See! I told you it was out there. You should read the original.” So I read the original. This kid may kill us all before the week is out.

Eventually we head over to the cafeteria for supper. We talk about how Timmy seems somewhat disturbed. At least he’s not as bad as Ariel was last year…as far as we know. He hasn’t mentioned Salad Fingers or Charlie the Unicorn and he hasn’t done some of the crazy things she did. The other counselors have not been turned on to the joys of Salad Fingers…yet. I tell them about how crazy it is and that they just have to see it to really understand. We’ll do that later.

Well, we were joking about having to keep an eye on Timmy now and trying to stay on his good side. I asked Jerry if he had ever seen Billy Madison. You know, the part where Billy calls up everyone that he did wrong in school and he calls up Steve Buscemi’s character and apologizes and the guy says it’s okay. Then, the guy marks Billy’s name off of a list of people to kill. Yeah, I said Timmy probably had a list like that and we needed to stay off of it. We joked that from now on none of us would tell Timmy he couldn’t do anything or discipline him in any way.

At one point during supper, Timmy walks by our table and says, “Hey.” I said, “What’s up?” And he said, “The ceiling.” I said, “Ohhh, you got me.” Then he said, “Don’t forget the lights.” After Timmy walked away Jerry said he was probably trying to get me to look up so he would have better access to my jugular. So the next joke came to be that anytime Timmy was around we would cover our throat for fear of it getting slashed. We decided we better keep an eye on his behavior and see if there were any more indications of derangement. It was kind of like we had our own intelligence agency.

We had a good bit of time to kill after supper so we went out to the front of the Student Union and let them play for a little bit. Then Michelle read a 5-minute mystery to them and had them try to figure it out. During the story, Jerry was sitting at one table with a few kids and Jessie, Ryan, and I were sitting at another table. Timmy was sitting at a table in front of Jerry’s table. Jerry started sending text messages to Jessie about Timmy. Things like, “Subject is 5 meters away. Appears calm.” Jessie let Ryan and me read the messages as Jerry sent them. They got pretty funny and we would try to keep from laughing. Jessie would send messages back to him and we could see him try to keep from laughing, too.

Jerry mentioned that Michelle was keeping on his good side and referred to her as Mrs. Buttkiss. Then he mentioned that Mrs. Buttkiss was laying it on pretty thick and may blow our cover. I noticed that there was a hole dug in the hill beside us. I mentioned that Timmy may kill us and dump us in the hole. Jessie texted that to Jerry. This went on for a while, each time we found it harder and harder not to laugh. Finally, Michelle finished up the story and then said, “Okay, what’s so funny?” We all busted out laughing. Some of the kids, including Timmy, said, “Yeah, what are you laughing at?” Jerry texted to Jessie something like, “Oh, no. We’ve aroused the beast.” They were still wondering what was so funny and suddenly Jerry jumped up and shouted something like, “Retreat! Retreat!” and he ran back into the Student Union. We busted out laughing. Eventually, he came back out.

Michelle came over to our table to see what was so funny. Jessie let her read the text messages. We were still laughing when Michelle said, “Okay, I agree.” A couple of seconds later I started laughing even harder because I realized she had just read the part calling her Mrs. Buttkiss. At least she wasn’t offended.

We sat talking and texting for a little bit while the kids played or talked. Somewhere in all this Jerry referred to me as Agent Log. That’s a reference to one of my teaching evaluations. Yeah, so anyway… I mentioned that I had never sent a text message before. Everyone was amazed. After a few minutes I texted to Jerry that I was retreating to a more defensible position. In reality I went to visit the little boy’s room. While in the stall I heard the door open. I thought to myself, “I hope that isn’t Timmy come to kill me with no witnesses around.” Whoever it was went to a urinal and was just finishing up at the same time I was. I looked over the wall of the stall and at that time heard Timmy’s voice, “Jonathan?” “Yeah?” “They’re looking for you.” “Okay, I’ll be right there.” Come to find out, Jerry had told Timmy to say “I’ve been looking for you” not “They’ve been looking for you.” He was hoping to really freak me out.

When I came back outside Jerry had moved over to the table I had been at with Jessie and Ryan. Jerry said he was honored to be the recipient of my first text message. Later I remembered possibly sending a one word text message to Josh, but I don’t know if I did it right or not so we won’t count that. I jokingly told Jerry that when people experience trying circumstances together it makes them grow closer and he was like a brother to me now.
We started talking about when we would have time to work on the newspaper that was supposed to be finished the next day. It would be nice to have another computer. Jessie mentioned she could run back to the dorm to get her laptop. So she left to get it. Jerry continued texting her along the way about Timmy recruiting other students and they would be able to overpower us. She didn’t respond and Jerry was thinking that maybe Timmy had some allies along the way to the dorm. Eventually she responded and then we saw her making her way back.

We watched as Timmy played with other students and we joked that he was training them. Then we watched as he tried to sneak up on a student who was taking a nap. We joked that he was sneaky like a fox, a reference to his letter to the editor. We even got some pictures of him in the act. That could be used as evidence later on.

At one point Timmy had been playing with some girls who were known to say some pretty mean things when they felt like it. Then we noticed Timmy sitting by himself looking somewhat distraught. Jessie asked us what was wrong with him. I didn’t know. I said he had been playing with those girls and they may have said something that hurt his feelings. Jessie went to check on him. She stayed over there for a while.

We decided to go kill some time in the science building before the kids were scheduled to watch some TV. We decided that I could show them some of the snakes that we have in the building. As we were heading that way Jessie said to me the reason Timmy was upset was that he just saw the ghost of his grandfather. Say again?

Well, we made it over to the science building and I told them about the herp museum and told them not to touch anything because I’m not even supposed to let them in there. I’m a rebel. When we finish up there I take them down to the display downstairs and tell them about ratsnakes. I get out the Great Plains Ratsnake for them to see. Hopefully they enjoyed it. Michelle was looking at the pictures on the side of the display and asked about them. That led to me trying to explain some reproductive anatomy about snakes and I think she decided she would rather live in ignorance of that subject.

We went back to the classroom just long enough for Jessie to set her computer up and for us to find out where the kids would be watching TV. Michelle took the kids upstairs to watch some TV and I started to go, but decided I really didn’t want to watch TV. I went back down to our classroom and found Logan and Jerry in the hallway watching videos on YouTube. So I stopped and watched, too. They had just finished a video of Charlie the Unicorn and now were starting on Salad Fingers. It’s always fun to watch the facial expressions of someone watching Salad Fingers for the first time.

Eventually Logan had to leave so Jerry and I went back in the classroom where Jessie was at and we opened up the world of Salad Fingers to her. I’m telling you, those facial expressions are hilarious. So now that we had all lost a few minutes of our life that we would never get back we started thinking about Timmy’s letter to the editor. Jerry was talking on the phone at one point and was reading the letter over the phone. Jessie tried to record the reading on her phone since he was doing such a wonderful job of reading it. After he hung up we decided to get a better recording and he took Jessie's phone and started reading the letter into it. He was using a strange accent that seemed to have a hint of Salad Fingers in it. This, in addition, to the morbid nature of the letter was almost more than I could bear. I sat there shaking as I tried to keep from laughing. He could see me out of the corner of his eye and started laughing. So he had to start over. This time he faced away from me, but Jessie made him laugh this time. So he went to the other side of the room, but he still couldn’t read it without laughing. After about 20 takes he finally managed to finish it. It’s a pretty good dramatic rendition of the letter I must say.

We started texting to Michelle who was with the kids watching TV. Turns out they were watching Bones. Not the best choice for certain individuals. Michelle said Timmy was on the front row, probably taking notes. And of course the show was about something gruesome like cannibalism. Michelle joked that Timmy would kill us and put us in a Crockpot.

Jerry used his phone to record himself saying, “We’ve got something for you to hear” in his accent that he used to read the letter. Then he sent that to Michelle. Then I thought, “You know, she hasn’t heard that accent yet. She’s not going to understand what’s going on.” Then Jerry remembered he had the scary sound from Psycho on his phone and he sent that to her. Before she had a chance to get it, we decided to go up the stairs and play it when nobody was expecting it. We headed up the stairs like people on a secret, dangerous mission. When we came out of the stairwell we saw Michelle sitting outside with some other counselors. We ran and hid behind a door so they couldn’t see and Jerry played the Psycho music. Michelle laughed and came over and Eddie was in the classroom where we were hiding behind the door. He came over also. We had them both come downstairs to listen to the recording of the letter. Then we joked some more about how he was going to kill us all. We would wake up in the middle of the night with him standing over our bed or something. “Hey, there, Timmy. What are you doing in my room in the middle of the night…with an axe?”

I don’t remember what we did the rest of the evening. Maybe we had them work on their presentations or the newspaper or maybe we just went back to the dorms after Bones was over.
When we did go back to the dorms I hung out in Jerry’s room for a while and we watched some funny videos. The kids in his room claimed there was some blood in the bathroom. “Oh, no! Timmy strikes again!” We looked at it, but I thought it looked more like some kind of cherry crème filling that someone dripped out of a snack cake. Who knows? After a while, I went outside in the hall to listen to more of Dan’s ceaseless stories and then a little after midnight I went to bed. Again, I walk in my quad to find all of my guys asleep with the lights off and I find my way to my room in the dark.

My alarm goes off at 6:30 which is way too early. I roll over and stay in bed another 10 or 15 minutes. Finally I get up and get my shower, get dressed, check some email, and then head out into the hall and yell, “Gooood morning, Campers! It’s time to get up and get ready for breakfast!” Then I go downstairs and wait for everyone to arrive and head to the cafeteria.

We eat breakfast and go to the classroom. I think we did the glass analysis this morning. We took different types of glass and measured the volume and mass to find the density and compared the various densities to an unknown glass sample. In the course of this project I had to re-teach the students how to do long division with decimals…someone forgot to give us our calculators and the students couldn’t function well when those decimals were present. But we made it through. I think we also finished up the drug analysis with the unknown and did the refraction experiment. Good stuff.

I think it was also this morning that Eddie stopped by and was talking to Michelle and I was sitting nearby. At one point Eddie told Michelle, “You know he’s 26? He could be our kid.” I said I was actually 27. And Michelle said, “I don’t know how he could be our kid. We’ve only been married 25 years.” I thought it was funny.

Also, by this time Jessie is working feverishly to finish the newspaper for our class. They are due by 2:30 in the afternoon and she’s still getting everything laid out so everything will fit. She was probably just playing solitaire or surfing the internet while the rest of us worked with the students.

Every so often mention would be made among the counselors about who was at the top of Timmy’s list. Jessie said She-devil had been getting on to him and was probably at the top of the list. That’s fine with me!

At lunch, Timmy decided to break his record of eating 3 ice cream cones after lunch. So he came and updated us after each cone. Of course, no one was going to stop him for fear of moving to the top of the list. He was also probably just trying to elicit some sort of reaction out of us. Didn’t work.

After lunch, we go back to the classroom to finish up our work. Of course, after five ice creams Timmy was quite rambunctious. I think each of the counselors had to get on to him at least once…which meant we each took our turn at the top of the list. He was even getting so bad that one of the teachers gave him a toy that he could squeeze on to alleviate some of his extra energy. He called it his ‘squishee’. After a little while he started slinging his squishee around and I joked that he would probably let it go and it would hit me in the face. I shouldn’t have said that because he then decided that it would be fun to hit me in the face with it. He never did, but it did fly around the room a time of two. Once I took it and one of the teachers told me I could give it back to him, but if it flew around the room again it would be gone. Of course I gave him the news so that put me at the top of the list, I’m sure.

Eventually he was horsing around with another student, and I went and stood between them. But he just tried to reach around me to hit the other kid. I was pulling him back and Jerry saw it and had had enough. So Jerry took Timmy in the hallway and talked to him…and skyrocketed to the top of the list. Five ice cream cones was not a good idea. We joked that his parents probably dropped him off for the camp and then took a trip to the Bahamas. We should probably get him to eat a bunch of ice cream before the parents pick him up.

Sometime during the afternoon the teachers started talking about how psychic’s are used in crime scene investigations and mentioned ghosts. At first, I thought they were going to joke about it, and I was worried given what had happened the day before with Timmy. But they played it safe. Before they joked too much, one of them asked how many believed in ghosts. There were a few hands raised. One was Timmy’s, who said, “I’ve believed in ghosts since yesterday.” That was all. I was waiting for a story about how he saw his dead grandfather outside the student union followed by a very awkward silence. Thankfully that didn’t happen and we left that topic.

The kids spent some time doing some hair analysis. They asked for some hair from Jerry and I wasn’t around but I think one of the kids had to try about twenty times before he could pull out one of Jerry’s hairs. Then they got some hair from Jessie. And then they asked for some of my hair. I leaned my head down for them to pluck one and the kid had the nerve to say, “A grey one or a black one?” Another one of the students told me I shouldn’t let that particular kid pull the hair. Turns out he was right. It was the same kid that pulled Jerry’s hair. I took him several tries and when he finally got one it felt like a good bit of scalp came with it. I can still feel it. Jerry and I started joking about giving them some chest hair to look at. They thought that was gross. These kids haven’t gone through puberty yet. I did pull one loose chest hair and nonchalantly asked one of them if they wanted another hair. I gave it to him and he looked at it under the microscope and then I asked if he knew where it was from. I told him it was a chest hair and he looked at me like that was nastiest thing in the world. Get over it, kid.

By this time, Jessie is finishing up the newspaper and has me proofread it before it gets turned in. I make a few minor corrections and we turn it in at the last minute. I can’t take all the credit, but without my proofreading skills the newspaper would have been terrible! I mean, I think a comma would have been out of place and a word or two would have been misspelled. Well, fortunately for everyone, I was there with my considerable skills to save the day! Okay, so I’m just trying to make myself feel better for not helping out more. So what?

So about this time we started getting the kids to put together their presentation for the parents to see the next day. They decided to do a PowerPoint to tell about the things they did and include some pictures. Some of the kids worked on that and the rest went outside to make straw rockets. I went with the group to make straw rockets since I was the only one who knew how to make them. On the way, Timmy was still being a handful, but eventually he calmed down. But then I had to get onto another student, so I guess it’s contagious.

Well, we went outside and I tried to explain how to make the straw rockets. I discovered that it was hard for me to verbally describe how to make these rockets. But eventually everyone made a rocket of sorts and we had a contest to see whose would go the furthest. So we killed some time that way and then headed back up to the classroom. We had some drawings in the classroom to give away some of the junk that we had leftover. And before you know it, it was time for supper.

On the way to supper the teachers ended up discussing grey hair and Mr. Magee said that it is the biggest lie ever when women say men with grey hair look distinguished. He said it still looks old. She-devil said distinguished is just a nice word for old. That makes me feel great considering I am already going grey.

At supper, Jessie brought her computer and showed me a video called “Scarlet Takes a Tumble.” I really don’t know what to say about this video other than “thanks for brightening my day!” I really shouldn’t laugh when other people get hurt…but I still do.

After supper we went back to the dorms to get ready to go to the HPESS for night two of a four-hour physical activity. Since I had keys to the lab with board games and a truck to haul them in, I went to pick up the games and take them to HPESS in case anyone wanted to play board games instead of physical games. When I got to HPESS I had to carry the games in myself since no one came to help me. Those bins of games are heavier than they look. After I went inside I found Dr. Yanowitz wondering where everybody was at. I said I thought everyone was going to come in one big group instead of groups here and there and they were waiting to get everybody together. I don’t know if that was right or not, but it worked.

Eventually everybody made it there. I didn’t play basketball because I had hurt my knee earlier in the week. I figured I would spend the time talking or playing board games or something. Well, I ended up not playing board games and turns out four hours is a long time to kill. I watched Jenna, Mark, and Michelle play Clue. I opted out of that game. But I knew who the murderer was, where it occurred, and what the weapon was. You wouldn’t believe how frustrating it can be to hear them guessing and being wrong time after time!

Eventually I went and played some volleyball and then I wondered around from place to place. I talked to Jerry for a couple of minutes as he was playing the new Monopoly. He tried to get me to take his place. Later he told me that one of the kids playing was so anal about the game that it was really not fun.

I spent a good bit of time talking to Eddie. That was actually a good relief from the boredom. He didn’t tell story after story like Dan, so I could actually contribute to the conversation! But eventually it was getting close to time to go back and nobody was playing board games so I went ahead and took those back to the science building and then went to the dorms. When I got there, the freezer was there with the ice cream. I got an ice cream sandwich and then people started making it back from HPESS. I held the door open for them as they came in. Then, for the last groups to get in, I told them that the ice cream was all gone. They didn’t care so that joke wasn’t fun. Last year Josh and I ate quite a bit of ice cream on the last night. This year it didn’t look like there was as much to go around so I stopped after my only ice cream sandwich. I went upstairs and drank a Dr. Pepper and ate two or three big Fudge Rounds. I checked my email and then went back in the hallway.

One kid had clogged his toilet and I knew that Jessie had had to go get a plunger earlier in the week so I sent word for her to bring it up to our floor. She did so…and dripped water on the floor in our hallway in the process. That better be clean water! She gave it to the kid and he went to work. And he was back in about 10 seconds complaining that the plunger was terrible. Well, it must work pretty well if you’ve fixed your toilet already. Anyway, we tried to give it back to Jessie and I suggested she might need it later. But she didn’t really want it. I don’t know why. She left it on our floor and the counselors came out in the hallway for our nightly pow-wow. I went to my room to get another Dr. Pepper and drank that while we talked, er, listened to Dan talk.

Dan came upstairs with a box full of popsicles. Since I have just eaten an ice cream sandwich, two big fudge rounds, and am on my second can of Dr. Pepper, I decide to let the other go for it. Everyone gets what they want, but there is still some left over. “Well,” I said, “I’ve gotta do it.” So I ate one, but man was I full. Mark had had more than he could count and Mauricio wasn’t far behind. I’m just glad Mauricio ate the last one, otherwise I would have taken it and it might have put me over the edge.

About half an hour after the kids were supposed to be in their rooms, the kid who had clogged his toilet came out and was about to go downstairs when we stopped him and asked him where he was going. He said he was going to see if anybody was still up. We all busted out laughing and told him he wasn’t, but instead he should go back to his room. He said something about not being able to lie on the spot like that. We all asked how hard it is to think to say, “I’m going to get my meal card (or something else) that I left in the lobby.” Anyway, he wasn’t the brightest kid.

A few minutes later a kid comes out of Eddie’s quad looking for the toilet plunger. We point him to it and laugh about how much use it’s getting. It’s a good thing Jessie left it on our floor. The kid picks it up and I make sure to tell him not to drip water on the floor. He walks very cautiously as if that will keep it from dripping. He goes back to Eddie’s quad and then a few minutes later Eddie steps out and directs the kid to the trash can. Wow! What’s going on in there? The kid brings the trash can into the quad and we laugh some more about the possibilities. Later we find out that one of the kids was using Eddie’s toilet because his was clogged. Eddie told him he would have to unclog it, instead of just using another toilet. So he oversaw as the kid plunged it. Then, he had the kid get the trash can to put the plastic bag in that the plunger had been in because the bag was pretty nasty and they put it in a new bag. Apparently it was pretty nasty. Then we sit in the hall and listen to Dan try to bring us down with his endless, sad stories.

Eventually we all go to bed and I walk into my quad to, once again, find all the guys in bed with the lights out and I find my way to my room in the dark. You know, I hardly ever saw the kids in my quad because they went to bed so early.

My alarm went off at 6:30 and I could not get up. I had contemplated getting up and yelling for the kids to wake up at 6:30, but I thought it would be too mean. Plus, I was really tired and didn’t want to get up myself. I thought about it again at 6:45. I didn’t do it. I didn’t get up until 6:50. I thought about waking them up at 7:00, but decided I would just wait for 7:30 like I had done the rest of the week. And for some reason, Demetrius decided to take a shower in the morning instead of the night before. So I had to wait for him to get out before I could get mine. But I did get my shower and got dressed, and at 7:30 I went out in the hallway and for the last time yelled, “Goooooood morning, Campers! It’s time to wake up!”

Now it’s kind of boring because several of the groups had decided to sleep for a few extra minutes before going to breakfast. Eddie’s group was one of them. I think that was the only meal all week that they didn’t get to early. But that meant I had more time when nothing was going on. So I waited downstairs longer waiting for people to get moving. Michelle got our group together to get some photos. While we were getting everyone together I noticed a couple of the girls getting my picture and wondered why they didn’t tell me to smile or something. If I hadn’t happened to look over at that right time, they would have had a picture of me standing there looking the other direction. Who knows? Anyway, Eddie came out to take the picture with Michelle’s camera which had a dead battery. That meant there was only enough time to take one picture after it was turned on. He was taking his time and Michelle complained that it was going to shut off. Eddie said, “One…two…oh, it just turned off.” He had to turn it back on again and take it quickly, but got it the second time. Michelle told him that’s why she wanted him to just “shut up and take it.” He said, “That’s what I’ve been doing for 25 years. Shutting up and taking it.” Ahh, marital bliss!

We went for our last breakfast of the camp and Michelle tried to get Timmy to eat a bunch of ice cream so that his parents would be in for a treat, but he didn’t eat any. After breakfast we went to the classroom to make sure their presentation is ready for the parents. We got a note that said one staff member needed to be at the student union at 9:30. So I went, not knowing what I was going to do. When I got there, there were some parents there asking me questions about what was going on. I told them I didn’t know but I was looking for someone who would know. Of course the CSI admins are always late. Finally Yanowitz shows up and explains to me what is going on and what she needs me for. There is a program for the parents at the student union which involves a talk by someone from admissions, and then they can choose to attend talks by people from the Honors’ College, Financial Aid, and one other person that talked about first generation college students or something. I just need to direct people to the right place.

Not many parents showed up at first, but I noticed some parents and overheard that they were Timmy’s parents. I texted to Jessie that Timmy’s parents were here and they looked kind of normal. Later she texted me back that morbid kids don’t come from normal parents and maybe they are afraid of him, too. I texted back that they did bring backup: the grandmother was there with her new husband. I said I hoped he ghost didn’t show up for a showdown. Jessie said if it did she hoped it would wait until after we were gone.

Well, the program for parents got started late. Big surprise. One family came out wondering where to pick up their kids. Yanowitz explained that they were to get their kids at the science building at noon, but that this program was just for parents. They started complaining that if they had known that they wouldn’t have gotten there so early and they left to go eat lunch.

So I killed some time and by this time another staff member had shown up. She also complained about Yanowitz. It was kind of funny, but I can’t disagree with what was said. Eventually we were about ready to head to the science building. We started trying to get everyone together to lead them to the science building. Of course, as soon as one group is ready they want to leave that moment. They get frustrated at having to wait while we round up the others. But wait they did; they didn’t have a choice. We finally got them ready and took them to the science building and to their respective rooms.

While we were getting situated, I got a copy of our newspaper and a copy of the photo CD and set them on my stack of papers by the sink on the side countertop. The kids gave their presentation and apparently there was even a picture of me riding the Red Wolf in the student union in the presentation, but I missed that one. After their presentation we gave them some awards and certificates. And we told them to get a copy of the newspaper and CD and sign out their kids. Eventually everybody made their way out and I went to get my stuff. Would you believe somebody took my newspaper and CD? Thankfully there were still others so I got some more and then took them to my office before someone else took them. Then I went back to the classroom. We said our goodbyes to the last of the kids and then asked about cleaning up…for extra money. Tanja said we would clean up that afternoon instead of waiting until Sunday afternoon like we did last year.

Jerry had already left by this time because he was about to hit the road for Washington DC with his family. Eddie and Michelle and their son, Tucker, weren’t staying for lunch since they live close by. But several staff members stayed for lunch. Jessie threw her plate away when she was finished and then Mark slid his plate over to Roland for Roland to throw away. I grabbed it and threw it away and bragged about how I was being nice taking people’s plates for them like Jessie and Michelle had done all week long. I still get credit for that right, even though Jessie had thrown her plate away and Michelle wasn’t even there?

Anyway, we were still sitting there about ten minutes after one. We were only scheduled to have the room until one. Someone that worked there came and took Roland and Mauricio’s plates since they were finished. We figured she was trying to tell us to leave. So we got up to leave. I went and got another hamburger and so did Mauricio. We joked that we should go back and sit down, but we didn’t. We headed back to the dorms to move out and then Jessie and I went back to the science building to help clean up.

We get everything out of the classrooms and into the one room to sort through everything. There’s a ton of stuff to sort through, but we start sorting. There’s a million pens, colored pencils, and markers. Also a ton of fingerprinting supplies, batteries, and all sorts of other things…and snacks. Since they aren’t doing CSI next year it means this stuff doesn’t have anywhere to go. So we were allowed to take stuff. I took a few gel pens, sharpies, pocket notepads, bottles of water, a full unopened bag of tootsie rolls, and a full box of M&M bite size cookies, and a few other odds and ends. Hey, it was gonna be wasted otherwise!

We get things sorted and Yanowitz decides what she wants taken to her department. Last year she took all of the unopened food and said she would put a note on there so that the psychology faculty wouldn’t eat it. I wonder who did get to eat it? This year there were several things to take so we put them on a cart. So there was the one cart and her little crate on wheels that she pulls around everywhere she goes. I get ready to take the cart and she says, “And that goes, too” pointing to the crate on wheels. So Jessie takes that since apparently Yanowitz can’t pull it herself. Some notebook dividers fell off the cart and ended up…somewhere else. Jessie and I get to the elevator and hit the door close button before Yanowitz could get there. Jessie joked that that was mean. I joked that there was no room for Yanowitz anyway. Now that was mean!

We get off the elevator and start to head to the psychology department. A few more notebook dividers fell off the cart and wouldn’t you know, they also ended up…somewhere else. On the way to the psychology department we complained about Yanowitz and a couple more times the dividers fell off the cart, but this time they made it back on. When we got to the other building we had to wait a while for Yanowitz to show up. She’s pretty slow. She finally got there and Jessie opened the door for me to push the cart through. There was a bump though and I couldn’t push the cart over it. Yanowitz said, “Hold on just a second.” I thought she was going to lift the front end of the cart over the bump. Nope. She went and opened the next set of doors. So I had to go around to lift the front of the cart over the bump and then the back end and then go through the next set of doors. We unloaded the stuff and then went back to the science building…complaining about Yanowitz the whole way.

We went back to the sorting room and took a few more office supplies. And then Jessie joked that we should take one of the fake birds and hide it somewhere everyday and then send the other person to find it. Maybe even give them GPS coordinates to follow. Jessie asked Tanja if she wanted to get in on that. She didn’t. Well, we were pretty much done cleaning up so Jessie and I left. As I was going to my office, Jessie said, “Do you think they care that I took this bird? I mean, I just walked out with it.” “Well, they didn’t stop you,” I said. Later I went back and took the fake bird that was in our classroom.

On Monday I got a text message from Jessie saying the bird was in place and ready for me to find. I immediately stopped what I was doing to go look for it. I asked what the ground rules were. It was in LSE and was supposedly in a pretty obvious place. I walked down the hallway of the third and fourth floors and then went to the second floor. I went in the mail room and then through the office, looking around as I went. Cindi asked if she could help me with something. I said, “No, I’m just looking for a bird.” She looked at me funny and asked what kind of bird. I said, “Oh, just a fake bird.” She said it wasn’t down there. I said okay and left. I went back upstairs and quietly asked Dave where it was at. He said he didn’t know, but pointed me in the right direction. I found it and brought it back. I feel kind of bad for cheating. Oh, well. This time I got to hide it. I didn’t know where to put it. But I walked up the stairs all the way to the top. I noticed the door to the roof open and thought about it, but decided not to. Instead I hung it on the hand rail at the very top of the stairwell. Jessie found it in like 30 seconds. Apparently I’m not good and hiding stuff… or maybe she cheated, too.

Dave suggested I hide it in the vivarium on the second floor, but I didn’t get a chance to. I must admit, it would look rather nice in there, what with all the fake plants and all. Oh, well. That was the end of our hiding the bird game.

I printed out the picture of me riding the Red Wolf and posted it on my office door. Thursday morning one of the custodians complemented me on that picture. Also, I did see Jessie again on Thursday and she said, “Hey, guess who I saw in Target?!” I said, “Timmy!” She laughed and said, “No! Mr. Magee.” Alright. She didn’t know he lived in the area.

Well, that pretty much gets us caught up to now. Now I’m just waiting to get paid. All in all a good week. Better kids than last year, but had to endure She-devil. And had a group of counselors that made psychotic kids seem fun. I’m kind of sad it’s over.

End of Story…unless Timmy shows back up with an axe or something.