First Night Back

My first night back as night supervisor started out busy, with homesick 5th graders filling the hub. One of them managed to do a pretty good job of filling the sheet of the hub's bunk bed with snot, not to mention the kid who filled the floor with vomit, and the kid who filled his jammies with pee (ironically enough, he wasn't one of the three potential bed-wetters I had been asked to wake up in the middle of the night). Thankfully, a teacher volunteered to clean the vomit while I continued to help the cluster of homesick kids and Papa Bear, who is my friend and coworker, but this week is volunteering as a cabin leader, dealt with the pee. That just left the homesick kids, who were mostly easy to cheer up. One girl said that the smell of strong mint calmed her down, but the mints one of the teachers had didn't do the trick. I was about to take my flashlight down to the garden so I could gather some actual mint leaves when I remembered that I had a tin of Altoids in the car. Those did the trick, although she came back for more at least once. Maybe she was just swindling me out of my Altoids, but I'm trying to cut down on my sugar intake anyway, so I was glad to give them up.

Once things settled down, I uploaded some photos, read a bit of Alastair Reynolds' "Pushing Ice", listened to the beautiful new Disemballerina release, "Undertaker", while walking my habitual two miles around camp, and watched Park Chan-Wook's Stoker. An evening of excellent entertainment.

Unlike last night, tonight I'll remember to put a memory card in my trailcam. I'd love to get some nocturnal photos of something besides deer and raccoons.

The lights in the parking lot have been fixed, which means that it's harder to stargaze out front. The visibility is nothing like it was up at Lava Beds, but it's still much better than it is at home.

There are wildfires burning in the state right now. It reminded me of the smokey sunsets at Lava Beds. Here's a sunset view of Schonchin Butte, with attendant smoke.

Currently listening to Orion Rigel Dommisse "Omicron"