I’m gonna go out on a limb here and assume that this might be another one of those niche strips that doesn’t make a whole lot of sense.  All I can say is this: if you haven’t seen Avenue Q before (or listened to the music on youtube), take the opportunity should it present itself!  It’s a super funny show with memorable songs and characters, plus some good life lessons sprinkled about.

In other words, it’s awesome!

aaaaaaaaand now it’s time for another story from camp!

Excerpt taken from an email to a friend concerning the situation:

“Heya,

Hope the summer is going well and you’re continuing to enjoy Skyrim!”

and here’s the relevant excerpt:

“So yesterday was another changeover day, where first session kids would go home and new ones would arrive.  I was taking two groups of kids (French and LA) to the airport to send them home.

Coming with me was Rachel (totes not her real name), the French counselor who I picked up a few weeks ago.

The plan was that we’d take care of the French kids first; their guardianship paperwork takes a bit longer than the domestic kids.  We get to their terminal, stand in line for about forty minutes, and get to the desk.

In an attempt to preemptively apologize for any upcoming confusion/craziness, I told the gentleman at the desk that I had a second set of kids to drop off at a different terminal, and that it would be super appreciated if we could get the paperwork done as soon as humanly possible.  The guy (let’s call him Greg) smiled and said it’d be no problem.  

Neat!

We start filling out the forms (all in French, unfortunately) and just as I’m about to sign my name down as the drop-off contact, Greg tells me that if I sign for the kids, I need to stay in the terminal until their flight is off the ground.

Nuts.

If we only had one set of kids to sign for, this would not have been an issue, but I needed to get the LA group to their flight, and couldn’t wait around.  Before we left camp that morning, I was given the understanding that I, and only I, could sign the kids away because I was the one that picked them up two weeks previous.

Nervously, I asked if Rachel could sign for the French campers.  “So long as she’s eighteen or over, it’s ok, ” said Greg.

Sweet.

I ducked under a few rows of queue rails, got Rachel, and brought her to the desk.  She signed for them, and I ran off to the parking lot with the LA kids, yelling, “I’ll be back for you, I promise!”

Run run run run

Hop in the car, kids!

Seatbelts!

Drive!

Park!

Luggage!

Run run run run

After the shockingly long jog to the desk at the new terminal, I’m told by the attendant that the LA kids, who were supposed to have their paperwork completed two weeks ago, had no paperwork.

“I don’t know how they were allowed to fly here,” she stated.

Nuts… again.

We fill out another unmercifully long set of paperwork, and unlike the French kids who got a guardian to take them to the plane from the desk, I would have to take them.

At the check-in section, right before the security part, I handed off the UM forms (unattended minors) to the… checker guy?  I give them to the checker guy, who asked the kids how old they were.

They gave their ages, all under 13, and he jokingly followed up with, “Awesome, you get to keep your shoes!”

We have a little laugh and headed off to the security checkpoint.  

Now, I was under the impression that a guardian would take the kids once we got to security.  I was wrong about this.  

I know I was wrong about this when I was made to go through security, to the point where I had to remove my shoes in order to be properly checked, despite the fact that I wasn’t going on the plane.

Apparently the guy at the previous station wasn’t joking about the footwear.

Anyways, we all arrived at the gate, and finally, a guardian took them onto the plane.

Now that the kids were out of my hands, I turned my attention to worrying about Rachel, who didn’t have a cell phone and was waiting all alone at the other terminal for over two hours.  I called camp and Dan said he’d try to get the airport on the line in order to get someone to deliver a message to her.  I thanked him and hung up.

A few minutes later Dan called back with this to say (paraphrased), “So… apparently when you call JFK you just get an automated response that says to leave a message and they’ll call you back.”

It should come as no surprise that, even twenty-four hours later, we have not received any call back.

So this poor girl is just standing there all alone, with no idea when I might be back to get her.  

The moment the LA flight left the ground I sprinted back to the parking lot, drove to Rachel’s terminal, and (thankfully) found her.

We were home free, all we had to do was drive back to camp and we’d be set.

We walk out the doors and it suddenly pouring rain.

No biggie, getting a little wet is nothing compared to all the nonsense we just went through.

We hit the road and-

Traffic.  Like, super traffic.  We spent over an hour on the Van Wyck… but hey, after that it’ll totally be clear roads!

Nope, twenty minutes later we hit another bout of traffic at a toll, where we wait in line for forty-five minutes to pay out $7.50.  There were people trying to cut the line for the cash only lane, and I swore that I wouldn’t let a cutter in when we got close to the toll.  That time eventually came, and a cutter forced his way in front of me.

I was so ticked that I wrote down his license plate number.  I have no idea what I’m going to do with that, but if I ever see that guy again… I’ll… give him a stern talking to… or something…

…probably nothing

…

definitely nothing.  

The final straw in all of this was my phone charger breaking, so my phone was dead for the entire trip back up to camp.  This wouldn’t be a problem, but here’s my dirty little secret: I’ve never driven up to camp before without any kind of GPS crutch, and internally I was freaking out a bit.  Those roads are pitch black at night, and it’s super easy to miss road signs.  

As fortune would have it, my streak of bad luck ended and we easily made it back, eleven and a half hours after we had left.

Gosh-darn-it and what-have-you.”

So… yeah… that was my Saturday!  I hope yours was nicer!