I just found out that I get to supervise first period horseback riding three days a week. Which is great, because from the sound of things, it's done off-site and is a private arrangement, so someone else is doing the teaching and I just have to go along as sort of an adult warm body representing the camp. Maybe I can even ride at some point myself; I did bring my riding pants just in case...
Things are still going well here. There are certain things that irritate me - they plan orientation discussions for an hour, finish them in 20 minutes, then feel obligated to keep us busy with inane games and so forth until the hour is up. Sure, some of it is "bonding", but they're wearing us out - about half of us fell asleep on the floor/couches in the Mezz (meeting room) today during a 15-minute break, myself included. If they would just give us a rest hour after lunch, that would make all the difference. I guess it isn't so important to some people who have activities without a lot of setup, but waterfront requires a ton of work to get it ready to go - stretching lane lines, threading buoys, disposing of trash and big rocks on the lake bottom, carrying kayaks, swimming ropes out to various places and bringing them back - not to mention the fact that there's an incredibly steep hill (we call it the Ski Slope) running from the woods to the water, meaning the trucks and buses can't come down to where we need them, so we have to hike the hill multiple times a day, usually while carrying heavy things. Ugh.
One thing that surprises me is how many people here don't like to swim. In Florida, it seems like everyone is a swimmer, is related to a swimmer, dates a swimmer, et cetera. Here, almost every single counselor (who isn't a lifeguard) has complained about how they don't like to swim or are such slow swimmers. It surprises me that even athletes would be so averse to getting in the water, especially this water - the temperature is perfect. (Albeit too warm for someone who's supposed to be training for a 60-degree swim...)
Anyway, the other counselors are all still very nice. I have two roommates, Mel and Faith. Faith just got here last night, and she seems nice, but we haven't gotten to know each other that well yet. Mel and I hit it off right away when I got here on Tuesday and are getting along great. I also met a girl named Mandy who looked familiar and had a familiar-sounding last name, but was from Cleveland, so I thought there was no way I could possibly know her. Then, when I (in passing) mentioned Gainesville to her, and she asked, "Oh, is that where you go to school?" Upon further discussion, we realized that she swam for the club team at Miami of Ohio, the university my club team traveled to for a competition in January - and invited to our own meet in February. So we swam against each other twice without ever meeting! (At least not that we can remember.) Funny.
We had to sign something today about Internet usage policies, and although I believe its intent was mostly to ensure that we didn't download porn, etc. onto the staff computers, there was also a mention of not connecting any nonregistered devices to the All-Star network. Which confirms what I already knew: that we are not supposed to have Internet access in the dorms. I'm keeping this very hush-hush - only my roommates and three or four other people know about my setup - and once the kids get here I'll be hiding all the paraphernalia in my desk and only hooking up to the connection at night after they go to sleep. But I'm not going to stop using the network, not when it's right here, and especially not when they haven't even got our staff computers set up yet.
On that note, I'm off to bed. Tomorrow we get to "be campers", meaning we get to go through a typical camp day as if we were campers. I think the lifeguards also get to go out on the boats and get a feel for what we'll be doing when we guard the waterskiers and wakeboarders. It sounds like it won't be as pressured of a day as the past two have been, since we've read through the entire manual now (meaning no more discussions of policy) and also had a guest speaker about child abuse and all that fun stuff. Tomorrow is "be a camper", Saturday is swim tests, games, and a couple more discussions, and then the kids come on Sunday. I'll keep you posted.
Things are still going well here. There are certain things that irritate me - they plan orientation discussions for an hour, finish them in 20 minutes, then feel obligated to keep us busy with inane games and so forth until the hour is up. Sure, some of it is "bonding", but they're wearing us out - about half of us fell asleep on the floor/couches in the Mezz (meeting room) today during a 15-minute break, myself included. If they would just give us a rest hour after lunch, that would make all the difference. I guess it isn't so important to some people who have activities without a lot of setup, but waterfront requires a ton of work to get it ready to go - stretching lane lines, threading buoys, disposing of trash and big rocks on the lake bottom, carrying kayaks, swimming ropes out to various places and bringing them back - not to mention the fact that there's an incredibly steep hill (we call it the Ski Slope) running from the woods to the water, meaning the trucks and buses can't come down to where we need them, so we have to hike the hill multiple times a day, usually while carrying heavy things. Ugh.
One thing that surprises me is how many people here don't like to swim. In Florida, it seems like everyone is a swimmer, is related to a swimmer, dates a swimmer, et cetera. Here, almost every single counselor (who isn't a lifeguard) has complained about how they don't like to swim or are such slow swimmers. It surprises me that even athletes would be so averse to getting in the water, especially this water - the temperature is perfect. (Albeit too warm for someone who's supposed to be training for a 60-degree swim...)
Anyway, the other counselors are all still very nice. I have two roommates, Mel and Faith. Faith just got here last night, and she seems nice, but we haven't gotten to know each other that well yet. Mel and I hit it off right away when I got here on Tuesday and are getting along great. I also met a girl named Mandy who looked familiar and had a familiar-sounding last name, but was from Cleveland, so I thought there was no way I could possibly know her. Then, when I (in passing) mentioned Gainesville to her, and she asked, "Oh, is that where you go to school?" Upon further discussion, we realized that she swam for the club team at Miami of Ohio, the university my club team traveled to for a competition in January - and invited to our own meet in February. So we swam against each other twice without ever meeting! (At least not that we can remember.) Funny.
We had to sign something today about Internet usage policies, and although I believe its intent was mostly to ensure that we didn't download porn, etc. onto the staff computers, there was also a mention of not connecting any nonregistered devices to the All-Star network. Which confirms what I already knew: that we are not supposed to have Internet access in the dorms. I'm keeping this very hush-hush - only my roommates and three or four other people know about my setup - and once the kids get here I'll be hiding all the paraphernalia in my desk and only hooking up to the connection at night after they go to sleep. But I'm not going to stop using the network, not when it's right here, and especially not when they haven't even got our staff computers set up yet.
On that note, I'm off to bed. Tomorrow we get to "be campers", meaning we get to go through a typical camp day as if we were campers. I think the lifeguards also get to go out on the boats and get a feel for what we'll be doing when we guard the waterskiers and wakeboarders. It sounds like it won't be as pressured of a day as the past two have been, since we've read through the entire manual now (meaning no more discussions of policy) and also had a guest speaker about child abuse and all that fun stuff. Tomorrow is "be a camper", Saturday is swim tests, games, and a couple more discussions, and then the kids come on Sunday. I'll keep you posted.
stormed at 23:38
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