And all he's left with is a blubbery, blubbering wife.

So, we went camping in our new-to-us trailer for the first time this weekend. 

Oh. My. Stars.

I'm one of those wives who tends to think about things before diving in. Thus, my endless questions about how much weight our truck can pull. More questions about "What if we push on the slideout without the bars being put on (because it would be just like us to forget....)?" Does he know how to pump out the crap? Load the fresh water? Are the stabilizer bars on okay? What are those boards for? Are you sure we don't need one of those triangle things on both sides? How is the truck doing? Maybe if you take it out of cruise control on the hills it won't be so hard on the motor. Are you sure the dog isn't going to jump out? Aren't we too close to the neighbours fire pit? Isn't our own fire pit going to burn our awning? You should be using your emergency break.

Yup. That's me.

Aren't I amazing?  Leon is so lucky to have me. Just consider everything he would have screwed up if I wasn't there. In fact, he is so confident that I helped iron out all the bugs this first time out that he figures he's okay going without me from now on. 

I'm just kidding. He's stuck with me most times.

Although, I do have to say that for someone who is so on the go all the time - and I do seriously mean all the time - camping is incredibly boring. I mean, really, what the heck do you do out there? And let us remember that I'm a boredom eater. A Costco size bag of M&M's, ice cream, raw weiners, coolers. I'm going to be a house if I go camping very often!!

You get up in the morning and brush your teeth outside in front of your neighbours so you don't waste water or grey water tank space. Then you have breakfast outside in front of all of your neighbours. Then you sit outside and scratch your butt in front of all your neighbours. It's a little weird when you think about how much of yourself you are sharing with these neighbours.

And then the neighbours get to delight in watching this first time trailer family.

They can laugh at you while you back into your stall, get everything set up, and then realize you forgot to stop at the water tap and fill up, so you hook the trailer back up and head out to get water. Then you think the water is full, so you go back to your stall and set up and realize the hose is a little funky so you actually didn't get any water at all, so you make trips to the water tap with a jug and fill it manually anyway.

They can watch while I pull out the lawn chair/bed thing. I laid it out so carefully and got the back and legs just where I want them. With my book in one hand and drink in the other, I go to sit down and suddenly I'm laying on the ground with my legs in the air. I guess the one set of legs didn't lock into place.  And if they didn't see it actually happen, the laughter from my family most definitely made them look after the fact. (I was a little stunned and laid there for a few minutes, laughing foolishly at myself.)

They watch, and smell, while the girls scam poor Olivia into scooping up dog poop. Really big dog poop.

They listen while my dysfunctional children (hey, it's them, not me!) have atter in their high-pitch, blood-curdling ways.

The get to enjoy the singing around the campfire (decked out in winter jackets for crying loud!) as my girls put on a concert. Lordy, do they sound beautiful together!

Then finally, they help while Leon "breaks" the trailer. Our jack broke and he had to try a make shift jack to get the ball/hitch thing hooked up on the truck. CRASH! Down goes our trailer. Thankfully we had a farm girl next door who just the week before had to learn this process when their tire fell off their combine. 

It was not pretty. At all.  I had to walk away to have a meltdown. At that moment I decided this camping thing was just too stressful. And really really really frigging cold. Did I mention that?

Then we got home. And there was almost nothing to unpack, save two loads of laundry and the perishables from the fridge/freezer.

How totally handy is THAT?? 

I think I'll go out again after all.