The Unhappy Camper

I'm jumping for joy. Notice my smile.

I am not a happy camper. In fact I fail to see the point of camping. How can anyone possibly derive pleasure by abandoning the amenities of home and living in dirt, using an out house, and having to pay fifty cents for a three-minute shower in a room where the previous user bathed their dog? (I should mention that the previous user bathing their dog was my wife, Kellie.) The privilege of experiencing poverty doesn't come cheaply. The beat up RV we rented ran $125 per day for five days, not to mention the $400 in gas it took to transport that beast from Los Angeles to Morro Bay and back. And just like living in a Third World country, I had intermittent electrical power, drinking water of questionable purity, and no convenient place to dispose of human waste. 

I wish I was anywhere else.

Camping is not fun. I fail to see the attraction of pretending I'm poor. I acquiesced to this little adventure only because Terminx was fumigating our house and we had to go somewhere. Kellie, who didn't want to bother with eradicating the terminates because they eat so slowly, insisted we go camping.

It's not just living in an RV that bothers me, moving that thing over public roads scares the crap out of me. I'm a retired submarine captain. Maneuvering an 18,000 ton nuclear powered, nuclear armed Ohio Class ballistic missile submarine around the world never fazed me, but driving a three-ton RV up and down a seven percent grade made me sweat. Going up hill I worried about over heating. Going downhill I worried about imminent break failure.

Kellie rented our RV from LA Discount RV Rentals, where RV rentals are half the price and one-eighth the quality of their competitors. There is an advantage to renting a well worn RV. It's hard to do any noticeable damage. One of our dogs threw up on the couch. After Kellie wiped it up it was the cleanest thing in the vehicle.

I’m glad I went on this latest trip, if only to remind me why I should never do it again. Kellie surely had an ulterior motive for taking me camping. I can hear her already. “Honey, I need a vacation. Would you rather take a cruise or go camping?”