Happy Jenday, everybody.

Wow...it took me three tries to type that line correctly...

Yep, I"m back from my week-long sojourn into the Land of Doing Nothing Very Much At All, which is technically a misnomer.  Normally, when I think of vacation I associate the word with relaxing and doing things that require very little effort or at least very little motivation.  Of course, one can get into a whole complexity of activities without needing much motivation.

Our vacation started around 3am on the 17th when we headed down to San Diego: four guys and three cars all loaded down with stuff (the cars, not the guys: we didn't get loaded until later).  We arrived noonish, said our hellos, and started the afternoon off with a dip in the pool.  The itinerary was simple: go to the firing range and play with guns, then come back and have a bachelor party.  I find that the simplest plans are the ones least likely to fail.  So about twelve of us piled up into cars and headed for the range.

Now, I have never really fired a handgun before.  Sure I fired rifles in the Army, and grew up with plastic pellet shooters and even paint ball guns, but never a real, honest to God, fits-in-one-hand bullet-spitter.  It's a little daunting at first.  That is: until you start hitting your targets.  Then some ancient human instinct arises from the depths of wherever it is stored and says "Yes. Hunt. Live."  It tried several different kinds of guns that day, from 22s to 45s, even a big ol' .357 like Clint Eastwood in Dirty Harry.  And no, I did not ask the target if it felt lucky.  It's an inanimate object.  It has no consciousness and one job: to be shot at.  Even if it did have feelings, I doubt one of them would be luck.  I'd say my favorite for the day, though, was the Rueger.  I'm not talk about the old German style they used in WWII, when they would line up several Jews and see how many they could kill with one bullet.  No, this is a newer sleeker Rueger with a nice smooth action that allowed me to hit the same place time and again.  It was sweet.  But as fun as all that was, it was hot and we were getting thirsty.  So back to Mikey's for celebration.

The rest of the night went as you would pretty much expect.  There were strippers and they were totally uninteresting, which is my experience with strippers.  Not that I have a lot of experience with strippers!  Not at all!  No sirreebob.  No strippers here.  In fact...I was practically forced to watch this atrocious display of female objectification.  It's horrible what those poor girls will due for a few measly one-dollar bills.  Especially when you can only get 20s out of the ATM.

Anyway, the rest of the week was much better.  We rebuilt a fence.  We swam in the pool.  We bought pirate floating devices with squirt guns built in and spent hours just laughing and spraying each other with water from a range of about ten feet. We went to a bar in our kilts (those of us who own kilts).  One day when we were out for lunch in Coronado we saw a hotel across the bay explode because of a natural gas leak. It didn't fall down, but it pretty much took out four floors.  The added bonus here was that the pizza place we were sitting in at the time had really cute waitresses wearing tight black shirts that had written on them, emblazoned across their chests in white lettering, the words "Hot Pie".  It became a catch phrase for the rest of our vacation.  And last Jenday we went out in my friend's 25ft boat to do a little fishing.  We didn't really catch anything, but that's why they call it "fishing" and not "catching".  All in all: a good week; a manly week.  In fact...looking back over all of this: guns, construction, beer, strippers, fishing...I don't think I've ever had a more masculine week.

But hey!  We still weren't done!  We still had War to attend to!  This is usually four days of non-stop fun-filled chaos.  But then it started to rain.  Fortunately, I had purchased an 8'x12' awning along with my new canvas tent, but of which were supposedly water resistant.  Whether or not that was true I was about to find out real quick.  Turned out it was true. Yay!  I didn't really doubt that it was, but I just wanted to build some suspense for you there.  Also, we were camping with some friends that have a huge canvas pavillion which we all ended up hanging out under, either playing games or, as on the last night: gathering around the fire and raising our voices in song.  All in all it was largely devoid of crazy, though there was a few ample samplings of debauchery to be had by all.

This War did seem less eventful than Wars past, and I'd like to say it was because of the rain.  But I fear that part of it comes from the fact that I'm getting older, which means I'm less likey to do stupid things ( the emphasis being on the less).  It could also be that the people I usually cause chaos with either weren't there or were occupied by other things.  Fun is always easier to be had when you have somebody to help share the blame.