A-Camp September Recamp 4: Small Town Saturday Night

Welcome to the fourth of four fantastic recaps of our entire experience at A-Camp 2.0, which took place 2.5 hours outside of Los Angeles at Alpine Meadows Camp atop a mountain in Angelus Oaks, California, from September 12th-16th, 2012.

A-Camp was the genesis of an idea Riese had at 3AM in July 2010: the concept was to take the spirit of the website into three glorious dimensions and create an affordable option for queers for whom other lesbian vacations aren’t always a perfect fit. In April 2012, we did it for the first time — along with 160 campers and 35 staff members, we rented out a summer camp in its off-season and enjoyed a transformative weekend of fun, friendship, panels, workshops, classes, sports, entertainment, events and so forth. It was probably the most awesome experience of our life and we knew from there it would only get bigger and better.

So in September, 220 campers and 40 staff descended upon The Mountain for four days of much-better-organized fun, friendship, panels, workshops, classes, sports, entertainment, events and secret initiation rites.

These epically long monster-posts will do their best to explain and extrapolate upon the camp experience, from avoided-shitstorms to emotional revelations to glory/triumph. But we can’t tell you everything. We must leave some things up to the imagination.

The next Camp Autostraddle will take place May 23rd-27th, 2013 in Angelus Oaks, California, Mark your Calendars!

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Saturday, September 15th

I. Saturday Morning Fever

Carmen Rios, Misfits Counselor/Contributing Editor: Another day, another cup of coffee with one slice of french toast to start my day. I was sad on Saturday because it was becoming clear that camp was eventually going to end but I did have the amazing experience of finding my iPhone in the dirt, so.

Annika Penelope, Unicorns Counselor/Writer: I’m apparently really bad at packing because I brought enough clothing to last me at least two weeks. This meant that I was able to have multiple outfit changes per day — not a single one of which was practical for camping in the mountains.

Riese Bernard, Runaways Counselor/Editor-in-Chief: Saturday! Saturday is the day in which I was scheduled to tell people how to be writers, talk about eating disorders, give away a campership to whomever loves Autostraddle the most and tell people how to have sex! EASY!

Sara Medd, 21 Hump Street Counselor/Stylist: Saturday was not as jam-packed with activities for me, so I tried to just enjoy spending time with the campers and tried to process some of my own feelings.

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Block A:

Chapstick-making w/Laura & Laneia

DIY Home Projects w/Marni & Jill

Tattoo/Body Art discussion w/Crystal

Queer Visibility in Media w/Carly, Riese, Haviland, Brittani, Carolyn & Mollie

Activism/Youth Outreach mini-panel w/Carmen, Katrina & Jamie

Professional Writing w/Riese, Rachel & Carolyn

Hiking w/Sarah Croce

Jill, Wild Stallions Counselor/Camp VIP: I thought the DIY Home Projects Workshop went well.

Marni Kellison, Camp Co-Director/Contributor: The unofficial title of this workshop was “Butching it up with Marni,” for which Carly had written a jingle that she’d been singing during every conference call we had leading up to camp and all throughout camp. It’s actually pretty catchy.

Jill: Marni showed everyone how to patch a hole in drywall and discussed essential tools to have in your home.

Marni: During pre-camp I made a little mini-wall out of scrap 2x4s and drywall that I’d haggled for at the Home Depot in Oakland, and for the workshop I had one person smash a hole in it with a hammer and then demonstrated how to patch it. Then I went through my tool bag and talked about different tools’ uses and what types of tools are good to have on hand at home, and did my best to answer people’s questions about home repair.

Gabby Rivera, Catch-22 Counselor/Writer: Butching it Up with Marni (and Jill!) was really a study on how to make girls swoon by getting shit done. This is not to take away the high levels of skill both Marni and Jill have in the DIY sector of queer living. No, it’s more of a comment on watching the campers watch them do their thing. The queers around Marni while she banged around on some dry wall were sprung. Sprung off Marni with a hammer in her hand, fer sure. Maybe even I was a little sprung, like how could you not be? I wanted to be Marni, do all of fix-it type things and swoon a little too.

Marni: Obviously I had Foreman Jill on hand to supervise the work, and she also shared her plumbing expertise with the group.

Jill: I crammed everyone into the Men’s bathroom in Eagle Lodge to show queers what a sink looks like and easy fixes for sinky problems. Campers asked great questions. It was a success, but no big deal. HOWEVER, later on I was informed by several people that, apparently, when you combine the butchy awesomeness of Marni and myself into one workshop, it creates enough pure sex heat to melt the panties (or boy shorts) off of women. True story.

Marni: It was so fun! I went to carpentry school in Montreal but don’t work as a carpenter at the moment, so I loved being able to talk shop with everybody.

Gabby: Jill — pause: can I just say how absolutely fucking amazing Jill turned out to be? like thank you lesbian Jeezus for making Jill — Unpause: So I left the Butchin it Up workshop for a minute and when I came back there were only five girls around Marni. Jill came back to the workshop area with like 20 other campers from out of nowhere. So I asked where they went. Jill says: Oh, we plumbed a sink. -shrug- Oh, right, cuz that’s a thing non-plumbers do for themselves. Also, wow that is such a perfect way to explain what ya’ll were just doing. I’ve never uttered the phrase “plumbed a sink” and now it’s one of my favorites.

Crystal, Thundercats Counselor/Music Editor: So many more people showed up to the Tattoo & Body Art Discussion that I had anticipated. I didn’t really have a game plan and so we just sat around the picnic tables and showed off our tattoos. Everyone had so many super interesting pieces and stories and questions.

Carmen: We turned the “Activism Mini-Panel” into a “chairs in a circle” discussion and it was really cool having people all contributing to one another and lending some helpful tips to everyone else. We all have something to learn from one another, and I think in organizing it’s super important to simply engage with one another about what we do.

Carolyn Yates, Valencia Counselor/Contributing Editor: There had been a lot of discussion about how Professional Writing 101 was not going to be a workshop, and I was privately worried that I was going to disillusion a lot of people about writing for a career (pro tip: do not do it if you have other skills!).

Riese: Nobody knew the Pro-Writing 101 thing was happening ’cause it’d been rescheduled from Wednesday, when I was sick, but I think we provided a personalized touch for the seven people who showed up, three of whom already work for me in some capacity.

Rachel Kincaid, Jetpack Counselor/Senior Editor: When we talked about the workshop, we realized that we mostly just wanted to emphasize how little money you make as a “professional writer,” which was depressing and not the ideal way to start off the day/panel. Also none of us had had very much coffee yet, so. The group of people who came to the panel were fabulous, though, and had a lot of awesome specific questions.

Carolyn: Riese and Rachel talked about writing for literary journals and I talked a lot about how I wrote blurbs about security cameras as a way to pay for school and we almost went over the time.

Rachel: I drew on my experiences writing freelance, writing for magazines, copywriting for a human resources outsourcing company, working at online magazines, being the editor of Autostraddle, publishing stories in books, working at a literary agency for two years, and so forth. I’ve been on both sides of a lot of things. (TWSS)

Daniela, Unicorns Counselor/Intern: I went to this workshop twice: once in April, once in September. I now have at least two new subscriptions to writers magazines and a written timeline for applying to a few contests. So, basically, this was a success. I left full of ideas and excitement about the fact that one day I can possibly make enough money writing to buy myself something nice of undefined value -and it’s going to be good.

Rachel: Riese did a great job addressing questions about the publishing world, magazines, freelancing and a variety of other important life topics. Carolyn is a super profesh freelance writer and was able to address a lot of things about credits, pitching, deadlines, and communicating with editors. I am mostly dumb and was able to primarily talk about an MFA and why/how you might ever pursue this largely impractical degree. It’s always great to meet other writers, and it’s super cool to be reminded of how smart and funny and driven the people in our field always are. Thanks for keeping the bar high, A-Camp writers!

Laneia Jones, Runaways Counselor/Executive Editor: I was so amped for chapstick making! This was the project I’d wanted to do at April Camp, but we couldn’t figure out the logistics of 20+ people making personal chapstick in a hut on a mountain, so we had to shelve it. But then Laura had a theory and a plan and BAM it was on the schedule for September.

Laura Wooley, Bomb Girls Counselor/Associate Editor: Chapstick making was a magical adventure. After spending 20 minutes or so being convinced that Deer Lodge was broken, Megan discovered the fusebox and flipped the switch so we could use electricity instead of having to heat our water in our burning loins of desire (or something).

Megan O’Grady, Valencia Counselor: Making water boil is so much more complicated that you’d think! I had an elaborate set up in the bathroom involving a microwave and two plastic chairs.

Laneia: Megan is the MacGyver of water boiling. This has been proven time and time again.

Stef Schwartz, Battlestars Counselor/Contributor/OG Autostraddle: I had no idea what I wanted to do for Block A, but I was having a lot of trouble making a decision because my lips were so chapped! Then I was like, “HEY, I SHOULD GO TO THE CHAPSTICK MAKING WORKSHOP!”

Laura: Instead of getting bored and leaving during the long figuring-out period, the campers who came pulled out magazines and started decorating their containers and it was so beautiful that I wanted to hug them all. Laneia and Megan boiled water and cheered on the intrepid lip balm mixers. I hope everyone got to share their chapstick with a really fun activity partner.

Stef: Laura and Laneia taught us how to make our own lip balm out of beeswax, oil and a flavor of our choosing, and then we got to decorate the tins we put them in! Everything was actually so precious I thought I might melt but NO! My wax did! And then it cooled and then I had chapstick. It made all the bourbon I drank for the rest of the day taste like tea. Sidenote, when I got home I bought candelilla wax (which is more vegan-friendly), some coconut oil and some flavoured teas and although I had to alter the recipe a liiiiittle bit, I ended up with some pretty delicious lip balm. I learned a craft!

Mary Tully, Little Rascals Counselor/Calendar Girl: Hot Laura made me chapstick!!!!

Brittani Nichols, Contributing Editor: The Queer Visibility in Media Panel was timed perfectly because there’s no better time to be sad than soon after you wake up.

Carly Usdin, Thundercats Counselor/Contributor/OG Autostraddler: This wound up being more of a discussion than a panel, which I think worked out really well.

Brittani: I don’t really buy into the notion of “straightening up” cultural productions to make them more financially lucrative. Despite my strong feelings on this topic, I managed not to drone on about it and I think the panel ended up being equal parts insightful and depressing. The main question we were left with was, “Do we take any visibility we can get despite the inaccuracies and negative portrayals or only embrace queer visibility we can be proud of?”

Carly: This turned really quickly into Real Talk About Money, the Patriarchy and the World of Entertainment, which got us all fired up. So we ended on a very Damn the Man, Save the Empire high note.

Sarah Croce, Forever 21 Counselor/Contributor/Calendar Girl/The Talent: I finally felt well enough to go hiking! Mary Tully and I led a small but amazing hike through the woods on a beautiful Saturday morning. Our three adventurous campers made it a delightful journey!

 

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Block B:

Postcard Making w/Carmen & Jamie

Social Dance w/Alex & Carly

Personal-essay Writing w/Rachel

Basketball w/Brittani

Body Image & ED Discussion w/Riese & 5 Anonymouses

Carmen: Jamie and I hosting Postcard Making was super fun, especially because she arrived on Wednesday and we hadn’t been able to hang too much. We were lower on supplies but the same amount of people showed up and Sophia made another avant-garde piece of art and EVERYONE’S POSTCARDS WERE ALWAYS AMAZING. I created a promotional test design for the Klub Deer afterparty, DJ’ed using some fancy speakers, and decided my only advice about life is “drinking has consequences.”

Carly: Basically Social Dance is the most fun I’ve ever had? I remember when the idea for this activity was proposed months ago, and even back then I knew it would be amazing, but I really had no idea just how amazing it would be. We had an amazing turnout and Alex led the group in some warm-ups and then some excellent choreography.

Alex Vega, Avengers Counselor/Design Director/Co-Founder: Social Dance gave me social anxiety all week leading up to it. I’ve never led people in a dancing situation before and I didn’t know how I was going to do it for an hour and a half. Luckily, the campers are awesome and just wanted to dance. Period.

Carly:  Everything sorta dissolved into the BEST DAYTIME DANCE PARTY EVER.

Alex: The whole thing was really just a free-for-all dance party. Also Michelle Attah, you guys.

Carly: Shoutout to Michelle Attah for CRUSHING IT.

Alex: ALL OF YOU ARE SUCH AWESOME/FUN DANCERS. WTF.

Carolyn: During the social dance I decided what I really needed to do was not talk to humans for an hour, so I went and read with a camper from Valencia and got really sunburnt and helped her look up what the weather in the place she’d told her family she was was like.

Cee Webster, Golden Girls Counselor/Tech Director: Watching social dance was super fun. I am seriously jealous of the dancing skills at camp.

Brittani: Every time I worry about there being enough people to get a Basketball Game going and every time I’m reminded I’m at a camp for queer women so duh, there will be enough people. We continued the tradition of not being able to breathe after an hour of running and jumping in that altitude and finished before the block was over. This gave us time to check out what everyone else was doing. Quickly I was summoned by the spirits of movement to the Social Dance where I could not believe there were so many people willing to dance in the middle of the day with all the lights on. I’ve never been more impressed.

Camper Quote: “My favorite activity was SOCIAL DANCING ZOMG!!! I love dancing but I only do it after drinking because I’m self-conscious, but during social dancing everyone was just having a great time.”

Rachel: I had been super pumped about getting to put together an Essay Writing Workshop where people could work on personal nonfiction/essays, because part of my real-life job as an instructor of mandatory English composition classes for college freshman is trying to get them to write personal essays, and it’s like pulling teeth and/or squeezing blood from a stone. It’s like squeezing blood-teeth, I guess. So understandably I was really excited about getting to work with people who actually wanted to be there, and weren’t just going to fart out something about how winning their softball championships senior year taught them to never give up. (Not that that’s bad! Props to you if you won your softball championships/never gave up! I just find it hard to believe that that’s the most important thing that’s ever happened to you.)

So I was really excited to be there with people who were also really excited to be there, but began to become more panicked when I realized that this meant they would be expecting a lot more from me, whereas my freshman students really only expect me to show up and not be visibly hungover. Luckily, we had a super awesome, small, intimate group of people who wanted to work on their writing, and I think we all made something really special together. We talked a little bit about what goes into personal essay writing in general, and worked with a Lynda Barry writing exercise that’s outlined in this post.

We all got to sit quietly in the sun and write for a while (and Lord, there’s something great about being on a mountain with a group of people who are all happy to sit in the sun and write quietly), and it was a great way to take some silent space to process on our own on the page in the midst of what can sometimes be a chaotic and overwhelming (although wonderful and affirming!) camp experience. After we regrouped, some people were kind enough to share a little bit about what they wrote with the group, and we reflected on the value of writing to write, even without a specific project or purpose in mind. Everyone who came to that workshop was a really special person, and I hope you’re all still writing!

Riese: So, the body image panel: we promised the campers and presenters absolute confidentiality going into this activity, so nobody was required to write about it or to even let you know that they were involved. But I’m already naked on the internet, so let’s do this thing!

Planning this was impossible. Pre-pre-camp emails remained Marked As Unread. Our pre-camp conversation involved a lot of fidgeting, deep breathing and near-crying. We talked about our experiences with eating disorders mostly, but also general body image/self-esteem issues, drugs, the role of family in defining our relationships to our bodies and self-harm. Clearly talking about these issues was hard enough without thinking about how to like, organize talking about these issues.

Luckily we’d brought Sarah to A-Camp, who works as a counselor and is in training to be a therapist. She was our on-site Go-To Girl For Feelings, and facilitating discussions like the one we had is basically HER BAG. She was a G-dsend.

Sara Medd: The Body Image Panel was one of the most profound times of camp for me. Even though I was in the role of a counselor at camp, I felt myself growing so much as a person during the week, and simultaneously feeling challenged that I still have so much more growing to do.

Riese: I’d envisioned about 20 people in a circle talking about our feelings and instead we packed Wolf Lodge so full that some people had to stand. It was profound and emotional and also cut short — I regretted that we lacked time for post-panel self-care or to get into discussions with the campers. Ultimately most campers seemed to really get a lot out of it and it was cited as a favorite by many, though, so it’s something we might build on for next time.

Camper Quote: I really loved so many of the activities, but if I were to choose one favorite, I would choose the body-image panel. That was a moment when I felt absolutely supported and understood as I was telling my short story and I respected the staff immensely for exposing themselves like that and telling us their story and their struggles.

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 II. The Afternooners

Riese: The Body Image Panel was my last “heavy” thing, so after that I felt light and airy like a fairy.

Gabby: At some point, Jill (Snatch-22 Jill) and a crew of other dapper queers organized a Dapper meet up in the lunchroom. It was awesome. I learned the phrase “Peter Pan-of-Center” as opposed to masculine of center. Bangarang. I loved sitting with the Dappers and talking about how the clothes we wear are more than just clothing. They’re an expression of a self that’s been held inside for fucking ever. It’s not about trying to being a “man.” For me (maybe even us) dapperness is where queerness connects to my instincts to be chivalrous, old school, gentle, well-dressed and dignified. Having brunch together pulled all those threads in and man, we were seamless.

Crystal: Six campers showed up to the lunchtime Australian meet-up, which was both lovely and surprising given that Australia is so far away. After spending a week surrounded predominately by Americans, listening to an entire group talk in Australian accents was incredibly strange.

Next: Somebody wins a campership and everybody wins when we all talk about SEX!

A-Camp September Recamp #3: Reading Dancing Spooning Singing Sewing Clubbing Dreaming

Welcome to the third of five fantastic recaps of our entire experience at A-Camp 2.0, which took place 2.5 hours outside of Los Angeles at Alpine Meadows Camp atop a mountain in Angelus Oaks, California, from September 12th-16th, 2012.

A-Camp was the genesis of an idea Riese had at 3AM in July 2010: the concept was to take the spirit of the website into three glorious dimensions and create an affordable option for queers for whom other lesbian vacations aren’t always a perfect fit. In April 2012, we did it for the first time — along with 160 campers and 35 staff members, we rented out a summer camp in its off-season and enjoyed a transformative weekend of fun, friendship, panels, workshops, classes, sports, entertainment, events and so forth. It was probably the most awesome experience of our life and we knew from there it would only get bigger and better.

So in September, 220 campers and 40 staff descended upon The Mountain for four days of much-better-organized fun, friendship, panels, workshops, classes, sports, entertainment, events and secret initiation rites.
These epically long monster-posts will do their best to explain and extrapolate upon the camp experience, from avoided-shitstorms to emotional revelations to glory/triumph. But we can’t tell you everything. We must leave some things up to the imagination.

The next Camp Autostraddle will take place May 23rd-27th, 2013 in Angelus Oaks, California, Mark your Calendars!

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Friday, September 14th

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I. Here Comes The Sun

Carmen Rios, Misfits Counselor/Contributing Editor: I did not make it to breakfast this day because first my shower exploded and then I had to do some Official Cabin Mama business. But I got a coffee.

Stef Schwartz, Battlestars Counselor/OG Autostraddle: I have never seen so many hungover chicks groaning their way towards the coffee machine than that fateful morning.  If you are one of the few proud souls who made it to breakfast that morning, I commend you ladies.

Riese Bernard, Runaways Counselor/Editor-in-Chief: I didn’t drink very much on Thursday night and so I woke up on Friday feeling like a SUPERSTAR, ready to chop the day into little pieces and eat them! Just kidding, I woke up feeling like a SUPERSTAR ready to freak out all day about the Staff Reading.

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Block A:

Sewing Square w/Carolyn

T-Shirt Cutting & Stenciling w/Carmen, Sara Medd & Laura

Career Workshop with Meredydd

Photography For All Skill Levels w/Robin

Lesbian Jeopardy w/Riese, Haviland & Jill

Trans mini-panel/discussion w/Morgan & Annika

Hiking

Gabby Rivera, Catch-22 Counselor/Writer: Friday morning, I was unjustly hungover. I will blame it on the altitude and not give a shit. I will not blame it on the Maker’s.

Vikki, Avengers Counselor/Contributor: On Thursday night, I had a bit of bourbon with my cabin mates and then hung out at a campfire and then went to a party in Wolf Lodge and had some drinks and then I went to Deer Lodge and did some dirty dancing and then I went back to Wolf Lodge and had deep meaningful conversations and maybe danced on the stripper pole a little bit and then went to bed around 3 a.m. Unfortunately, I was scheduled to lead a hike on Friday morning. Sometimes you gotta pay to play so, on Friday morning, I got up and showered and dressed in my snazzy hiking shoes and showed up to do my duty. But then…a light shone upon the dining hall and an angel appeared and offered to lead the hike for me and I married her on the spot in a glorious lesbian wedding attended by all of A-Camp and officiated by a coyote. Okay, I didn’t marry her but did have a passionate love affair with her kindness.

Mary Tully, Little Rascals Counselor/Calendar Girl: Hiking on Friday did not have nearly as many people show up because I think everyone was hungover. I did not realize how hungover I was until I was ON the hike. Holy Altitude. Alex joined us this time!

Morgan McCormick, Battlestars Counselor/Contributor/Calendar Girl:  Annika and I’s meeting before the Trans Mini-Panel/Discussion went like so: “Feelings?” -A “Feelings.” -M “Feelings!” -All of the above.

Annika Penelope, Unicorns Counselor/Writer: This was the only early (9:30am) activity that I was scheduled for during all of A-Camp. I’m lucky if my morning routine takes less than 90 minutes, which means that I had to wake up a 6:30 in order to be ready in time. The early time turned out to be a good thing though, because we ended up having a really intimate discussion of our experience of being trans* or having trans* friends/partners.

Morgan: It was really, I dunno, family-y. We all sat in a big circle and just said what we wanted to about our experiences, everyone listened, everyone waited their turn. So I guess it wasn’t like a family at all! Teehee. For cereal, though, my favorite panels are audience-run, and it was a nice change of pace to talk transy things some place other than the internet. I wuv woo, Internet. I do. But there’s a real power to hearing people’s stories live and out loud, plus if it hadn’t been for a trans panel I attended some years ago, who knows, I might not be the me I love so much right now. All hail Trans Panel!

Annika: It was really cool to see people open up and share their stories!

Camper Quote: My favorite part of camp was being a trans queer woman in a queer women’s space and not being the only one and it being no big thing.

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Stef: I wanted so badly to go to the Trans Mini Panel but made a quick detour back to my cabin for a jacket or something, which was a mistake.  I was hit by a nap attack of such tremendous power that I couldn’t even make it back into my own top bunk; I passed out in someone else’s empty bunk, drooling on myself.

Gabby: I hung around Katrina’s Queer Barbershop, pretended to take pictures and mostly napped/got it together on bags of linens. Katrina’s barbershop was super mellow and I feel like when she’s an old DQ, it will exist in real life.

Camper Quote: “My favorite activity was probably just hanging out at the barbershop listening to the banter and watching people get alternative lifestyle haircuts.”

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Laura Wooley, Bomb Girls Counselor/Associate Editor: Some girls can get away with having an entire game show devoted to getting girls to take their shirts off. Those of us who can’t take other routes. At the T-shirt Cutting & Stenciling Workshop the next morning, I found myself in a room with 12 women in various states of toplessness thanks to the imprecise art of t-shirt cutting (and recutting). There’s more than one way to skin a cat, y’all.

Carmen: Many an Autostraddle-deco item was made! We listened to “Watch the Throne” throughout. I went to my next panel with one sleeve cut off of my STAFF shirt.

Carolyn Yates, Valencia Counselor/Contributing Editor: I was worried that not that many people would show up to the Sewing Circle on Friday because I forgot to mention that it was happening again on Thursday, and I was right! Also a lot of people thought we were T-shirt cutting, and/or absconded with the scissors. But I actually did teach someone how to sew! She showed me her beanbag the next day and I felt irrationally accomplished. Also someone else came up to me and showed me her cross stitch, which was both about science and finished, and which was particularly awesome because she’d never done cross stitch before.

Robin Roemer, A-Camp Co-Director/Photographer: I always get really nervous before I have to do a Photo Workshop because I’m not comfortable talking about myself. So I chatted a bit about my experience and had everyone talk briefly about their experience/skill level before getting into some technical aspects of photography and a Q&A session with the help of camper Kamila who had a lot to share with us from her own studio lighting experience.

Meredydd, Golden Girls Counselor/Business Advisor: Even though The Career Workshop was sparsly attended I think it ended up going okay! The questions the campers were looking for help with really matched up neatly with the experience Cee and I have. This let us really connect with campers pretty much one-on-one which is always great.

Riese: I love trivia! I love Jeopardy! I love hosting things with Haviland and I love Jill! All of those things came together for a glorious game of Lesbian Jeopardy, featuring thrilling categories like “Ani Difranco Lyrics” and “Literature Featuring Hot Lesbians.”

Jill, Wild Stallions Counselor/VIP Camper: I was in charge of determining who buzzed in first.  “Yes! Easy job!” I thought.  Riese even tried to intimidate everyone by telling them I was a cowboy and would kick their ass.  But instead I ended up feeling like one of the replacement NFL refs with my cabin heckling me and trying to influence my calls.  And then I forgot that I was going to exact my cowboy revenge on them so beware next time my campers! BEWARE.

Riese: Lizz was with us in spirit by having written questions for a category called “The Seven Sisters As Described By The Simpsons.”

Hansen, Camper/Contributing Editor: Misfits didn’t win Lesbian Jeopardy. Surprise!

Riese: I think Marika won. Marika of The Yellow Team. She’s not allergic to winning, it turns out.

Crystal, Thundercats Counselor/Music Editor: Carly and I spent the morning writing anonymous notes to our campers and discussing how perfect they all are.

Carly Usdin, Thundercats Counselor/Contributor/OG Autostraddle: They were so weird. Like, the weirdest notes. For Rachel Walker, I [poorly] drew a robot wearing a bowtie. For Jen Freitag, I wrote the following—

Hey I just met you,
And this is crazy.
But here’s a cat in a denim vest,
Your spirit animal, maybe?

Crystal: For the rest of the day I was on “Rover” duty, which I interpreted to mean that I should walk around the camp site showing everyone photos of my kitten.

Stef: I spent the afternoon in Falcon Lodge, rehearsing for The Haviland Stillwell Show with Marni.  Because I live in Brooklyn and Marni’s in Oakland, we hadn’t had a chance to actually sit together and practice together until the day of the show, which was a little nerve-wracking.   We were putting together arrangements and sorting out the set list when suddenly Marni busted out this amazing Ani DiFranco-style rendition of Jessie J’s “Do It Like A Dude,” which made my heart stop and my eyes bug out of my head.  Marni, you guys. Heartthrob.

 

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Block B

Zine-Making w/Riese, Laneia & Rachel

The Truth About Cats and Dogs with Mary Tully and Jill

Design & Branding w/Alex, Geneva & Meredydd

Coming Out Panel w/Robin, Whitney, Morgan, Haviland, Carmen, Carrie, Annika & Mollie

Kickball w/Jamie

Alex Vega, Avengers Counselor/Design Director: For the Design & Branding Workshop, we all sat in a circle and talked about marketing, designing websites and the importance of branding, which may sound boring but I promise you that our super casual discussion was far from boring, my friend. We talked a little about Autostraddle and our brand and process.

Meredydd: It was great hearing Alex talk about her creative process and so helpful to hear campers talking about what they want from the site redesign.

Alex: Meredydd is a branding genius and shared some fun anecdotes from when she worked on projects with fancy pants businesses like Coca-Cola. Everyone had feelings about their jobs and office environments and how different it is living and working as a creative person and what that means for us.

Meredydd: Sharing the concept of ‘flawsome’ with everyone has got to be one of the highlights of camp. Branding is a huge passion of mine and it was great to share that. Next time I hope we talk more about the design process too.

Jill: Mary and I had a wonderful time at The Truth About Cats And Dogs. Mary is an animal trainer/behaviorist and I’m a veterinarian so we’ve got this subject on lockdown.  Also – Digger was there!!! She trains animals too and had a lot of great things to add!

Mary: We talked about training and animal healthcare. Everyone that came had such great questions! I was pretty much in heaven. Then my whole cabin showed up to participate. And I died. LONG LIVE THE LITTLE RASCALS!

Jill: Workshop attendees wowed us with insightful questions about their cute, silly, and crazy pets.  Mary and Digger answered questions about how to train dogs (and cats!), and how to remedy some specific problems such as a dog that is scared of cars on the highway.  I answered general questions about pet health such as why chocolate is toxic for pets and things to do for an arthritic dog.  We were having such great discussions that I think we even went over our allotted time a little bit!

Carmen: Not gonna lie, the Coming Out Panel was emotional. But a lot of people were glad we had it.

Morgan: Can I come out as being in love with all of Coming Out panel? It was like Gender Panel but in a completely different array of rainbow flavors.

Whitney Pow, Neverland Counselor/Contributing Editor: Coming out is a really scary process, and having so many people be able to speak to their individual experiences — coming out to friends, siblings, parents — was really inspiring.

Carrie, Forever 21 Counselor/Community Managarette: I don’t know what to say except that I felt like I learned as much from the audience as I did from fellow panelists. And I wanted to high-five Morgan every time she talked.

Morgan: Also it had Robin being totes adorably pumped. I know Robin’s always pumped, but still!

Robin: I shared my experiences coming out to a very religious mother.  Coming out is never easy and I really liked the focus on not feeling pressured about coming out and the importance of a support system.  Everyone had so many amazing things to share.

Whitney: I spoke about coming out to my family and how, while the beginning was difficult and sad, my article for Autostraddle, “Estranged,” ended up carving out a space in my family to talk about me being gay and about me getting married. My extended family read the article. My parents read the article. My brothers read the article. My aunts, uncles and cousins started reaching out to me — calling me, sending me emails, telling me they loved me. I never expected anything like this to ever, ever happen. I had no idea that an article, that words, could make such an impact.

Sarah Croce, Forever 21 Counselor/Calendar Girl/Contributor: Coming out is the great equalizer of our people. We have all been through it, or will have to go through it. No matter how hard or easy each person feels it was, it is something we have all had to confront and admit first to ourselves, and then out loud.

Riese: I entered ‘zine-making and exclaimed “I didn’t get drunk last night and I feel SPECTACULAR! Let’s make some motherfucking ‘zines!” I was so pumped.

Rachel Kincaid, Jetpack Counselor/Senior Editor: Zine-making REPRISE. This time there was at least one camper present who knew more about zines and zine-making than I did, which was awesome and made me feel even better than I already did about all the new people I was meeting at camp.

Riese: I love it when that happens, I just wanted to hear about all her things! Also, Shannon brought stacks of old comic books for us to use, which was especially awesome.

Laneia, Runaways Counselor/Executive Editor: I eavesdropped on Grace and Shannon while they conceptualized and titled their future zines. I hope they make them all because they sounded so cool.

Rachel: Also, sidenote, I really wish ReadyMade was still in circulation. Also that Grace attended everything I did in real life, so that she could fetch coffee and exacto knives.

Hansen: I was really inspired by all of the zines we got to look through, especially Laneia’s because it’s beautiful, you guys. We decided to make a zine about our cabin, but in true Misfit nature, we basically sat in a circle and put paper mustaches I found in Bitch magazine on our faces. We then wore them to lunch. I lost mine shortly thereafter and I’m still upset about it.

Laneia: Rachel played Fiona Apple for us this time and I felt a lot more focused and centered. I think this is when we realized that zine making, like High Tea, was actually just an elaborate way to hang out with people you hadn’t met yet. In that sense, these activities are pretty important.

Camper Quote: Lesbian Jeopardy was very enjoyable and funny but it made me realize I mostly wanted to just talk to people at A-Camp– which is why I went to zine making for the next block (I hadn’t planned to go because I am not creative and have no zine feelings) which turned out to be the perfect art therapy and bonding experience.

Cee Webster, Golden Girls Counselor/Tech Director: A lunchtime PDX meetup was organized by the Portlanders, and so I joined that. Us Portlanders exchanged restaurant & bar recommendations and email addresses. I hope everyone comes to the Autostraddle Portland meetups!

NEXT: Get your Swag(ger) on!

A-Camp September Recamp #2: Blame It On The Altitude

Welcome to the second of four fantastic recaps of our entire experience at A-Camp 2.0, which took place 2.5 hours outside of Los Angeles at Alpine Meadows Camp atop a mountain in Angelus Oaks, California, from September 12th-16th, 2012.

A-Camp was the genesis of an idea Riese had at 3AM in July 2010: the concept was to take the spirit of the website into three glorious dimensions and create an affordable option for queers for whom other lesbian vacations aren’t always a perfect fit. In April 2012, we did it for the first time — along with 160 campers and 35 staff members, we rented out a summer camp in its off-season and enjoyed a transformative weekend of fun, friendship, panels, workshops, classes, sports, entertainment, events and so forth. It was probably the most awesome experience of our life and we knew from there it would only get bigger and better.

So in September, 220 campers and 40 staff descended upon The Mountain for four days of much-better-organized fun, friendship, panels, workshops, classes, sports, entertainment, events and secret initiation rites.

These epically long monster-posts will do their best to explain and extrapolate upon the camp experience, from avoided-shitstorms to emotional revelations to glory/triumph. But we can’t tell you everything. We must leave some things up to the imagination.

The next Camp Autostraddle will take place May 23rd-27th, 2013 in Angelus Oaks, California, Mark your Calendars!

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Thursday, September 13th

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I. Hello, Morning

Block A:

GAYming w/Morgan & Jill

Queer Families Panel w/Vikki, Laneia, Carrie, Whitney & Riese

Book Club w/Carolyn, Jamie & Meredydd

Music Trivia w/Crystal & Stef

Postcard-Making w/ Carmen

Hiking

Individual Style Workshop Sessions w/Sara Medd

Jill, Wild Stallions Counselor/VIP Camper: Gaymers was one of the first morning activities of the first day of camp so everyone was a little muted and tired. Thankfully Morgan was full of energy and got everyone stretched out with a game of “Human Pac-Man,” in which we turned Deer Lodge into a life size Pac Man course and everyone ran around eating ghosts.

Morgan, Battlestars Counselor/Calendar Girl/Contributor: It was all part of a diabolical scheme to force my fellow gamer kin to get up and move around a room and experience the awesome power of cardio.

Jill: We then discussed our favorite games, obscure games, and websites we liked. Morgan also discussed her involvement with the Trans Panel at PAX East.

Morgan: Then we moved on to the meeting’s meat: feelings. There are no feelings more fulfilling, as a geek of any stripe, than telling people about your favorite things, and then hearing about everyone else’s favorite things.

Jill: So that was the morning in which I was amazed by the greatness which is Morgan.

Gabby, Catch-22 Counselor/Writer: I wasn’t scheduled for anything which was nice. When the schedules first landed in our inboxes, I realized that all of my feelings regarding my entire life would eventually be put out into the A-world, so a nothing block was a good block. I set out, camera in hand, ready to peer into the morning’s workshops/crafts/things.

Cee Webster, Golden Girls Counselor/Tech Director: I spent the morning roaming and helping/hindering where I could. For example: Finding supplies for Carolyn for her sewing workshop, dropping in on the introvert meetup and searching for the elusive tape.

Carolyn Yates, Valencia Counselor/Contributing Editor: For Read a Fucking Book (Club), we read Santa Olivia, by Jacqueline Carey.

Meredydd, Golden Girls Counselor/Business Advisor: Santa Olivia is a really good book and I hoped it would give us a lot to discuss. I think it was a success! Campers also enjoyed the book and we got into the themes of science-fiction world building and comparing the relationship of the queer characters with the straight characters.

Carolyn: I really wish I’d written down everyone’s recommendations.

Meredydd: It lead into a larger discussion of how far authors are allowed to go with sex scenes for queer characters in Young Adult fiction – something I hadn’t really thought about much. Also we now have a Nerd-Straddling group on Facebook where we talk about our favourite books (science fictional and otherwise)!

Stef Schwartz, Battlestars Counselor/Writer/OG Autostraddler: This was our second time leading Music Trivia, and this time around we’d decided to turned it into a Rainbow War activity. Crystal and I were a bit nervous but somehow we assembled a fairly large crowd and the competition got pretty heated, with question topics ranging from Tegan & Sara and other well-known queer artists to hip-hop, riot grrrl, film soundtracks and obvs the Spice Girls.

Crystal, Thundercats Counselor/Music Editor: 50 campers started buzzing and shouting out answers all at once at it was pure madness. The Yellow team were the only ones who played by the rules and I suspect that this was their downfall.

Stef: Crystal threw delicious Australian candies to whoever answered correctly.

Gabby: Watching Stef doing anything in her Captain’s hat is probably on my top ten list of favorite things to watch. She is a master and knows her music shit.

Crystal: Just like when we played this game at the April A-Camp, I kept hitting Keisha with stray Toblerone missiles. I’M SO SORRY KEISHA.

Gabby: Crystal was throwing out candy to the crowd but like Australian candy so it was all weird and amazing looking. I love how A-camp competitions aren’t ever overly aggressive or mean spirited. It’s really just a hoard of queer chicks knowing that they’re smart and flying with it.

Crystal: The Purple team won, which I felt really good about despite my allegiance to the Red team because Chelsea sung all of her answers and deserved all of the points.

Carrie, Forever 21 Counselor/Community Managarette: Everyone came to the Queer Families Panel with really different stories and perspectives which was great. I felt tiny and inexperienced hearing Whitney talk about marriage and Laneia and Vikki talk about their kids because those are worlds I don’t know anything about. But it mostly just made me excited and hopeful for a future that will involve those things.

Laneia Jones, Runaways Counselor/Executive Editor: I was really honored to be part of it. Everyone’s perspectives were so unique and important, and the audience had great questions and comments.

Gabby: I don’t think I’ve ever heard Laneia speak irl so much. It was awesome.

Alex Vega, Avengers Counselor/Design Director: I could listen to Laneia and Vikki tell stories about their children all day. Especially stories that involve important/deep topics like how to tell your kids that your family is a little different than the other kids at school, as an example. It was the first time I had even thought about that stuff… like maybe possibly having my own family some day and how that situation might go. (i.e. terrifying)

Riese Bernard, Runaways Counselor/Editor-in-Chief: The Queer Families panel was my idea and I was so pumped to rep my gay self and my gay Mom, but then I got altitude sickness and couldn’t sleep Wednesday night or move Thursday morning (I also have fibro, which basically doubles the pain of anything that ever happens to me ever) and Marni had to have a Real Talk Moment with me where I had to face the fact that I wasn’t gonna be on the panel after all. Intern Grace brought me water pitchers and Cheerios in a styrofoam bowl and listened to me writhe and told me stories. I didn’t have pants on and I determined that I’m officially a “sickly” person in general. Alas.

Laneia: I talked with a camper afterward and she showed me a whole new side of being the child of a queer divorced mother — one that I hadn’t really considered before — which I’ve definitely kept with me. Maybe the best part of A-Camp is how easy it is to learn something new, about yourself or the world. Like if you just stop and listen long enough, someone will show you something amazing and necessary.

Camper Quote: “As a person who works in education, I am absolutely fascinated by the relationship between children/their gay parents, and gay parents/the educational system. Please talk about that forever.”

Sara Medd: I love having the opportunity to meet individually with campers to chat style for Individual Style Consultations!! Not only is it more helpful to give advice that is individualized, but I get to know campers who are not in my cabin who I may not have been able to meet otherwise.

Camper Quote: I had a style workshop with Sara, and she really helped me. I LOVE HER.

Carmen Rios, Misfits Counselor/Contributing Editor: I always think nobody will be interested in my lame nostalgic crafts but so many people came to postcard-making! We demolished a lot of paper inside of Falcon lodge and created a series of beautiful postcards ranging from practical to modern art.

Gabby: They were so damn cute surrounded by construction paper, scissors and the incurable virus of crafts: glitter.

NEXT: The Queer Women of Color Panel, Speed-Dating With Hannah Hart and MOAR!

A-Camp September 2012 Recamp #1: We Absolutely Started The Fire

Welcome to the first of four fantastic recaps of our entire experience at A-Camp 2.0, which took place 2.5 hours outside of Los Angeles at Alpine Meadows Camp atop a mountain in Angelus Oaks, California, from September 12th-16th, 2012.

A-Camp was the genesis of an idea Riese had at 3AM in July 2010: the concept was to take the spirit of the website into three glorious dimensions and create an affordable option for queers for whom other lesbian vacations aren’t always a perfect fit. In April 2012, we did it for the first time — along with 160 campers and 35 staff members, we rented out a summer camp in its off-season and enjoyed a transformative weekend of fun, friendship, panels, workshops, classes, sports, entertainment, events and so forth. It was probably the most awesome experience of our life and we knew from there it would only get bigger and better.

So in September, 220 campers and 40 staff descended upon The Mountain for four days of much-better-organized fun, friendship, panels, workshops, classes, sports, entertainment, events and secret initiation rites.

These epically long monster-posts will do their best to explain and extrapolate upon the camp experience, from avoided-shitstorms to emotional revelations to glory/triumph. But we can’t tell you everything. We must leave some things up to the imagination.

The next Camp Autostraddle will take place May 23rd-27th, 2012 in Angelus Oaks, California, Mark your Calendars!

 

 

Monday, September 10th 

On Monday, most of the A-Camp Staff arrived in Los Angeles via air, vehicle, or “already living in Los Angeles” and shipped out to Angelus Oaks for relaxing restful evening before Pre-Camp began on September 11th.

I. Hi-Ho, Hi-Ho, It’s Off to Camp We Go

Riese Bernard, Runaways Counselor/Editor-in-Chief: In April, about ten of us arrived at Alpine Meadows — our first time seeing the actual site — approximately 12 hours before campers began arriving. The rest of our staff arrived on the same day the campers showed up. This was a recipe for crazymaking so this time we scheduled for everybody to fly in/shuttle out or drive out on the 10th, attend pre-camp the 11th, and be ready eager beavers on the 12th.

Carly Usdin, Thundercats Counselor/Contributor/OG Autostraddler: At April’s incarnation of A-Camp, Lauren and I spent the whole time shooting the documentary, so I wasn’t able to fully engage in the activities and I didn’t get to form bonds with very many campers. I was determined to change that this time. I couldn’t wait to get on the plane with Robin; then I spent the entirety of the flight working on the Faggity Feud intro video and was so engrossed in that that I forgot to eat lunch.

Rachel Kincaid, Jetpack Counselor/Senior Editor: On my flight from Chicago I sat next to two girls of Scandinavian descent (Swedish? Dutch? I don’t know) who appeared to be some sort of Olympic-level athletes and also obsessed with eating Slim Jims. It was a harrowing trip. I do have to commend the in-terminal dining options at the Phoenix airport, though. Hats off.

Morgan McCormick, Battlestars Counselor/Calendar Girl: In the Atlanta airport, recovering poorly from the red eye that carried me there from DC, I noticed a cute short haircut, with a girl attached to it! I looked at her, she looked back and I looked away. Then she looked at me, I snapped my gaze back, and she stared intensely at her book. This went on. Then I pulled up bookface on my phone with a pic of A-Camp staff, walked over to her and said “Are you with Autostraddle?” “Oh my God yes!” Daniela and I intro’d each other, talked about our background in sexual health, boarded and, as we separated to our respective plane corners, we promised to meet again… AT A-CAMP.

Laneia Jones, Runaways Counselor/Executive Editor: Megan’s mom let us borrow her super fuel-efficient hybrid, which had satellite radio, so I didn’t even have to make mix CDs! How did we fit everything in it? The world may never know. We only had to go back to our house four times before we could finally leave the great city of Phoenix, so all in all, not a bad start.

Riese: Marni & I drove to Los Angeles on Sunday and then from there to Angelus Oaks on Monday. Economy Rental Car + Shit-tons-of-supplies = Riese spending hours with her legs on the dashboard because the legspace was full of supplies. It was pretty sexy!

Rachel: Because of my primo travel scheduling skills, I ended up with literally eight hours to kill in LAX. This was fine, as I had a ton of work to do and LAX has free wireless, shoutout LAX. I engaged in some really intense eye contact and aggressive body posturing to get access to the outlets in the baggage claim, and spent hours scheduling posts and working on grad school stuff.

Carrie, Forever 21 Counselor/Community Managerette: My flight got into LAX at about 10am Monday morning. I was giddy but also sleep-deprived and hungry so I stumbled to the international terminal to get food and coffee. About an hour later I met up with Daniela and then we ran into Katrina, Carmen and Gabby outside the duty free shop. (I credit the queer forces of the universe for bringing us together.)

Carmen Rios, Misfits Counselor/Contributing Editor: Then I went to Grace’s terminal to meet her in the action which sparked “It Takes A Village,” a week-long communal process led by Gabby to turn me into a proper butch woman. She made me chug a beer and meet Grace as opposed to having Grace meet us. I love to hug Grace, you know?

Crystal, Thundercats Counselor/Music Editor: Carly and Robin were the first people I found at LAX and seeing their excited faces reminded me that the 14-hour flight and subsequent jet lag is absolutely worth it.

Carrie: After Carmen left to meet Grace “Casablanca-style” at her terminal Rachel tweeted at us to get over to terminal 6 and catch the bus with the rest of the staff. The funniest thing about this is that twitter probably was the most efficient way to get our attention.

Crystal: I saw someone walk past who looked like Daniela Sea from behind and later discovered that it was our VIP camper, Jill!

Rachel: Jill is a superb human being and has excellent boots.

Riese: I think “HOW’S JILL” is the first question I asked Robin when she called. Jill was our A-Camp VIP — during our fundraising campaign, she picked the Megamillions “A-Camp VIP” Perk which meant she came to camp as a team member and got her own room and gifts and love and stuff. Robin said that Jill was both awesome and happy, which made me feel both awesome and happy.

Laneia: Was anyone prepared for how much we would love Jill? I thought I was ready, but I was not.

Rachel: There were some close calls — would the group that had gone to get Starbucks from terminal 4 make it back in time for the shuttle at 2:30?? — but in the end, all was well.

Riese: I spent a solid portion of the ride making sure I had everybody’s name memorized in case somebody asked and studying important facts about The Runaways I had helpfully recorded on index cards. I won’t tell you the memory games we had to play for Marni.

Alex, Avengers Counselor/Design Director: The night before pre-camp, I brought ALL the things in my car including Morgan and Mary.

Morgan: She buried me alive while Mary said soothing things.

Carmen: We stopped at the liquor store / grocery store / veterinary hospital for a quick trip to Vodkaland, in which I bought the cheapest glass handle of vodka that didn’t call itself “Seagrams.” It was Smirnoff. It was meant to last me the entire week.

Carrie: Jill entertained us with insane stories about cattle and tornados in Oklahoma. Daniela was nice enough to buy me a bottle of rum when I stupidly left my wallet locked in the bus during our pit stop.

Carly: I continued editing the video on the bus (when I wasn’t asleep), and Robin shared an email from Marni in which Beth (who was the Director at Alpine Meadows in April) (!!!) asked if she could come visit one day at lunch, and we all cheered.

Rachel: There was a brief, heady moment where we thought we might be able to get Carly to play her League of their Own DVD on the shuttle, but it wasn’t in the cards.

Carrie: I don’t know if they knew what they were getting into when they agreed to take a bunch of queermos up that mountain, but they did a really good job because no one on our bus cried or threw up or anything. Our driver even managed to do a three point turn on the edge of a cliff on the way up.

Katrina Casino, Snatch-22 Counselor/Writer: Bus driver man, wherever you are: thank you. Great job. I don’t know how the fuck you made that bus U-turn in the middle of that tiny, curvy road, but man. Go you.

Rachel: At last we arrived, and even though I had been awake for almost 24 hours at this point, it was so exciting to see everyone I love in one place that I kept just sort of covering my mouth with my hands and squealing quietly.

Whitney, Neverland Counselor/Writer: You guys, they are the best people, and the best kind of people — amazing and warm and open and lovely and so intelligent. I have all of the gushiness reserved for them. I felt so blessed to be in the mountains with such great, inspiring people, you guys. I’m so lucky.

Stef, Battlestars Counselor/Original Team Autostraddle: I headed up the Late Van Experience. Some of us had to go to work Monday, and some of us were just weirdos who booked late flights. Although I was super jealous of everyone who arrived early and got to the mountain Monday afternoon, there was something extra exciting about rounding up the latecoming staff (Malaika, Annika, Whitney and Laura) and piling into a van for old times’ sake. Once we’d excitedly gathered our tiny posse at LAX and picked out our trusty rental steed, we hit the road in search of late night tacos and lesbian camp adventures.

Megan O’Grady, Valencia Counselor: Every now and then, Laneia would screech, “We’re going to CAMP!!” And I could only say, “I KNOW!” in return because really, what else was there to say?

Carly: We were the first ones to arrive and I remember just looking around outside of Wolf Lodge, taking in the beautiful, quiet surroundings, and being overwhelmed with excitement and awe and gratitude.

Morgan: After the 2013 Calendar Girls shoot, I figured I’d never get to see Robin, Sara, Alex or Sarah again. Out, out brief candle as Bill said, but I never wanted to cling on like a Klingon and spoil that perfect moment on the beach. Then Riese asked me to join up as a counselor for A-Camp and it wasn’t until that late Monday night moment, when we’d finally hit mountaintop, that it hit me. Hit me in the form of Robin lunging out of the dark and giving me a hug to go down in the annals of hugdom. It’s good to come home.

Riese: Being back at Alpine was like going home for Christmas! All my friends are there and we’re planning this really awesome party! Except the food is probs a lot better at Christmas. I’m Jewish, so.

Laneia: Yes! I had that written down: “Going back was like going home. Where did that come from? Thank you.”

Rachel: There was much hugging and drinking of whiskey, and I think at one point Carly and Laneia and I spent thirty minutes just showing each other pictures of our pets on our phones. Laneia’s dogs are real cute, everyone.

Stef: We meant to stop for towels and other camp necessities, but by the time we got going it was almost midnight and the only open thing we could find was a WinCo in Pomona, where we bought champagne.

Malaika Alba, Misfits Counselor/Contributing Editor: And I also found the biggest bottle of Arbor Mist I had ever seen in my life! Yup, I’m classy like that. You guys, I couldn’t resist: they sure don’t sell wine bottles that big in Canada.

Stef: With the help of my trusty navigator/roadtrip DJ Annika, we ascended the mountain at 2:30 in the damn morning with minimal issues and crept quietly into our bunk beds.