I did two camp briefings yesterday, one at Duncraig for 60 kids from Mirrabooka, Shenton and Duncraig, then another one at Mandurah for 16 kids. I didn't leave quite enough time between the two so it was bit of a rush getting from one to the other. Prior to that we had breakfast at IKEA and afterwards I checked out a few things in Mandurah with a view to using them on the camp. Now that the train line runs to Mandurah it's a lot more accessible.
On the way home I saw a couple attending to a roadside cross about 50km out of Bunbury. I did a U turn and went back to talk to them. I told them about my Behind the White Crosses project and asked them about this particular cross. It happened to be the first anniversary of the ladie's daughter. She told me a bit about what had happened and offered to email me a picture and some info that I may be able to use. It was sad to hear about her daughter's death but I was glad I stopped, finding out info about individual crosses is not easy and I was grateful that this mum was prepared to share her daughter's story with me. The first test run of the project is scheduled for Thursday this week. I'm still in need of more kids to come on the trip and be part of the pilot program.
I had to drop my laminating machine off at Dave and Nicole's place at Eaton on the way home. He and Josh are going to make the ID name tags for the kids going on the camp. It's a big job, requiring some 200 tags to be made so I'm really glad to have been able to delegate it. Certainly more glad than was Dave when I threw his Dockers towel in the spa! So desperate was he to retrieve it that as he lunged for it he scraped his leg on the wooden platform surrounding the spa, drawing a tiny amount of blood and a huge amount of whingeing! He was complaining to whoever would listen and was met with very little compassion, his own daughter telling him to "Toughen up Princess"! Click on the picture from yesterday's post for all the graphic detail!
As a devoted reader of this humble blog he had been all excited about being featured on Holt Press but now resigned himself to having to read about his injury and injured pride.
Mrs Holt Press enjoyed chatting with Nicole who has some sort of immune deficiency illness that takes away the pigment in her skin, permanently! She did tell me the name of it but I've forgotten. Sorry Nicole! She seems to be handling the situation with customary good humour and there were comments about Dalmations and albinos being thrown around.
Also there while we visited was Dave's younger brother Mark who earns his living playing in a band on a cruise ship. He reeled off a list of places he visits in the course of his job, all exciting and exotic, but the only one I can remember was Rome.
Madison and Sport Boy had fun in the spa together, conducting their own spelling bee. Nicole dubbed Madison Brain Girl, a foil for the title Sport Boy. On the way home I joked to him it could be a good future match-up, Sport Boy and Brain Girl. No way he replied, she's two years younger than me!!
After all these diversions and delays we were much later getting home than I'd expected and by the time I'd had dinner and looked through my latest parcel of badges and pins from America it was almost too late to put in an appearance at the year 8 camp. I had rung The Heir earlier and asked him to pick up the PA and drop it off at the camp site so they could use it for a disco.
I headed down to the Holy Mile but only made it as far as Monaghans where I was stopped by a police roadblock. There had been a serious crash, a hit and run in which a female pedestrian had been run over, and the road was blocked. The driver had then crashed into a car before finally hitting a tree and being apprehended by the police. The woman is in Royal Perth Hospital in a critical condition.
I made it to the camp this afternoon to help with some sports and games. I reffed my first ever game of basketball and had to endure the quizzical and scathing looks of the newly arrived Chinese student who was clearly unimpressed with my performance and not at all sympathetic to my excuse that I played football not basketball! I told him to stop whingeing!
The rest of my day revolved around camp preparation, as it will for the next week.
I did get to watch the season return of Hustle tonight, followed by the second episode of Survivor for the week!
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