Better Hide That Bait!

I was sitting here at lunch today, eating some wonderful, fresh cooked, fried chicken livers. Oh, how I do love a mess of good, fried chicken livers! As I was eating them, I had to smile as I remembered a camping and fishing trip with some friends when I was in my 30s.

My first husband, our kids and I had all gone camping with another couple that we were good friends with. The morning stuff had all been taken care of, all the kids were wandering around the campground, cutting loose and having fun, Judy and I were sitting in their trailer visiting, and our guys had planned to go fishing but remembered something they needed first, so had decided to run into the nearest Walmart first.

Somehow during our conversation, Judy and I got to talking about the baits the guys used to fish with. I was surprised that they had planned to use chicken livers that day because my (then) husband NEVER fished for catfish, but, apparently, hers did. So I guess that day, it was Lloyd's turn to pick the fishing style.

As Judy and I sat there talking, I mentioned how much I loved a good pan of fried chicken livers, but rarely ever cooked any because I was the only one in the house that ate them. Judy eagerly agreed that she loved them, too, but never ate them either because she, too, was the only one in her house that ate them and she didn't like to cook them just for herself.

So as we began to discuss how much we loved chicken livers, our tasters for them began to grow, especially since we each had someone sitting there to enjoy them with. We began to rummage around her trailer and my camping box and before you know it, we had put together all the makings for a great pan of fried chicken livers, including the onions and toast. But there was just one thing we needed . . . . . the chicken livers  .

Yep, you guessed it, we opened up the trailer refrigerator, eagerly and excitedly took out the chicken livers the guys had gotten to go fishing that day with, cooked them ALL up into a beautiful plate full of delicious fried liver 'n onions that we spread out over toast and gobbled up like starving pigs before the guys got back from getting the remainder of the tackle they had needed to go out fishing that day.

Let me tell you, SHOCK didn't even begin to cover it when they came back, opened up the fridge to retrieve their chicken livers to go fishing with, couldn't find them, then turned around to find the empty container sitting next to the greasy skillet and us huddled together with the 'cat that swallowed the canary' look on our faces. They were in such disbelief that they couldn't even yell. They just walked back out of the trailer together, absolutely stunned, and tried to figure out what in the heck they were going to use for fish bait without spending all of their fishing time driving back into town. (they did eventually yell a little)

Yes, they let us live, but they never let us forget it, either. Mad didn't even begin to cover it, but they couldn't help but laugh a bit in there somewhere. But it was all so worth it, because that was one of the BEST messes of fried liver 'n onions that Judy and I ever ate! So fellas, let this be a lesson. If you are planning on fishing with chicken livers, and it is fresh, unspoiled liver, you better keep it in your site or hide it well, because when you go to take it out to fish with it, it just might not be there!  

Solar Hot Water

It has been hotter than blazes here this summer! . . . . . high heat and heavy drought. It is, by far, the worst drought I have seen in my lifetime. I have been so busy with trying to keep up watering my veggie garden and keeping my farm critters comfortable, that I haven't even gotten to go camping once this summer. That is rare for me. I have gotten to go on a couple of picnics, though, and that was really nice and wonderfully enjoyable.

The intense heat of this summer seemed like it would last forever. Then we had a BIG break and we thought it was over, but, to our dismay, the heat came back, once again, with a vengeance. Nearly every day last week was well over 100°.F. One day, as I went to fill my goats' tubs of water and had to wait for the hot water to clear out of the hose, it reminded me of another interesting camping story of days past. . . . .

When I was little, that favorite campground I loved so much didn't have all the many strict rules that campgrounds have today. One rule it did not, at that time, have, was a set number of people camping in the park. There was no limit as to how many people could camp there, nor to how many people could hook up to an electric outlet or a water faucet. Even though most of us didn't have a problem camping without electricity, running water at our camp was very nice to have. So, yep, the closest, local discount store sold LOTS of y-connectors. The campground was packed with people (not bad because we all grew to know each other and became friends) and a network of hoses, branching out all over the lower end of the park with y-connectors, was a common sight. Unless you were there, you could not possibly comprehend the extent of the networking of hoses.

The area was heavy with flint rock, so the water in the hoses heated up quickly throughout the day. Most people camped in tents then (yes, the good kind of camping), and even with quite a few in trailers, the trailers weren't nearly so modern as today. Most hot water tanks were small and ran only on propane, which were also small tanks. Tent campers had to heat their water over a wood fire or camp stove..... either that or send their kids up to the bath house to the outside utility sink to fill up containers with hot water. So hot water was highly valued.

As the day began to wind down, the race amongst the campers was on! Pots and pans began to ding and rattle as all the women rushed to be the first ones finished with dinner. Why? Because there was hot water in all those hoses! Most people used the white drinking hoses, so the water was good for cooking with. Starting with already hot water saved on propane when cooking. And the first few to finish dinner got solar heated water to do their dishes with and didn't have to wait for water to heat or waste precious propane as the little hot water tanks refilled. Many never even turned on their hot water tanks in anticipation of always being the first ones done with dinner. If you were an outsider looking in, I am sure it was an hilarious sight, but it worked out very well, and inexpensively for those that were fast, leaving time to go back out on the lake for a bit after dinner settled, or play a game of horse shoes, croquet, etc. No one ever really got mad if someone beat them to the hot water for dishes. You only had yourself to blame for being too slow. But heaven help the ones that, on occasion, decided to use it to take a shower in their trailer instead of walking all the way up to the bath house!!!

Tentfire Is MY Name

Hello, all!

It has just been brought to my attention that someone else has started using MY Tentfire name and has even set up a website under that name. Sheesh! But I assure you. I AM THE ONE AND ONLY TENTFIRE, I have copyrighted the name, and have been using it for many, MANY, MANY years. Anyone else using it is doing so illegally and that will be dealt with. Yep, it seems like anytime anyone comes up with something good, someone else wants to come along and take it. Ugh!

I also want to take a moment to thank everyone that has been reading my blog and patiently waiting for my new stories. I have a temporary computer going now (until I can get my main one fixed) and have lots of new, great stories outlined and ready to post. I am looking forward to sharing them with you!

Happy Camping to you all and I WILL be back shortly. I can't wait to get back to posting my old camping stories.

HAVE A TERRIFIC DAY!!!

TENTFIRE

Forever In Our Hearts

Oh, my! It seems I have a pattern of an annual post. I really must break that pattern and get back to this blog. I have so many camping stories I want to tell, but my non-camping life seems to be taking up far too much time these days.

Today's post; however, won't be quite so happy. Today ..... we laid one of the 'old gang' to rest.

When I was barely old enough to begin grade school, we began camping at Cherokee Landing State Park. The park superintendent lived in the house at the top of the hill with his wife and six kids. I got to know most of the kids well, became very close friends with some of them (and still am to this day), spent a large part of my summer hanging out with them, and visited them during the winters. Our dads were great fishing buddies (now THERE were some story tellers for ya!), and we kids became like extended families..... like close cousins.

But very sadly ..... at just 41 years young, the youngest one of that fun and caring group of kids was laid to rest today, leaving behind two young children of his own. It was a HORRIBLE shock, and I am still numb and speechless. This was faaaarrrr from expected! It just doesn't seem real. And it was very, very strange burying someone on Memorial Day weekend.

Although I am still in regular contact with a couple of them,  it had been many, many years since I saw any of the rest of the six. Although it is really nice to get to see old friends, talk, and catch up on what they are up to these days, I find it VERY SAD that we wait for a funeral to do this.... that we wait until one of our own is gone. We are all guilty of it, but we should really make a much harder effort of staying contact with those that we care about and not put those little talks off for another day. Life changes quickly and you never know when the next day is too late.

RS, when I think of you, great memories always come to mind and a warm smile to my face. REST PEACEFULLY. You are already greatly missed and will remain forever and fondly in our hearts.

MY LIGHTNIN' BUG STORY

As a child I passionately loved Lightnin' Bugs. Well, actually that has never changed. I still do. Last summer I relived that joy as I introduced them to a couple of my nieces and nephews. Their excitement as I brought one in to them, darkened the room, and showed them my glowing hand was priceless! The next time I stopped by their house after dark they were outside chasing them and squealing with glee!
And during "peak" lightnin' bug season I like to drive about a mile out of my way when I go home to watch them in an open country hay field where there is such a concentration of them it looks like the stars in the milky way have spilled down to the ground. The city lights can't even begin to compare to the magnificent site of millions upon millions of lightnin' bugs twinkling all at once with nothing but a midnight blue sky for their backdrop. I have to pull over and stop to watch for a few minutes, spellbound by their amazing beauty.

. . . . . . Now, to step back to a bored summer night of my teenage years. My family was all camped out at our favorite campground on Tenkiller Lake. Normally, quite a few of my teenage friends were also camped out there and we kept ourselves entertained until our parents forced us to 'break it up' and go to bed by about 2am. But this one particular weekend most of my friends had other places they had to be and it was mostly just my younger brother and me at our camp. The word "bored" is not in my vocabulary. Very, VERY, rarely do I EVER get bored, and then it is only briefly (like a few seconds, to a minute or two at the most) because I seem to always manage to find, if not create, something to do. Well, on this particular night my parents were sitting in their lawn chairs in the nearby clump of persimmon trees, busy visiting with the other adult campers. I honestly don't remember what my brother was doing, probably making "roads" in the dirt for his Hot Wheels. I didn't want to sit in the stuffy little trailer where I had lots of light and it was too dark outside to work on my afghan. As I sat there a moment thinking of what to do a lightnin' bug blinked a few feet from me. As it did it 'sparked' a thought. . . . .
I jumped up and grabbed the unsuspecting bug as it blinked again. With my hand clinched securely around my catch, I quietly walked over to our little trailer, slid open that tiny metal door embedded in the center of the screen door, and let the lightnin' but go, quickly shutting the little door back!   I worked hard to keep my giggle surpressed as I repeated this process all night long! How many? I don't know. I lost count the first half hour.
It got late and everyone retreated to their own camps for bed. When several of my teenage friends were all out there, we all slept outside in a big group (each on our own cot, of course) but since it was just me and my brother, we very reluctantly had to sleep inside the trailer that night. We all went in, took our turns in the tiny little bathroom to change into our sleep clothes, then laid down to go to bed. My mom was the last one to lay down, turning the final light out. We all settled in, got comfy and was just about to drift off to sleep when......blink, blink.....blink.....blink......blink, blink, blink............ Hundreds of tiny little lights began to blink! I laid there as still as I could, pulling the blanket up over the bottom half of my face to hide my proud, satisfied grin. CINDY!!!!!!! (not my real name, of course) GET THOSE THINGS OUT OF HERE!!!!!
"But Mom, what makes you think I did it?"
"Because no one else in this family would do something like that. Now get up and get those things out of here, now!"
"But I like them. I want to watch them as I go to sleep. They're pretty."
"Well, I don't like them, now get up and get them out."
"But I'm so comfortable, can't I do it in the morning, p l e a s e?"
"No, N O W ! ! ! ! !"
Let me tell you, catching them all the second time and tossing them "out" of the trailer wasn't near as much fun.

The "TENTFIRE" Name

I was on-line one day signing up for my first "dating site." I had just lost my Round Dance partner and was looking for a new dance partner. Some friends had urged me to try looking via a dating site. Hesitantly I began to fill out the sign-up info. In no time it came to the part where I had to pick a screen name.


I thought of several screen names, but each time I checked it's 'availability' it was already taken. It would say that I could use that screen name with the next number after the name. Well. . . .I am pretty unique (which isn't always good, lol) and I wanted a unique name, one that truly represented me. I didn't want one that everyone else picked. 


So I sat there thinking. . . . What is one of my favorite things to do. . . .something that I really enjoy and makes me happy. . . . CAMPING (I had just divorced and my kids and I went camping often to "destress"). . . . . Let's see. . . .we usually like tent camping best so I will use "TENT". . . .to represent not only camping, but the style of camping I like best with my kids. 


Then I thought. . . . What do we especially like to do when we go camping? . . . When we start to set up camp, one of the first things we usually do is start gathering up wood to have ready for a big bonfire at night. My kids and I have always enjoyed relaxing, cooking over, talking and bonding by a big bonfire. And I have wonderful memories of my musical son playing his harmonica, saxaphone and guitar as we all relaxed by our bonfire. Even now the mental picture of those times gone by is still very calming. And when I was divorcing another one of my friends also was divorcing at the same time. We had become friends at the lake over 30 years ago (we won't count past that 30, lol). Our husbands had cut us off from all of our friends and we had lost contact for many, many years. A mutual friend from our old camping days got us back in touch with each other during our divorce period. We (and our families) had been close. We learned that at times we had even been pregnant simultaneously, each having one of our boys only two weeks apart! We, our kids, and several of our long-lost friends then got together often on weekends that first summer of singlehood, camped together at the campground we had all met at originally, reminisced on old times, and caught up on lost years around a HUGE campfire as our kids got to know each other. So I shortened "Bonfire" to use just "FIRE." 


And so my screen name "TENTFIRE" was born. It is a screen name that signifies the beginning of a "new life,"  holds warm thoughts of lost friends found, and fun, happy times with my kids.  Quite a few years have passed now since my screen name was born, yet still, no matter what the day may bring,  the thoughts it holds makes me smile and feel good. It signifies my "happy place."