i woke up early, a little after ern. she's running 10miles in napa for her marathon training (donatedonatedonate). I showered then scrambled over to parents and picked up camping gear. derek and liz are having their first anniversary campout at lake mendocino this weekend so we needed supplies. after i raided their gear, i picked up the necessary sundires, then headed home and packed up for 2 days. i was just settling down for a nap to slow my headache when ern got home, so we finished getting things ready and headed out the door a short while later. the drive to lake mendocino was nice and short. despite leaving later due to ern's running and packing, we managed to get there around the same time as everyone else. after we set up our camp, we all headed down to the lake for gasoline and beer fueled fun. derek had his 2 jet skis (550cc & 650cc) and sadie brought her dad's powerboat. we went out and had a lot of fun tubing around then jet skiiing, but i have some massive bruises and my whole body is sore now. all of my non-computer muscles got used pretty hard, but it's a good kind of sore.
After water fun, it started to get dark so we all began cooking dinner and drinking beer. derek brought 1 keg of pbr and 2 pony kegs; coastal fog amber ale and some pear cider. after the community dinner we had a good time drinking, playing games and talking while batting at the bugs. the pbr i had been drinking all afternoon wasnt settling so well so i switched to water. between the sun and the fun i sweated out any buzz i would have had so i was sober for the day, despite the sheer volume of alcohol that was available in addition to the kegs. ern got tired around 10:30 or 11, so i put her to bed. i was tired and sore and thought i'd sit up a minute and talk with the remaining fire group, but instead i wandered down to the beach where the majority of people were "listening" to neil give a stargazing guide. the astronomy lesson was neat despite the interruptions, which neil was a good sport about, so i stayed down at the beach for an hour or two. once interested had fully waned, we all wandered back up to the fire. more of the group splintered off and it ended up being myself, brook, janeen, ryan (asleep in a chair), jay, neil, caitlin and kendra around the fire. did i mention 20 + people were there? we talked until the wee hours, brook and janeen had some interesting, illuminating things to say and jay and neil had plenty of stories to tell. eventually, i got too tired to stay up so i wandered my way towards the tent. i didnt have an instrument of time with me, so i can only assume it was really effin' late. kendra, neil, brook and jay stayed up and talked the fire dead. ern woke up to let me know that my side of the air mattress was flat. this wasnt a problem though, as we had brought 5 of them, and pumped up three. i swapped in a good one and we talked for a while after that, until we both fell asleep.