Summer is here. Of course, this season has lost most of its special meaning now that my friends and I are all working. To us, it seems that summer is just that time of year when it's hot. To those younger than us, it's still that magical time of year when there is no school. It's also that time of year for camp. I have had two camps in my life: Camp Equinunk, the sleep-away camp where many of my famous stories took place, and Day Camp, where I worked as a counselor. By the way, Day Camp is not its real name, but since my mom works there (it's also a school), she decided to be a whiny ho and pester me until I changed the name. This article will have two parts. The first part will be about my times as a lanky teenage counselor at Day Camp, and the second part will be about my times as a young nerdy camper in Equinunk.

Being a counselor is a tiring job. The job itself isn't really tough, but controlling around 20 ritalin-deprived 10-year olds can wear even the strongest of men out. These kids were little monsters. They always fought with each other, they had no manners, they cursed a blue streak, and at least two would go to the nurse a day for doing something stupid like swallowing a handful of pebbles on a dare. Despite all of that, the kids were awesome and I liked the job, but my social life was in dire straits because of it. I didn't want to hang out with my friends - I just wanted to sleep because I was so fucking tired.

When I first started out as a counselor at Day Camp, I had to be a Counselor-in-Training (CIT) for two summers. Being a CIT was a pretty sweet deal. Although you had to watch little hellions all day, there were often CIT-only field trips to bowling, mini-golf, and the mother of all field trips, the water park known as Splish Splash. That was all very cool, but you know what sucked about being a CIT? No paycheck. None. Zilch. Nada. The only money we got were tips from kids parents on the very last day of camp. Man, was that day sweet. The campers would arrive in the morning with envelopes containing cold, hard cash. I recall just wanting to push my campers down, take their envelopes, and just go home. What was the point of watching after them anymore? I got paid. They could go jump in front of a truck for all I cared after I got my tip.

Anyway, if you're a CIT, each kid tips about $20. So if you have a group of 25, you make about $500 for the entire summer. That's IF every camper tips you. There's always the cheap $15 tipper and the worst of all, the Stiffer. Stiffers are the kids whose parents refused to tip. I don't care if the family is on welfare, I want my goddamn money. Counselors who are stiffed are incredibly scornful. They want to take out the cheapness of the Stiffer's parents on the Stiffer. This one Stiffer didn't tip any counselor one summer, so we almost threw the rotten brat into a brick wall. The lil' bastard caused trouble all summer and we worked our asses off to control him. What did we get for it? Not a dime.

So you can see that working at a day camp isn't really monetarily sound. When I was an Assistant Counselor (AC), I got a paycheck. Want to hear how much this stellar thing was? $200. A week? No, sorry. A check for $200 in the middle of July, then another on the last day of camp. That, plus tips (the average tip for an AC is raised to $30). Yeah, shitty as fuck, but I totally agree with it. If you ever worked at a day camp, it's not really much work. It's controlling a bunch of bratty kids, but many of them are cool. They're just young and stupid. I think 75% of the time I just played cards and handball with my fellow counselors. If the camp actually paid counselors a steady paycheck, we counselors would be getting away with highway robbery.

DIRTY JOKES

My first summer at Day Camp would be rough. I was a geeky 14-year old kid who had never taken care of anyone before. During orientation - a two-hour day where the campers and counselors first meet - all the kids hated me. Apparently, their CIT the summer before was the greatest CIT of all time. All they would say to me during orientation was, "Victor's cooler than you." "Victor let us do anything we wanted." "You look dumber than Victor. You probably are dumb."

The campers wouldn't let up during the first day of camp either. I needed something to earn their respect. So what did I do? I told them dirty jokes. Instantly - INSTANTLY - I earned their admiration and trust. They weren't really dirty jokes either. They were just stupid jokes that only 10-year olds and idiots like me would laugh at. One joke had to do with a woman's breasts growing so large that they explode. They were laughing all day, but I knew that if one camper told their parents about the joke, I'd be in deep shit. I said to everyone, "Remember guys, this stays at camp. You cannot tell anyone about these jokes, especially your parents. Agreed?"

"Agreed," all of my campers replied. So naturally, the very first thing they did when they got home was tell their parents the dirty jokes. The parents complained to the people in charge at Day Camp, who in turn complained to my head counselor, who in turn let me off very easy because he was cool. I never told a joke again, but it didn't matter - I was as cool as Victor. Isn't that all we want out of life? To be as cool as Victor? The campers thought I kicked so much ass, one even made me a certificate.

Damn straight

I'll admit I slipped up some summers later when a camper asked me what a douchebag was. After days of annoying me, I went, "WOMEN CLEAN THEIR VAGINAS WITH DOUCHES! A DOUCHEBAG IS WHERE ALL THE CRAP IN THEIR COOCHIES SPILL INTO! NOW SHUT UP!"

ERIC

I hate you, Eric. I hate you.

I had to get that off my chest before talking about this kid. You may think I'm a bully and a heartless prick after reading this, but I'm writing this for your enjoyment, so fuck you if you don't like it. Anyway, I worked as a counselor at Day Camp for five summers. During my final summer - after high school graduation and before freshman year at college - there was a new camper to Day Camp and he was put in my group. His name was Eric and he had … problems. The kid was autistic or had a severe case of ADD or some shit. All I know was that a head person at the camp said Eric needed "extra" attention. I'd say, "Eric, it's time to play some baseball." There would be no reaction. He'd just stand there, moving his arms around in weird ways. What weird ways? Well, it's hard to explain. You know when there's gnats flying around your head, you swat them? He would be doing that, but in slow motion. There were no gnats, mind you - he was just insane.

Let me tell you something: you don't send a kid with mental problems to a normal camp. They will not keep up and the other kids will eat him/her alive. Poor Eric was no exception to that fact. My campers would make fun of him NON-STOP. Nothing I said could prevent them from picking on this kid, and I'll admit, sometimes I didn't want to stop them. Those kids could come up with some good taunts. I know, I'm a bad person. The best is when they ran up to Eric and sang Papa Roach's Last Resort as, "Cut Eric's dick into pieces. This is my last resort." I couldn't stop laughing. I'm kind of laughing right now.

Eric would also change for the pool by getting completely naked. Now, most kids at that age have acquired a sense of shame and know that getting naked in front of other dudes ain't cool. Eric was oblivious to that fact. The first day he arrived, when the kids began changing, I heard screams from the changing room. I ran in, thinking some kid fell and cracked his motherfucking head open, when I see Eric just standing there naked. The kids were running, screaming, pointing and laughing - it was quite the scene.

"Eric," I said. "Put your bathing suit on, man. Come on, let's go."

"Errrrrr magrrrrrrrr," responded Eric. Oh, did I not mention? Eric spoke in gibberish. Usually they were these angry "grr" noises mixed in with other letters of the alphabet. It was like when a kid throws a temper tantrum, they go like, "GRRRR I hate broccoli! I don't want it! GRRR!!!" Eric spoke like that all the time. It was like trying to communicate with Lassie.

"What's that, Eric?"

"Errrr urrrrrr!"

"Trouble at the old mill? Hahaha...No seriously, get your fucking bathing suit on." Eric stood there, once again swatting invisible gnats in slow motion. That's why the kids ran. It wasn't so much that Eric was naked, but he was standing there naked for a very long time. By the time the kid decided to put on his bathing suit, everyone was already at the pool. But the fun didn't end there.

The thing about pool time was that it’s a great time for the counselors to chill out and just play cards in the shade. We don't want to work - our campers safety is now in the hands of the lifeguards. Eric would NOT go into the pool. He would be standing at the edge of the water, swatting invisible gnats in slow motion or even reach around to his back like he was trying to remove a tag from a shirt. Of course, he was not wearing a shirt. With Eric not in the pool, the fucker was still in our jurisdiction and we did not want to work. We'd all say, "Eric, hop in the pool. It's hot out. You'll like it."

Eric would run up to the edge of the pool, then back off. He would run up to it again, then back off. You could walk up to Eric, scream "GET IN THE POOL!" into his ear, and he would not react. Seriously, this kid should not have been in day camp. He really needed special care and we didn't know how to give it to him. So how did we get him into the pool? Simple. We told Eric that there was a bee near him.

Eric would scream like a little girl and jump into the pool, regardless if people were in his way. He would jump and land on top of kids swimming. Eric was DEATHLY afraid of bees. I mean it. The kid pissed himself if he saw a bee. Once he saw a harmless honeybee, so he ran to the other side of the camp, shrieking like he just saw his parents having sex. Lying to Eric about bees is the equivalent of telling someone who's afraid of flying that slight turbulence means a plane will crash (as they're on a plane). We were cruel, cruel people. It wasn't long before the campers found out about the bee thing, so every five seconds they would tell Eric a yellow jacket was about to sting him. Eric never had a moment of peace, the poor kid.

One day I actually got through to Eric. It was so fucking random, too. I was talking to some other camper about Resident Evil, when Eric runs up to us.

"Resident Evil?IloveResidentEvil!IplayResidentEvilallthetime. IhavethethirdoneandIwasplayingitwithmy brotherandthegirlinthegamegoes'grrrIamAlexiaandIwillkillyougrr.' Somybrothertriedtokillherbuthecouldn'tandshegoes 'Hahahahah'anditturnsoutshe'samanandthereisnoAlexiaand..."

It was like a dam burst open and everything was pouring out. It wasn't like he made sense, either. He was still grr-ing, only he was talking at a non-stop pace. It only vaguely resembled English. I had no idea what Eric was babbling about! I had never even played Resident Evil to begin with. I was telling the other camper about how I never played it, but Eric thought that I was a huge fan. I kept telling him to stop talking, but he wouldn't. For the rest of the day, this kid would babble on about Resident Evil. I think I told him there was a bee flying around his head and he stopped.

FAT KIDS

There are a lot of fat kids these days. There were also a lot of fat kids in the late 90's. That Eric kid I talked about before? I saw him naked when he wouldn't change in the changing room that one time, but I didn't see his junk. I couldn't. He had a belly that protruded out and blocked it, like a hungry Somalian child. Seriously, if you're the parent of a fat boy or girl, STOP FEEDING THEM! I mean it. Just stop with the food. Let them go two or three days without any nourishment. It'll make all the difference in the world.

I gave some of the fat kids nicknames. My favorite one is Jiggles. Whenever the kids had to play a sport and Jiggles would be slacking off, I would scream, "LET'S GO, JIGGLES! I WANT TO SEE CRISCO COMING OUT OF THOSE PORES!" During my group's play, I convinced him to lift up his shirt and repeatedly slap his stomach like a drum while on stage instead of performing one of the songs. This was in a packed auditorium with plenty of girls. They were laughing at him, but it was worth it because I was laughing at him, too. Other fat kid nicknames include:

Truffle Shuffle - This kid would do Chunk's famous Truffle Shuffle on command. He was great kid and he was like 5'2" at 10-years old. Truffle Shuffle is probably a star football player for his high school now.

Grimace - He often wore purple, so he resembled the famous obese McDonald's character. He was cool and was into heavy metal.

Fat Crazy Kid - This mullet-sporting heffer tried constantly to choke campers and counselors alike. He was another child that should not have been in camp as he had violent tendencies. Maybe jail would have been more suitable?

Glutton - Glutton earned his nickname because one of the Seven Deadly Sins is gluttony and this kid was a textbook definition. He wouldn't ask for food. He would demand it. Glutton would steal other kids food off their plate and eat it, leaving them crying. If he wanted something food-related and we said no, he wouldn't relent until he got it. During one of the times at the camp's tennis court, Glutton noticed a cooler filled with sports drinks and ice cream.

"I want it," said Glutton, licking his lips. To be honest, I wanted some as well. It was like 95 degrees and the open tennis court had no shade, but the tennis instructor said the contents of the cooler were gifts he bought for his staff because they spend all day on the simmering tennis court with few breaks. I totally understood. Not Glutton.

"No, I want it!"

"Sorry," I said. "It's for tennis staff only."

"No! I want ice cream!"

"Tough shit. It's not for you."

"I want the ice cream."

"No."

"Yes."

"No, goddammit! Jesus fuck, you're such a glutton!" This was the first time I ever said his nickname to his face.

"What's a glutton?"

"It's a person who's spoiled when it comes to food." Yeah, Glutton was hurt, but get this: he never ate other people's food for the rest of the summer. I set him straight.

A SOMEWHAT RACIST STORY

One summer there was this black kid in my group who I will name Ash, since he always played Pokemon. We got a note from his mother one day that read, "Ash is coming home really tired after camp. Please limit his activities. Thank you." We all got a good laugh. You're supposed to be tired after camp! It's a day filled with sports and other activities! Roy, my head counselor that summer (who was also black), says to us, "Too tired, huh? Okay Ash, you're in luck. There's a new invention called a Cotton Gin. Now you won't have to spend all day in the fields picking master's cotton." We all began dying of laughter when Roy said, "None of you can ever use that joke on your own because you're white." We all stopped laughing immediately and nodded.

DODGEBALL

I loved Dodgeball as a counselor. There is nothing better than playing campers vs. counselors Dodgeball. I would throw that red rubber ball with such velocity that if a camper dodged it, it would smack the wall and make that "PING!" sound which would echo throughout the gymnasium. The campers didn't care if they got hit by the dodgeball either. I'm amazed because being on the receiving end of a dodgeball - especially a dodgeball thrown by an older kid - hurts like a bitch. I know from experience, which is an experience I'll talk about in part two.

Some kids wouldn't accept being "out" in Dodgeball. You MUST respect the rules of Dodgeball. I don't even care if you're Superman. If I'm playing Superman in Dodgeball and I manage to get him out, he damn fucking better leave the court. If he doesn't, I'm throwing down. I don't give a shit if he is powered by Earth's yellow sun and he could smash me into powder - I'll take him on. Anyway, if there was a kid who refused to leave the court, every counselor would aim for him. Usually this pissed the kid off even more and he would cross the line in an attempt to attack us.

Whoa. Crossing the line in Dodgeball when you're already out is to me what taking a shit on the Quran is to an Islamic extremist. But the kid is in even more trouble because now he's in point blank range of our dodgeballs. Then the kid would pull a dick move, like standing still with his arms crossed as he's being pummeled saying, "Big deal. It doesn't hurt that much. It's just a dodgeball." Then some counselor would slip and a dodgeball would collide into the kid's head at 100 mph. The kid cries and that's how it ends. It's how it always ends.

That's the end of part 1. Stay tuned for part 2, coming in about two weeks! Or whenever! I don't care.

Questions? Comments? IplayResidentEvilallthetime. IhavethethirdoneandIwasplayingitwithmybrotherandthegirlinthegamegoes 'grrrIamAlexiaandIwillkillyougrr? E-mail Fishman347@yahoo.com