Our Great Nation's Country

Our great nation’s country is celebrating yet another year of awesome. I love birthday parties, but I love them even more when it’s for America. It’s the one day out of the year everyone in this great land can say, “High-five buddy, you’re a winner”. It’s the one time a year where we might forget our entitlements and first world problems and just get together to have a good time. It’s a SPECIAL day where the bombs literally burst in the air (aka FIREWORKS, see what I did there?) and people try to out-do each other’s patriotism (RED, WHITE, AND AWESOME). I feel that. I resonate with that. I love that.  I am that. America and neon have no bounds to me; I see it and I MUST have it. If I found out you have neither, prepared to be surprise GIFTED and you’re welcome in advance. You needed those things and I will do my duty as a patriot to supply my good friends and fellow humans with our commonalities of bright, obnoxious, and safe colors with that of our great country’s nation because if that’s all we have… then I’m proud of the bonds that mend us all together. In which case, here is a middle-10 list of all things that are Americanly awesome (because the top 10 list is just too intense to talk about).

 The Top 10 Middle List of Americanly Awesome Things

*can also be found on the top 10 list of all things that are Americanly awesome.

1. Bacon. #duh #obvi #number1datingcriteria. It's like hydrate or die....just different.**

2. Channing Tatum: He and his abs get more awesome every day and he loves America*

(and this is LITERALLY my favorite part of this entire movie...that and you know when he's dancing...in sweatpants, and looking like he's about to propose to me any second...nbd)

3.  Starbucks…..EVERYWHERE: There have got to be more Starbucks’ than there are Walmarts. You can’t put a Walmart across from another Walmart unless one of those Walmarts is actually a neighborhood Market…then it’s totally ok. BUT you can put a Starbucks across from another Starbucks AND you can put yet another Starbucks inside of a Target or something fancy like that  across from another Starbucks (obviously you can’t put a Starbucks inside of a Walmart….haha that’s just silly). #drivethroughs #theyhavenewcupsthatfitanENTIREBOTTLEOFWINE.

4. The Backstreet Boys: ARE STILL PERFORMING AS IF THEY NEVER BROKE UP, AS IF THE 90’s and EARLY 2000’s NEVER LET THEM GO, AS IF THEY WERE ALWAYS COOL. #theywere #IstillloveN’Sync

5. OREOS: Birthday Cake and Peanut Butter had babies with Oreos and their new bundles of joy are AMAZING. I’M NOT KIDDING. CRACK. #mine. #AmericaEFFFFFYeah

6. Jimmy Johns: no explanation needed *
 

7. Commercials that have the same characters in them all the time so we can start to develop a relationship with them in our minds: M&M’s, Progressive’s Flo, the Most Interesting Man in the World, The Haverty Couch Couple, the Gieco Gecko, the All State “Are you In good Hands?" Guy,  Beer(duh), sexy people in perfume/cologne ads; it doesn’t matter if they aren’t the same they are all stupid attractive and literally make me feel like “YES, if I smell like that, I. WILL. Be like that.” #somanysmellssolittletime 

8.  Beer, Wine, and MUSIC FESTIVALS: Americans love Festivals like they love America itself. ANY excuse to FEST up our lives is just another excuse to have THE MOST FUN.*

9. Snap Chat: When used responsibly, it’s totally on the middle-10 list….I can’t stop snapping. 

10. 7/11 Free Slurpee Day: THIS IS JUST A FRIENDLY REMINDER THAT THIS SHIT IS RIGHT AROUND THE CORNER. You’re welcome.#THISisMYAmerica

So make good choices and stuff and keep being American....it looks good on you.

Dear Disney....You're Doing it Wrong.

Dear Disney, you’re doing it wrong. 

In 1998 you showed the world what summer as an adolescent could be like. You showed us that puberty is best discovered and tamed within 2 months of confined cabins with severely outnumbered and under-qualified counselors. In 1998, you chose to choose and entered the theme song that I promise anyone who has heard it would not forget it:

BUG JUICE. It was on par with Zenon: Girl of the 21^st Century, Brink!, and Smart House. You gave us three summer camp filled seasons and then……nothing. I WAS A SUMMER CAMP fiend. My favorite movie of all time: Heavy Weights. MTV’S true life: FAT CAMP, I VHS-ed that shit. The Parent Trap: I know every word. SALUTE YOUR SHORTS, don’t make me start singing. DISNEY- you are doing it wrong. EVERY summer camp experience caught on film, whether planned or not, has a gravitational pull like bugs to the pretty purple zapping light of death. YOU NEED to get your shit together and probably bring Bug Juice back. It was your greatest mistake cancelling it. I get it- I have NO idea what kids these days are interested in- but I’ll tell you what, you tore my heart out. Summer CAMP is what brought out my extroverted tendencies, it’s where I had the MOST fun during the summer and would do everything I could to go back for more weeks of awesome. So in lieu of my summer camp deprivation, you gave me a piece of what I was missing.  

 

I’m not going to lie, I still look at summer camp jobs as a 20-something. My shit is like 86.3% together at this point but I’m on the verge of needing a new direction. Summer Camp just feels right. Maybe I should go back to school AGAIN and just go the teacher route and THEN spend my summers as a camp director. That could be on point or a huge mistake that says “bye bye ambition” (NOT that teachers don’t’ have ambition, it’s just not in alignment with my personal career goals aka mah teacher friends are AMAZEBALLS). WHAT I’m saying is, Disney, you’ve done so many things right but I just can’t forgive you for this. I can only watch Heavy Weights so many times….just kidding,  I can watch it todos los dias (that means all of the days in Spanish…you’re welcome).

But what it all comes down to is that YOUTHS of today are missing this. They don’t even KNOW what they are missing!

 

HELP the summer camp economy; help the YOUTHS leave their cell phones behind, HELP the YOUTHS forego childhood obesity and GET THE HELL outside. HELP THEM to help you…this is how this would go:

Step 1: Kids go to summer camp

 

Step 2: Kids have revelations about their experiences: 

Step 3: Kids learn about love:

Step 4: Kids learn about conflict 

Step 5: Kids go home and miss summer camp 

Step 6: Kids are too old to go to summer camp

Step 7: NOTHING. YOU’RE WELCOME.

LIFE LESSONS HERE PEOPLE. LOVE, LIFE, CONFLICT MEDIATION. SUMMER CAMP is like pre-freshman year at college without the booze and with a little more guidance….unless you’re a junior camp counselor. We need to stay away from the Jr. Camp Counselors….too old to be at summer camp, too young to be a boss. 

AND IN CONCLUSION, bug juice doesn’t come in a jar, we hold Camp Anawana in our hearts, you might find your identical twin sister in the next cabin over, and lunch is usually cancelled due to lack of hustle and it’s important that we deal with it. SERIOUSLY, DO IT better Disney: bring back televised summer camp, HELP THE YOUTHS, and make good choices and stuff. HLOCK out *Mic drops*.