Yet another busy week and weekend. Swimming lessons continue for the kids (Mondays and Wednesdays). Mom and Dad left for home on Tuesday, and softball returned to our losing ways (I was 2-for-4). Wednesday, we took the kids to the county fair to do some rides and see the animals. We met the Myerses there for dinner and to do the midway. It is AMAZING how quickly you can burn through a lot of money at the fair by doing not all that much. But Tuesday was 1-ticket-all-rides night, so we figured it was the best time to go. Alex even rode the big yo-yo, spinning around swing thing (lost his hat, but it almost fell right on me). Otherwise the big slide was the big hit. We went back again the next day after swimming too, but just to see the animals we'd missed the previous day. Friday we took off after I got out of work (early) to go to Indiana Beach campground; it was the Zimmer picnic weekend. First time we've gone since 2002, I think. We got there a bit before dinnertime and waited in line quite a long time to check in, then set up and made dinner, and took the kids to the water park at the campground afterwards. We tried to get a fire going to roast marshmallows, but I forgot to bring a hatchet so it didn't get started and we roasted them over some burning paper plates instead. We got the kids to bed around 9 or so and Beth remarked how relatively quiet it was there. Then it started getting interesting. There was a party of about 30 people, all related as near as we could tell, in several sites around us, all of whom were loud and all of whom were rude. They were about 50-50 adults and kids, and all the kids were literally running through all the campsites screaming at each other and banging their plastic toys togther. The adults also seemed to have no boundaries, as some of them passed directly through our campsite on the way to the bathrooms, literally under our awning, without lowering their voices all night. Plus a pit bull dog that barked at everyone going by. And the radio with rap playing. Meanwhile, the site directly next to us was empty until around 10, when the oldest, most beat-up popup camper I've ever seen was pulled in and a party of 6 adults got out and started setting up camp. I remarked to Beth "wouldn't it be great if they all sat around the fire drinking beer all night?" Well guess what. By around 11 they finished setting up, and began sitting around their campfire drinking beer...and playing country music on their radio! Again, no volume control on anyone. So we were oddly juxtaposed between the trailer park on one side and the hood on the other. If the country got turned up, the rap got turned up directly after, and vice versa. The good thing about all this was we had gotten a free night with a paid night, so we decided that if we didn't want to stay Saturday night as well, we wouldn't have lost anything. And we'd have a place to park the camper all day anyway. In the morning, it seemed we couldn't get to the park any faster than if we'd started from home, for some reason, and we weren't there until around 11. We got our free lunch, then hit the park. Water park first, since it was pretty hot. They really had a crowd problem there, though. Both the lazy river and the slides ran out of tubes for people; those who came down the slide were just picking the tube up and heading back up the stairs, and those finishing up a lazy river ride were staying on their tubes and going around again. So there was a large buildup of people wanting to get on who couldn't. Someone at the park needed to start telling people the ride was over; get off. But it wasn't happening so we just waited and waited until finally we sent one kids with one parent at a time, then switched kids. We did the rides afterwards, and Alex even rode a roller coaster (the Cornball Express...not the largest, but quite fun). We go a great photo of Alex and me riding the thing from a souvenir shop. There was also a problem on the bumper cars: Alex got to drive one himself but someone knocked his car in such a way that the pole slid off the electric grid on the cieling, and his car wouldn't move for 2/3 of the entire ride. I tried to help him out but couldn't do much. He had been so excited to do this, and it was such a disappointment, and it was late so he was very tired, so he almost had a meltdown right there. Poor kid. And Missy was nearly scared to death by the haunted house every time we went near it. We hiked back to the entrance only to find that the shuttle to the campground wasn't running any more, then hiked all the way back (the kids were just beat)and found we could ride the water taxi back there, which was fun. When we got back we packed up the camper as fast as we ever will and headed home. With all the problems we had over the trip, the park was a lot of fun.