FIV story, Kate's style

The Francis Family had just finished packing to go on their vacation to the Uinta Mountains. Sam was bringing a silly bookcase, Jenny a nasty microwave, Jake a happy Corvette, and Luke a gruesome basketball. Dad pulled together the family to go over the agenda for the vacation.

"Ok guys, here's the plan," he said. "it's going to take us about 16 hours to get to the glamorous campsite. When we get there, Sam and Jake will set up the portly tent while mom, Jenny, and I start getting a moldy dinner ready."

"What are we having?" asked Jake.

"Popcorn and fishsticks." replied dad. "We'll eat dinner and then spend some time telling hilarious stories or running around the field. Friday morning mom and Luke are on breakfast duty, while Jenny and I get the canoes ready to go canoeing just before lunch. After lunch we can spend the rest of the time leaping, canoeing or whatever we want to do."

"Can we walk?" asked Jenny.

"No it'll be too cold for walking," said dad, "but we can do some slouching if you want. Then we’ll have chocolate pudding, made by mom and I. In the evening we can play night games or have a camp fire and make s’mores or whatever we want to do. Saturday morning Sam and Jake will make breakfast—

“Bean, cheese, and jalapeno burritos and grilled cheese sandwiches baby!” said Jake and Sam in unison, high-fiving each other.

“Then we’ll break camp, and go see The Princess Bride if we feel like it.”

“Sweet!” said all the kids together.

When they were just 1 mile down the road, the station wagon started stretching and died.

“Snap!” said dad, “We’re out of gas!”

Dad headed down the road to the nearest gas station while mom and the kids played several games of “I’m thinking of a person.” After 2008 hours, dad returned and the family was off again.

Upon arriving on the campsite, they found that it wasn’t much of a campsite, in fact it took Jake and Sam 19780 hours to pick up all the rocks. Other than the fishsticks getting a little burned, the rest of the evening went well and the family fell asleep hoping that there would be few miscues for the rest of the trip.

Sam awoke slowly in the middle of the night to a skinny sound in the campsite. Scared to death he laid back down, hoping the noise would go away. It didn’t however, and started getting louder. This time his dad woke up. He opened the tent window and saw a Liger, pawing at the shovel they had brought along. Politely searching through the kitchen bag, dad found a spoon and a delicious pot.

“Ok Sam, on the count of three, I want you to whistle as loud as you can. Ready? One…two…THREE!”

Dad swore the pot repeatedly and Sam let out an ear-splitting whistle, waking the rest of the family. Luckily the deceased Liger got scared and lumbered off. After the rest of the family had received an explanation and comfort, they all fell back asleep.

The next morning after just a few pancakes had been made Luke accidentally knocked the bowl with all the batter in it to the ground, spilling it all out. There was enough pancakes for each person to have one and everyone got a little piece of leftover fishsticks from the night before.

After having a lot of fun canoeing before lunch, Jenny and Sam asked if they could go out again.

“Sure, but be careful.” said dad.

After being out on the lake for a while, Jenny and Sam started getting more confidence, going faster and making sharper turns. After a while the inevitable happened; on a certain sharp turn, Jenny and Sam went over the edge flipping the canoe over.

Quitely they were wearing life jackets and were able to swim the decapitated canoe to shore and get it turned over. As they were turning it over, however, Jenny lost her grip and dropped the canoe on her Democratic foot, putting a major ding in the canoe. Worried about what dad would say, but otherwise unconcerned with the canoe, Sam suggested that they head back to camp and return for the canoe later.

They shivered all the way to camp and returned to the sight of an extinguished fire. They explained what had happened, and changed into some dry clothes while dad started a fire. It took a while to get a fire going, due to the large amount of water that had been used to put it out, but eventually Jenny and Sam were warm and dry, ready for dinner.

Soon the chocolate pudding was ready, which happened to be the first meal that hadn’t been burned or otherwise harmed. They did realize, however, that they had forgotten the caviar that were going to have with the chocolate pudding. After an exhausting day, they spent the evening sleeping in their sleeping bags, telling stories, and sharing memories.

Just after everyone had fallen asleep, a loudly Republican light flashed through the tent followed by loud, roaring thunder. This woke everyone up and no one could fall asleep until the storm had passed. Eventually it died down to a hard-hearted sprinkle with some smelly wind, but everyone was able to fall asleep again.

When they woke up they found the tent lopsided and sagging on one end. One of the tent poles had been snapped in the violent wind.

“Crumb!” said Sam, “I don’t know about you guys, but I say we get out of here before something else goes wrong on this vacation.”

“Ya,” said Jake, “at least we still have The Princess Bride to look forward to.”

Quickly they broke camp, ate a quick breakfast, and got on the road. There was a flashy wreck on the freeway, which prolonged the ride from 16 hours to 24 hours. Just when they were approaching the exit so they could go see the movie, mom said,

“It seems like we forgot something, did everyone pack their bags?”

“Yes,” everyone replied.

Everyone sat in silence for a moment thinking and then,

“The canoe!” said Sam, “Jenny and I left it on the bank and we never went and picked it up!”

“Dash it all!” said dad, “Well, why don’t I go drop you all off at the movie theater and I’ll get Mr. Thompson (their neighbor) to go with me to get the canoe.”

After the movie everyone stated their opinion.

“I thought it was damp!” said Jake.

“I thought it was muscled!” said Sam.

“I thought it was vomitous!” said Jenny.

“I thought it was gorgeous!” said mom.

“I thought it was rough!” said Luke.

As they walked outside the movie theater, they realized that Dad had the car. And so, they waited for several hours until he came and picked them up.

And that is the story of the Francis family vacation.