AD Sunshine VS. The Desert (0-2)

Happy New Year ya'll (as Britney would say).

As you read in my previous post, we scrambled to come up with plan B and it actually turned out quite nice. We ended up in the desert in Sweihan, at a farmer's old shack with a nice big tent out in the field. We drank drank drank way more than we should have before midnight, with me and my friend M even treating my brother and others to some quite amusing dancing involving a poll holding up a tent. Good fun. Midnight came around, and then people started dropping like flies, falling asleep in the tent, which was initially meant to be the party area. Oh well...some late-nighters, including yours truly, hung around by the bbq outside, having leftover food and sharing swigs out of the Johnny Walker bottle.

Good old Johnny, he kept me warm until about 4 am when I decided I'd hit the sack. I set up my sleeping bag in the tent and there began my battle with the desert. Although I live in the desert, I can quite honestly say I am not a desert kinda gal. I love camping, when it involves an island and my beloved ocean. But camping in the desert proved to be quite a nasty experience the first time around (in 96, when I got so bloody cold at night I started hallucinating and seeing camels walk by right in front of me...hmm, no I was not drunk.)

So this time as I said, I set up my sleeping bag and snuggled in with a pair of jeans, socks, 2 sweaters and a scarf around me. I was still cold. I pulled open another sleeping bag and covered myself, and still, I was shivering. I figured I'd go into one of the rooms in the old shack and put a wool blanket over me. My legs were still jerking uncontrollably. I've always heard that some kinds of cold weather you can feel in your bones, and this was exactly it. My bones were frozen, nothing would keep me warm. I asked my bro to hang out with me for a while, hoping the conversation would make me forget my frozen state, but it was just getting worse. We woke my sis up and decided to head home at 5 am with our friend Z. By then I was wearing my brother's bomber jacket and had a sleeping bag on my legs in the heated car, and only then did I begin to warm up. I passed out in the car and ended up home, showered and in my bed by 7 am.

Not exactly the new year's eve I had planned for...but oh well!

All this to say, the desert = never again. I had said that 10 years ago, and I say it again today. NO MORE!

I am an island girl, don't make me sleep in the midst of dunes under (gorgeous, I have to admit) starry skies.

What did ya'll end up doing? (don't ask, I've had Britney's "ya'll" in my head all day.)