Written by: Kristine at Gun Safety Innovations & the Outdoor Bloggers Summit

When Jody asked for guest bloggers she mentioned that if you wrote a guest post while she was away you would be required to write something funny. Now, writing humor is not my forté but I did promise Jody a guest post and I like to keep my promises. So, I guess I’ll tell you the story of perhaps the most embarrassing and, at least years later, funny thing that ever happened to me in the woods.

Several years ago I convinced my Dad to take me fishing. If you fish with Dad, you generally hit the water before even the fish are awake. Given that it was a cool morning and I was still slightly sleepy, I had brought along the biggest cup of hot chocolate available, and I was drinking it at a fairly steady clip. At this point it hadn’t yet occurred to me that drinking all this liquid would require a bathroom break at some point. Finally, nature called and I had to ask Dad where the bathrooms were. His response was not terribly pleasing. He would pull up to shore and I could go off into the woods, out of sight of the river, to take care of business. He clearly didn’t see any problem with this plan.

Now, what you have to understand here is that there is no way that a woman can go to the bathroom in the woods without getting at least a little bit undressed. Given that I didn’t want to be flashing other boaters on the river, once Dad pulled over to the bank and I headed off to find some privacy, I went way back into the woods. Things went pretty smoothly, or as smoothly as a bathroom break in the woods can go, until I started back to the boat. The problem was I had no idea where the boat might be

The space between the bank of the river and the woods where I had gone was covered with grasses which were taller than me in some places. I got out of the woods o.k., but the tall grass defeated me. My Dad told me later he could see the grasses swaying as I blundered around like a wounded elephant. His first thought was to come get me himself, but he also thought I might not appreciate how hard he was laughing. So, he did the next best thing and sent Gus the dog to find me.

There I am blundering through the grass, getting more and more concerned as the boat, or even the river’s edge, fails to appear. Suddenly, I hear something else crashing through the grass and it’s coming toward me. Is it a bear? A mountain lion? A psycho killer who will drag me off to his cave?

As it turned out, much to my relief, the thing crashing through the grass was Gus the dog. Once he found me, he gave me a look that conveyed the idea that he pretty much thought most humans were dorks, and then turned and started back toward the boat. I followed along behind and soon was safely reunited with the boat and my Dad. To his credit, Dad only chuckled a few times.

That was the first, and the last, time I ever took a bathroom break in the woods.