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Tuesday, June 30, 1998
At about 8:30 tonight Frank (my friend) and his family picked me up from my house and we set up two tents: One for the boys and one for the girls. I also paid $75 for the week and got my arm band. After this was done, we went back home for the night.
Wednesday
This morning, I woke up and checked my e-mail for the last time and I watched a Veggie Tale online at http://citv.com/veggietales/ in RealAudio format. It was the "Where's God when I'm scared?" tape. It was really funny, but I don't think anyone really wants to know about it. At about 11:45 a.m., I got on my bicycle and rode out to Cornerstone. On my way, a friend from Bushnell offered me a ride in his truck, but I refused in order to enjoy the nice bike ride. When I got there, there was a lot of traffic, and I passed by the people that offered me the ride. I rode over to our tent and locked the bike to it. My combination is 256, I only locked it because my parents made me. After that, I stumbled over to main stage not really knowing how to get there. I watched the last half of the opening ceremony. After that, I went walking around. I saw a few pepsi machines in front of what I later learned was the exhibition tent. I put two quarters into the Pepsi machine, and they both fell out. I walked over to a Coca-Cola machine, put in two quarters and pressed the Cherry Coke button. Presto! Nothing happened. I pressed Coin Return and nothing happened. I looked around and saw that the machine was not plugged in, and there was no electrical outlet in sight. There was few people working in there, and one of them explained to me that there was no power in that tent, and the power to the tent had been out since Monday, when the tent was blown over in the storm. I decided to wait for the electrical crew to finish up and get my Cherry Coke, because I really didn't have too much spending money ($3 per day). I waited by the machine for 3½ hours (patient, huh?). When the power was finished and turned on, I gladly assisted in plugging in the machine. Now is the moment I've been waiting for. People have been putting money into the machine and losing it there for two days now. I won't go thirsty again for a week. When I walked over to push the Cherry Coke button, nothing happened. The machine took my money. I waited 3½ hours for nothing more than a few conversations. I decided to just put in another 50¢, and get a Cherry Coke. It was 4:30, so I decided to go back to the tent (I was supposed to meet Frank's family there at 2:00!). When I got there, Terry Broady (Age 40) the preacher at the Bushnell Christian Church, Marcia (age ommitted) his wife, Becky (Age 14), Frank (Age 16) and Catherine Broady (Age 4) were there, but Julie Broady (Age 16) will be at camp until Friday. They had just arrived. They brought with them two citronella candles to get rid of the insects. Terry and Marcia left, because they weren't camping. Me, Frank, and Becky had to stay in a group until Becky found her friends Michelle, Chris, and Seth. We walked around for a long time, and we finally found their camp site. They weren't there. They had gone back to Bushnell to ask where our camp site was. After a couple hours of walking, they finally showed up. Frank and I headed over to Main Stage to see Three Crosses. On our way to the stage, we started talking to a guy whose tent was along the way. His name was Jerry. He's a youth minister from around Chicago and he has a four year old granddaughter named Destiny. Destiny was cute. She refused to talk to Frank, but she said hi to me. Jerry was talking to two of his friends who came along, Mark and Bob. We saw Jerry there almost every night of the week. Then we finally made it to the stage. Their music was great. After their performance was over, Frank went over to get their autographs. Unfortunately, he had nothing to be autographed. He pulled out his drivers permit and had them sign it! That's definitely unique. We didn't show up at the main stage again until about 10:00, so we didn't miss any of Third Day. Third Day was great too. After their band played, we were really tired and we went to the tent to rest for a while. We didn't leave the tent. Overall, I had 4 cans of Mug Root Beer and a can of Cherry Coke.
Thursday
The next morning, Frank & Becky were supposed to be at the gate by 10:00, so their parents could take them home for a while. I woke up at 7:00 in the morning, got out of the tent and got on my bike. I rode my bike back to Bushnell. When I got home, I took a shower. Then I cleaned my mouse's cage. I have a mouse, because when I took Zoology last year we were required to bring in a small animal and take care of it. After I cleaned his cage, I had some lunch. A barbeque beef sandwich, macaroni & cheese, and a Diet Dew. When I was done eating, I got back on my bike and went back towards Cornerstone. About a ½ mile before I turned to the entrance, the Broady family passed by me in their van. I was supposed to meet Frank at the tent at 2:00. I sat outside my tent during most of the time talking to my neighbor campers. About every ½ hour I went back and got something to drink. One of these times, I stopped at an ice cream stand and bought a Strawberry Chill. If any of you people reading this page go to Cornerstone next year, buy one of these. They are really good. At about 1:00 p.m., I went to the Hy-Vee tent and bought a Fruitopia, which I located by plunging my entire arms into the ice (it felt really good). I also wanted to stick my head in the ice, which one of the employees said they did yesterday. The Fruitopia I chose was Strawberry Passion Awareness. When Frank showed up at about 2:30, I was asked if I wanted to work Friday. I was offered a 3 hr. job working at one of the ice cream stands that I was supposed to work at last year, which was cancelled due to unforseen melting problems. I gladly accepted the job. After that, we went swimming. While swimming, there was some guy who blew his shirt into a bubble and was taunting and yelling at everyone in a really humorous way. He told someone to go and make a little kid cry. While I was swimming around, I noticed a t-shirt that said "Body piercing saved my life". I didn't have a clue what that meant until I saw the back that had a picture of two pierced hands. I had never seen that perspective before! We left the lake at about 5:00 to change and get ready to go to main stage. We went to the tent, and Becky had just finished staying quiet for 20 minutes against a dare that was proposed because of her blatant inability to shut up. I have a similar inability but said that I could go for an entire hour!!! Laughter rang through the land. I started my timer and shut up. I made my way through the time using sign language and writing. There was horrible singing in an attempt to get me to say something. I said nothing for the entire hour. Terry and Marcia arrived during the last 10 minutes of my reign of silence. I said nothing. Right when my timer hit one hour I started talking. Soon, Frank and I made our way to the main stage. On the way there, I overheard someone yell "Where's my pot?", and I immediately assumed that there was a drug problem. Then I heard "I haven't had a chance to clean it yet". Obviously the conversation was about a metal pot rather than the drug. When we made it to the main stage, The Electrics were just starting. They had pretty cool accents. I like music played by any group where the members have accents. After their group finished playing, Frank and I decided to go down the hill, closer to the stage to see The Waiting and Sixpence None the Richer. I liked this music too, but of course I liked all the music I heard at Cornerstone! After the last two stage performances, we went to the Pepsi machine outside the nearby showers. I got gasp! A MUG ROOT BEER!!!! We sat down in front of the ice machines, because we were tired from standing up 4 hrs. straight. Somebody walked up to us and said "Three bags of ice, please". The sign on the ice machine said it was closed, and there were locks on the machine. I didn't want to insult them, but it was.......I told them that I didn't work the machine, and the machines were locked. After that, we walked around until about 2:00 a.m. There weren't any bands that I was interested in too much, so we sort of floated around the entire grounds. I had to fall asleep fast, so I could wake up to work at 9:00 the next day.
Friday
We took down the tents this morning because there was supposed to be a big storm today. I was supposed to meet the person in charge of the ice cream stands at her trailer at 8:45 for instruction. I took my bike to a tree near the entrance to lock it there. The chain to the lock didn't quite fit around the bottom of the trunk, so I had to lift the bike off the ground and lock it in the air. Until Sunday afternoon, my bike continued to levitate there. It was almost 8:45, and I didn't know where the trailer was. Becky and Seth had already started walking there. Michelle, who wasn't working, had to take me there, because I didn't have a clue where it was after Terry's good but not so good directions. When I got there, a money-holding apron was handed to me, and I couldn't tie it. It was one of my first experiences with an apron. Enough about the apron, we were taken to the stand that was nearest to the exhibition tent, because it was best stocked, and control over that stand was given to Becky. The freezers were filled with ice cream and dry ice. There was bottled water for $1.50 in a bin beside the freezers. She explained the best way to organize the money and that we could help ourselves to the ice cream (watch out!!). I was taken to my location, where the water costs one dollar and I didn't need any quarters because there was nothing for sale that didn't cost an even dollar amount. During the three hours that I worked, I had two bottled waters, a drumstick, a Nestle Tandem (very good), and a rainbow push-up. Also, a nice man with a bicycle offered to ride over to the pizza hut tent and pick up my order of one pepperoni pizza and breadsticks. The breadsticks came with a ranch dressing, which I didn't think would be good, but I was surprised. Those were the best breadsticks that I ever had. At almost noon, Terry came up to me with a message from my parents. My parents were going to be gone the rest of the Fourth of July Weekend. They were going to Mark Twain Lake in Missouri. They wanted to see me before they left, so I walked over to the stand where Becky was working. I held her Strawberry Chill (which are really good, you should try one!). Then, Terry came back, and we all walked to the stand where Seth was working. He also had a fruit Chill (I think it was lemon, but I'm not sure. After a phone call, I found out that it was Strawberry). I forgot what happened next, but after that, we went to Terry's van to go back to Bushnell. We also gave Andrew and Kate, two people from the band Ivy League, a ride to Bushnell. I was dropped off at my house, but the rest went to the Broadys' House. While at home, I talked about my experience so far, and said goodbye. When they left, I finally showered and ate some more food. I had to wait a couple of hours for my ride back to Cornerstone. During this time, I learned how, by ear, to play the Star-Spangled Banner and the elusive "Pine Trees" song (A camp song derived from 'Blessed be the tie that binds') on an organ. Then, my ride back to Cornerstone. I vowed yesterday that I would get some cheese fries. I started my journey from near the lake. When I was walking uphill on a dirt road, it started to rain. It wasn't too bad. I finally got to the food area and bought my cheese covered french fries. There wasn't enough cheese. It started to rain much, much heavier. We took shelter under the Pizza Hut tent until I finished my fries. After that, I went to Dairy Queen and got a cookie dough blizzard. I wanted mint M&M, but they were out of mint flavoring for the ice cream. I went to Hy-Vee to take refuge from the drumming rain. The inside of the tent wasn't much better. There were puddles everywhere, and the best place to stand was in the mud. That blizzard made me thirsty. I ran outside to dispose of my cup, spoon, and soggy napkin. When I went back in the tent, I headed straight for the Fruitopia. I've been hooked on Fruitopia for about a week now. If only Becky didn't let me try Fruit Integration last weekend when we went to Champaign....Eventually, I probably would have tried it somewhere else anyway. I got Tremendously Tangerine. It was good. We listened to the speaker in the Cornerstone Magazine tent, while I drank my fruitopia. Unfortunately, I had to stay longer than I wanted to. The woman sitting at the table next to me wanted to get some food and asked me to watch her stuff. About 20 minutes later, she came back with Pizza Hut food and Frank and I left the tent. We walked over to the exhibition tent and looked around. I saw an interactive touch-screen computer display about a group called Wycliffe (or something like that). They did work with Bible translation and all that stuff. Someone from the area gave me a book about it. At about 6:00 we started walking toward the main stage. We didn't want to miss Deliriou5?, Five iron Frenzy, or M.C. Hammer. During our trip, we saw several people sliding down the dirt road, which was now mud because of the earlier downpour, which had now stopped. All the people had matching shirts and skin colors. All of them were dressed in garments that were now perfectly mud-tinted. When we got to the stage, I could see that people had been sliding down the hill there, because there was no grass to be seen on that corner. The entire area around the stage was really muddy. I don't know anything about Deliriou5? except that they have accents, but they played first. After that, was Five Iron Frenzy. At about 9:00 a friendly body surfer accidentally hit me in the face. My lip was cut, and it started to bleed. This would be a great time for none other than Mug Root Beer. When I was getting my root beer, I noticed that it was very hard to determine the original color of my shoes because of the mud. When I was finished with that I went back down the hill and stood a nice, safe distance from the crowd. When it was time for M.C. Hammer, I walked up toward the middle of the crowd. "Brian Lobotomy needs to keep an open mind" was one of the important announcements made during the boring interlude before Hammer. Frank reminded me that at 12:00, we had to meet Terry at the entrance, but he thought Terry was staying for the M.C. Hammer concert, so we decided we should go after the concert was over. The entire crowd remained occupied playing with inflatable balls and carrying people around. About 45 minutes later, it was announced that M.C. Hammer was here, but the bus with the choir and a few other vital things were still on their way through the roads - very carefully. During this wait, someone pointed and yelled "bus!", but the person was mistaken. Someone standing near me pointed and yelled "Golf Cart!", and they were right, I saw a golf cart! Of course, the golf cart had no importance at all. When the bus finally arrived, people were chanting: Bus, Bus, Bus, Bus....Lots of cheering and stuff too. He started with a song called "Raise the Roof" (maybe it wasn't called that, I have trouble hearing things sometimes). His music was fast, sounded good, and I even danced, which is something that I just don't do. During one of his last songs, he got down off the stage and started walking through the crowd. I bet the security people got really mad (In case you didn't know, one of the security people, Mike, had a birthday Wednesday and is 51 years old now). He ended the concert with the same song he started with. After it was over, Frank and I hurried to the entrance, but Terry was nowhere to be found. We walked up and down the main street, where we saw Becky, who said she saw him at the entrance at 12:00 (Now is about the time we realized Terry didn't see M.C. Hammer after all). We walked back to the entrance to find Terry, which this time he was there. We got in the van, and went to Bushnell (Right now, it's about 2:00). I was dropped off at home, and I needed to call, when I needed a ride back to their house (If you didn't forget, we took down our tents in preparation for the storm). I had some food, and gave our dog some food. After I was done, I called and got a ride back to their house. Once there, I stayed up until at least 3:00 talking.
Saturday
I woke up today at an early time and walked home to shower and eat. I ate two hot dogs, macaroni and cheese, Pepsi, and a Diet Dew. I got back to Cornerstone at about 3:00. We set up the tents just for the afternoon so we could keep stuff there. For some reason that I couldn't remember, Frank wasn't there yet. I walked around with Julie, Doug, and Jacquie. Walking toward the food area, I bought a can of Mug Root Beer!!! Julie bought something to eat, and that made me hungry, so I went to pizza hut and bought breadsticks. Then, I went to Dairy Queen and ordered a Mint Cookie Dough Blizzard (Nobody had ever ordered that before, according to the guy working there). I got my Blizzard at about 4:28. I also bought another Fruitopia. We had to meet Terry and Marcia at 4:30 between the New Band Stage and the Exhibition tent. When we got there, they hadn't showed up yet, so Doug, Julie, Becky, and Seth all went to get something to eat. Doug came back with nachos. After we met them, we went back to our tent, and everybody except me changed to swim. I left my swim stuff in the back of the van. I decided to swim anyway and get my clothes wet. Doug and I are the only ones that actually swam. He had trouble keeping level in deep water. He bobbed up and down, but didn't get his contacts wet though. At about 5:30 we got out of the water and walked back to the tent. There, everyone except me changed clothes again. I was still wet. At about 6:40 Frank finally arrived at the tent. We walked to the Main Stage. This time, we decided to sit down. We sat down on the side of the hill. After Plankeye finished their music, we decided that sitting was too boring. Before Grammatrain started, we went down closer to the stage to stand. One of the people standing in front of me turned around. It was my friend Casey, from Quincy, IL. I met him last year at camp, and I hadn't seen him since then. After Grammatrain, we were both called by nature, and when we emerged, someone holding a tarp asked us to help. I grabbed part of the tarp, and so did Frank. We then asked for someone to lay on the tarp. We threw them up in the air. We continued this "tarp toss" until the end of Supertones. The skin on my knuckles was almost all rubbed off from the activity. When the Supertones were almost done, they started, with audience participation, to sing slower songs. After that, was a powerful speech by a band member. We ended the night on the ground praying. As we walked away from the stage, I had a lot of time to reflect on what had happened over the entire week. It was almost all over. We went to the machines by the nearby showers, but there was no Mug Root Beer. The machine was sold out!! I was determined to get my Mug, so we ran to the machines outside the exhibition tent. All were almost sold out. No Mug Root Beer. In desperation, I dashed toward Hy-Vee. The machines there all had the words "Sold Out" scrolling across their sad, LED screens. I went back to the Exhibition tent, certain there was no Mug Root Beer left on the entire grounds. My only choice that was open was to get :-( Diet Pepsi. Next, we made our way back toward the lake. The fireworks display had already started. The amazing pyrotechnics combined with overheard singing of the National Anthems of both U.S. and Canada made me happy to be an American. This was definitely the best Independence Day I ever celebrated. After the display was over, we went back to the tent and helped in its disassembling. We carried the tent to the van, and went back to Bushnell. I was taken to my house, and I ate. I got a ride back to the Broadys' House at 1:15. 'Twas the night after Cornerstone and all through the habitation, not a creature was stirring not even little Catherine. I got to sleep effortlessly.
Sunday
After Church, Bob Miller asked me to correct a small problem that he was having with his computer. I agreed to only on the condition that he took me to Cornerstone to get my bike that had been parked there since Friday!
