Manito-wish, Part I

Yesterday's post to Fleex's Lab was the last scheduled post for the trip my class took to Manito-wish, a leadership/outdoors camp in northern Wisconsin.  Just two hours ago, I got home off the long bus ride.  (I'm noticing that, due to a week of being away from electronics, my typing is a lot slower and less accurate than it usually is.)  In the week I was away, quite a few things went on.

• McGraw-Hill LearnSmart updated.  I now know absolutely nothing about how to use it.  Fortunately, they left a classic mode button to let me use the old style.  Tonight, I just got started on the biggest assignment so far, four days later than intended.  Catching up shouldn't be too difficult; I just need to do about triple the amount I was doing when on schedule.
• Mojang pushed the biggest snapshot in the history of Minecraft's full release stage.  Grum has stated that a massive refactor "breaks all the things".  In addition to that, huge changes to the terrain and new flowers make it feel like an entirely new game.  Guess what I'll be doing when Forge catches up!
• Apex High School Learning courses progressed according to plan.  I think there's a little bit of easy review stuff that I need to do by the end of this week, but nothing major.  Currently, I have a 126% score because of an unbalanced extra credit assignment.
• I gained a subscriber on YouTube, bringing my sub count to 21.  Unfortunately, I can't really create more videos because...
• I got sick with a viral infection, possibly strep.  My throat hurts, I'm constantly thirsty, and my voice just sounds awful.  No recording will be done by me anytime soon!

Alright, now that I've covered all the things that were not related to the camp, it's time to list things that went on up there on the outskirts of Boulder Junction.

• Group name games.  It seems every new place has to have everyone introduce himself to everyone else by throwing some sort of object around a circle.  Fortunately, Manito-wish went a little further than just names.  They had this rope-like thing that would be passed around the circle and wound for each person as he spoke about various aspects of his life.
• Amazing family-style meals.  I think eating family-style (by passing around large containers of food and shoveling it off as desired) really brings a group together.  Giving pitchers, plates, pans (receiving burn injuries while doing so), and bags to nearby people on request forces people to get outside their own little world, even at the dining table.  The food was amazing, as was the occasional dessert.
• Communication building.  There was this one game in which a "minefield" had to be navigated using at least three people in three roles.  The "rescuer" was blindfolded and could only hear and walk.  The "spotters" were mute and could only see and gesture.  The "speaker" was turned away from the "minefield" and could only see the spotters and speak.  It required some planning to create the gestures, but most of the challenge was in reaction times.  My personal favorite role is the speaker.

As this is getting longer that most posts and I need sleep to recover from the 6:30 AM to 10:30 PM awake times, this will be continued tomorrow!