Little Moose's Big Adventure!

Morning dawned in the deep woods of Sproul. "I wish I had a great big chocolate mocha," my husband said from inside his tent. "And I'd like to add on a really huge cinnamon roll," I added from inside my own tent. Yeah, we were doing what backpackers do best, which is to talk about food. Food we've eaten. Food we want. Food we're going to eat when we get out of these woods!

"I wish I had another one of those chocolate rabbits from last night," I said. Man, they were good, but I thought we ate them all. I heard a stirring from inside his tent. My husband had something in his hand.

As he got out of his tent, I realized what it was: the very last chocolate Ghirardelli bunny! Oh my gosh! I unzipped my tent to let that bunny in. In mere seconds, it was gone: nothing but chocolate and caramel goodness in my belly. Wow, and to give his very last one to me, his wife. What a loving man!

"It starts with an R . . . RockETTES," I said. "What?" my husband asked. "That song. That's who sang it. The ROCK-something. Rock . . . RockETTES, that's all I'm coming up with!" "Somebody's watching me," I sang blithely, with great enthusiasm, and awesomely out of tune. Oh, it was driving me nuts: WHO SANG THAT TUNE?

We got out of our tents and got around, and an hour or two later, I heard my husband rummaging around in his backpack. He pulled something else out. What? Another chocolate rabbit! This one he ate with gusto. Yes, it was what I'm calling the Miracle of the Chocolate Rabbit: that good guy who gave his last chocolate bunny away got one right back from the Universe, hooray!

We spent just a bit more than 24 hours exactly at our campsite, for we'd arrived at 1:15 p.m. the day before and hiked out at 2 p.m. on this day. It was a short walk back to the car. We loaded our gear in.

I pulled Little Moose out of my backpack and sat him in the front seat with me. We'd be going by the Clarence Moose, and one of his very most favorite things in the world is there: a huge MOOSE! Yes, a moose just like him. Moose kind!

Well, we were driving past the Clarence Moose, and my Little Moose was going crazy, and my husband said, "We're going to stop so you can get some pictures!" I got my camera ready, just about to get some shots out the window.

But no, he meant STOP STOP. So he parked the car, and out the Little Moose and I hopped, and we went over and I took about a dozen photos of the Big Moose and the Little Moose, bonding and making friends. Above you may see one of my favorite shots of the two of them. You have no idea how much this moment means to that tiny moose; it means EVERYTHING.

And then Little Moose and I got back in the car, and we drove home. As soon as I got into the house, I went straight to the computer. "ROCKWELL!!!" I screamed. "It was ROCKWELL who sang Somebody's Watching Me, with Michael and Jermaine Jackson singing back-up!" And so the mystery of Who Sang That Song was solved.

And we unpacked the car and I made a pizza, and I aired out my camping gear and eventually put it away, and got the potted plants out of the garage and watered them and put them back where they all belong.

And I washed the dishes and refilled the hummingbird feeder, which had gone empty in our absence. And so it was that we moved back into our regular lives, having spent one night away in the wilderness, and having come home with one VERY happy Little Moose, as you can see!

It's my tradition to include a soundtrack song, and though it has absolutely NOTHING to do with this story, except that it drove me nuts trying to remember who sang it the entire time I was gone. So here is Rockwell, with Somebody's Watching Me, from 1984. Oh yeah, and that IS Michael Jackson singing back-up!