Turkeytime at Timberlake!

Turkeytime at Timberlake!

Wednesday, November 30, 2005

IMAGE CAPTION - Thanksgiving fun at Timberlake

Well, it did snow here last Tuesday and that seems worth mentioning, but the biggest news to report is that I just got back from unloading the new waterslide from its delivery truck with Bobby, Stephen Owens, Christian, and Bryan Harris (It was almost two thousand pounds). Let me tell you guys, it is a thing of beauty! The anticipation of it has been intense, and we are excited to see it actually here. I have loaded a picture of it up above to the right where it now sits under the canoe shack. (Still mostly in the wrapper!)

On the counselor front

Adam Knott got to meet his favorite football player, Zach Thomas, #54 of the Miami Dolphins. And he also got to meet Ricky Williams and Ronnie Brown (who played for his school, Auburn) Special note: although Director Dan loves Adam Knott and all of his Auburn counselors, he disdains Auburn's football program. This could be due to some jealousy of how good they are compared to Ole Miss (his alma mater).

Matt Layton (who recently stated his intention of returning to camp this summer) is performing in a rock and roll band in Kentucky called "Tonight We Dance."

Brent Bundrick and his brother Trey went to see the band U2 play a couple of weeks ago. Brent is thinking about returning to camp! He called last week, and is looking hard at it for this upcoming summer. Trey is doing really well at the University of Alabama as the intern for RUF.

Any Camper news?

Definitely! Stephen Owens and I recently went to Wilmington to promote camp and saw Matt Whipple at his house. He just got a new computer and it is really cool. From Wilmington, we headed over to Charlotte and hung out with the Nowokunski family. They were hilarious and Todd, their oldest boy is now planning on working at camp this summer as a CIT! Just before Thankgiving Annie (my wife) and I went over to Nashville where we attended a camp show at the home of Cody Wilhoit. He was doing great and wanted to wish everyone from camp a big hello!

I guess that is all for now. Have a great week!

Dan

P.S. Fried turkey tastes better than oven-cooked. I figured that out last week!

What is Timbertales?

What is Timbertales?

Thursday, November 17, 2005

IMAGE CAPTION - Having fun at Timberlake

Welcome to Timberlake's first online newsletter, Timbertales!

In all of my conversations with campers in the off-season I have noticed that the most frequently asked question is, "Dan, what exactly do you do when the summer is over?" I usually respond with some sort of tirade about how I practice my battleball skills in the Mike during freezing cold conditions (not unlike Rocky before he fights the Russian and trains in the snow), or I just tell them about how I wander the camp painted up in my Iroquois headdress randomly screaming the morning yell. But all of that, of course, is just me trying to be funny and hasn't happened but a couple of times. The truth is that most of my time I have been traveling around the country with Stephen Owens to introduce Timberlake to new families and potential new staff.

So what staff is returning?

Hopefully, we can get everyone from last summer back, but at this point we have definitely hired: Zach Washburn (CIT Director), Stephen Owens, Joey Wang, Bryan Harris, James Michael Wilson Sanders, Neal Cope, Matt Kilgore, Kevin Wolpert, Mike Denoia, and Chris Healy. Lots of the guys from last year have told me that they want to return, so my suggestion for you campers is to give them a call/email and beg them to sign up for next summer!

So what about the new CIT's?

There are a few still in progress, but the definite guys right now are: Drew Andrews, Brian Bush, Josh Platt, Thomas Gibson, Louis Liberatore, Brian David, and Todd Nowokunski.

Anything else?

Well, now that you mention it, we are in process of building a really sweet waterslide from the road above the lake down into the lake through the Rhodo trees! Also on the building topic, we are rebuilding the Canoe dock and updating Tigertooth's walls and bathroom! Both should look great when finished.

also: Stephen Owens never left camp and is still here helping us hire staff. Chris Galloway, James Michael Wilson Sanders, Bryan Harris and Matt Altmix are all living here in Black Mountain just right down the road from camp. Bryan and James are at Montreat, and Chris and Matt are working in schools in Asheville. We all hang out and throw darts in the evenings. It is great to have them here!

I will be updating this news periodically so be sure to keep checking back!

Happy Camping!

Dan