dispatches from the beach - belated edition.

we had mentioned awhile back - before the great disappearance of '09 - that we were going on our annual summer shore trip to long beach island. well we did, and as always we had a great time. this year was filled with standard lbi fun - boozing on the beach all day, grilling up a storm at night - and some nice surprises - like discovering a ridiculously good sushi place on an island full of fried fish shacks and ice cream stands - but oddly enough our most interesting tale from the trip is one of horror.

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our very first day in the house that we rented started off rather frantically - as first days often go - as 14 of us showed up at the house around noon, eager to get our vacation on. mass unpacking ensued, and as it was our most crowded night, and we were having a big first night 4th of july bbq, you can imagine how much we were all tripping over each other getting the kitchen set up/bedrooms assigned/luggage stowed away etc.

what you might not imagine is that during this the kids from the neighboring house were all over our property. brief back story: the home we were renting for the week and the house next door to it were owned by joint families - the family in the house next door had apparently been staying in our house the week before (that didn't make much sense at the time, and still doesn't now), and so for the first hour or two that we were there unpacking, some of the neighbors were still removing their belongings from our yard. they were friendly enough, and were trading beers with us, so at first we didn't care about their kids all too much.

however, by the time we were starting up our bbq festivities that evening, we started noticing the two kids still randomly around - in our backyard bushes looking for their toys, attacking one of our trees with a butterfly net, even standing on our front porch telling us the key code to unlock the front door. finding them slightly annoying, and the latter incident more than slightly disturbing, we decided that if they kept hanging around we'd go complain. but thankfully they disappeared, and the next few hours were spent playing lawn games, watching fireworks, and toasting to our nation's independence.

fast forward to bedtime, much later that night - five of us are having a slumber party in the living room, sprawled out amongst an air mattress and three couches. after chatting for a bit, we all quiet down and start passing out. suddenly, from across the room one of my friends hisses, "there's someone at our front door!" being on the couch perpendicular to and closest to the door, i open my eyes to see a shadow looming on the wall. a rather short shadow, but a human shape nonetheless.

as my friend continued to more loudly and urgently whisper to the rest of us that there is indeed a child at the front door, images of the children of the corn run through my mind. we then hear the screen door open and the front door starts rattling, and the three of us females in the room are now yelping in fright. just as the front door is about to be pushed in, the two guys in the room bound over to it and yank it open, revealing one of the little monsters from earlier in the day.

after asking what the hell he was doing trying to enter our house in the middle of the night, we were informed that he had left his stuffed animals in the attic room, and could he go get them? the rascal received a resounding NO and a brief lecture about how adults go to sleep at night and you can't just barge into their house to sneak into their rooms and retrieve your toys. the little imp continued to whine about his toys, but the guys firmly told him to come back in the morning, ring the bell like a normal, mannered person would, and he could look for them then.

the next day stuffed animals were found in the attic, and so we returned them and tattled on the little brat. suffice to say we didn't see him on our property for the rest of the trip.