Do we really need... The phrase: "roughing it"?

This weekend I had the pleasure of going camping with my wife, two sisters, and their two husbands (not each).  One of my sisters had posted on her Facebook wall that she was going to be "roughing it" camping.  I laughed and thought "are we not going to have 4G coverage?"  Then of course the whole weekend I was thinking about that particular phrase and realized: we aren't at all roughing it.


Oh yeah, we had it "rough" all right.


We had to sleep inside a tent and we had shoddy cell phone service.  These were the roughest parts through the entire weekend!  We slept on air mattresses which wasn't terrible and an electric pump for easy inflating.  We had a portable stove, a portable propane grill, and plenty of firewood that we did not chop ourselves.  The wood was dry so it burned with east, and my brother-in-law had bought a duraflame starter log, so creating a fire was no hassle.  We had brought plenty of food for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.  We had 3 cases of Miller Lite, 1 case of Coors Light, 3 cases of Bud Light, 2 bottles of Vodka and 2 bottles of wine.  There was an electric outlet, bathrooms, and showers.  It was borderline inhumane.

What is hard to believe is that we were among the ones who did "have it rough".  We actually had to walk to the restrooms, and had power at one individual source that had to be distributed via extension cords and power-strips.  There was a large group of people making use of portable apartments at the campsite.  The funny part is, these people considered what they are doing as "camping"!  I argue that they are merely "apartment moving", because what they are doing hardly resembles camping.  I can imagine the only fun and exciting part is moving their mammoth sized vehicle-houses from one site to another.  Especially when you take into consideration the tight and winding mountain roads!  It was a challenge navigating my small '06 Hyundai Elantra (yeah, so keep clicking my sponsors until you read my complaints on high gas prices, and poor gas mileage from my Ferrari) up and down those crazy roads!

Oh, we had to clean up the damn place.  That was kind of "rough".  Imagine waking up completely hung over, ready to get on the road to get home, and having to break down and clean up.  It was pretty miserable.  KOA campground needs to add a cleaning service for campsites.  They could price-gouge the shit of that service too.  I wonder ponder paying upwards of $500 for the convenience of being able to just bolt on the last day.

Do we even know how to "rough it"?


Let's face it.  A majority of us have been pussified over the past two decades.  I am pretty sure there are people living in some countries who have to decide whether to feed or eat their children, and here I am getting pissed off because I can't check my Google+ while thinking my life is OVER.  Just think about that!  People deciding whether to make a meal for their children or of their children!  In all seriousness, it is quite sad.

Ten years ago companies were able to get away with charging for Wi-Fi (Wireless....  what the hell does the Fi mean? (fidelity...  see, I didn't even have to get up and get a dictionary!  Thanks Google)), nowadays we just expect to be connected no matter where we go.  Don't get me started on Starbucks!  How the hell did they figure out how to get people to stay inside their damn store all day?  All they sell is over priced, shitty, "gourmet" coffee to hipsters with Mac books, writing God knows what they are writing about (I just thought of how ironic it would be if I was writing this sitting at a table in Starbucks).  OK, where was I?  Oh right, how convenient everything has become.  Even meeting and keeping in touch with people has become a snap professionally and socially with sites like Facebook, LinkedIn, Myspace (hah!  Who uses Myspace anymore), Twitter, and Google+.

By no means am I suggesting that I am suddenly going to stop lugging around my laptop everywhere I go, or start offering businesses donations to help them maintain their internet bills.  Absolutely not.  The weekend DID get me thinking about how easy camping has become, and our idea of "roughing it" has become quite pathetic.

Solution?


Luckily there is a solution (If you are wondering if I am going to take my own advice, my answer will be: "Hell to the NO"...  Well, I might, but I doubt it).  We all need to take one REAL camping trip.  We load up the basics: beer, tent, clothes, basic hygiene products, lighter, knife, and basic food.  Trek into the woods, find an area to set up camp.

Does the solution sound miserable?  Absolutely, which is why I stopped.  I was getting bored and exhausted just thinking about doing something so lame.

The other solution.


Let's stop using that damn phrase!