The Bodyguards

Yvonne and I are very lucky women when we go to Mountainfest because we get our very own bodyguards...O.K. They're Norms body guards but we get to look at them at least twice a day.
Norm is a high school principle who spends Merritt week being the money guy.
Before each shift he gathers us all together and assigns us ticket booths.
The beer gardens are bigger than a full football field, in fact it may be two football fields. Inside there is one stage at the front. A dance floor, several tents with picnic tables, a couple of mobile food stands, four ticket booths that hold up to three people in each and on each side is the bar- holding twenty or more servers across- which dispense beer and coolers in exchange for a ticket.

Norm and his bodyguards drive a golf cart to each booth and set the volunteers up with a float. And a roll of tickets for the shift. I found out that there are 1000 tickets on each roll at 4.50 a pop each roll brings in 4500.00. We often have to call for new rolls half way through the shift. We like that cause we get to flirt with the body guards some more :)
The bodyguards are all police or corrections officers in their day jobs. These are big, big men.
Last year Frank and Pinot were our body guards, Pinot was gregarious and friendly Frank may as well have been guarding Windsor palace. He would stand against the wall- all six foot five 200 and some odd pounds of him and not crack a smile if there was a gun to his head. Yvonne immediately fell in lust and I immediately made it my mission in life to make him crack.
It took three days but eventually we got him to at least say more than hello. By the end of the week we saw Frank in a whole new light and were sad that he wasn't with us again this year.
We had three bodyguards this year. I guess because of the enormity of the event. All three were great fun and we looked forward to seeing them each day.
Norm's interior sidekick was a delta police officer named Byron. If we can liken men to dogs then Byron was a Chihuahua, not very big but lots of energy and would lick your toes with out much provocation. Outside we had Bobby and Shane, both corrections officers and sweet guys, quiet most of the time but would chuckle at our antics. We found out later that they weren't quiet so much as hung over every day.
Shane was my favorite. Cute and cuddly if he was a dog he might be a lab-German Shepard cross. He was sweet to us but I got the sense he could rip a strip if necessary.
Bobby seemed like a big old Saint Bernard he'd bring you hard liquor and drag you out of any bad situation.

This year we were treated to a party at the VIP/Security campground.
At 4 am on Saturday our bodyguards came knocking- being that it is Merritt and that we had behaved ourselves relatively well thus far- we got up and went with them.
It seems the security personnel party in the wee hours after all the others have gone to bed. They have a fire in their camp which was good because the nights were awfully cold. I also discovered that they have showers and flush toilets. All luxuries we do not have in Campground 'A'.
I also know now what they do with booze confiscated off the grounds!
However they were well on their way to oblivion and we, having just woke, were too far behind. We mingled and chatted till 6 am and were driven home in a golf cart.
Also a first.
Our little Chihuahua drove us home and I'll tell you riding on the back of a speeding golf cart is way more scary than a speeding race car in the Indy 500....Seriously. I was sure we were going to die.

We made it home just in time to witness someone's walk of shame at which point Yvonne yells out "Honey you must be freezing" at which point I give her a little kick. You never talk to someone doing the walk of shame, they want to believe you didn't see them...

Tomorrow I'll tell you about our experience all most working in campground 'C'