Amazon leases five Kentucky RV parks for seasonal occupancy by its Camperforce.  Four camps compete on amenities, things such as a lake view, partial shade, reliable WiFi, firepits and tables, and one even operates a full-service bar.  The one-way commute from them ranges from 7 to 15 miles.   These parks have to be fun to earn any Camperforce business.  We camp in the fifth, right across the street from Amazon and within the city limits of Campbellsville.  Everything is convenient, and we suffer through their miserable WiFi, their total lack of shade, and borderline hostile management.  Kat says we’re here to work, and besides, after Amazon work, most are too tired to dance, fish, or drink until they fall off a barstool.  I agree:  convenience is good!

I just wish the owners of this place weren’t such asses, and lazy ones, at that.   But there’s a silver lining to every cloud — they provide one unintended amenity.   That would be a succession of ridiculous signs.

Grandpa Simpson built Heartland.  He is said to be a self-made millionaire.   I have no proof either way, but that’s what the locals say.  He looks 80, still active and healthy, if deaf as a post.  But he is slowing down.   Grandpa supposedly gave Heartland RV to his son, Jeff, this year.  As they say, “The acorn don’t fall far from the tree.”  Jeff is at least as ardent a penny-pincher as his old man, and like Grandpa, Jeff is wont to post hand-lettered signs exhorting, threatening, and cajoling his campers to make Jeff’s life easier.  Grandpa had several printed years ago saying “Please Don’t Let Pets Pee on the Shrubs”.   Grandpa’s classic hand-written signs included “Dog’s Don’t Get ShoweRs.  No Dog’s in the Bath House” and “This Is ElectRic Heat – Keep The DooR Closed”.

There was no cable TV our first year at Heartland, but cable and many good channels arrived in Year Two.  Pink hated to be left alone, so I took her to the community center where she and I happily watched nearly two months of LSU football.  Around our fifth or six game, she began to occasionally growl at the screen.  Eventually I figured it out:  Pink hated Alabama!  At first I thought she recognized their uniforms, but The Google says canine eyes only have green and yellow color cones, but humans also have red. Now that I think about her growling when the network ran Alabama touchdown replays, she either had to recognize that A stolen from the Atlanta Braves, or read Alabama on their jerseys.  She was one smart dog.  Or maybe she sensed that when I growled and cursed she should agree.  But I digress.

Our football watching ended soon after some old biddies pointedly told me “Dogs are not allowed in this building!”  “Says who?”  “There’s a sign on the door.”    “I believe that sign says that she is not allowed to shower.  Television is ok.”  A week or so later Grandpa posted “No Dog’s Inside.  Some Have AlleRgies.”  Somebody with hand-writing similar to mine got him in blue ball-point ink: “Dogs Can’t Give Their Allergies to People.”

Jeff has been in charge of us in Camperforce for a month.   He too loves his signs.   As every former camp host will tell you, the worst part of the job is cleaning restrooms.  Today I saw a new sign that absolutely took the cake.  “After You Use the Toilet Use This Brush.  We Can’t Clean Up Every Time Somebody Sits Down.”  In blue ball-point ink just below that, someone has already written, in a different hand:  “Jeff, Amazon Says It’s OK If We Leave the Skid Marks for You.”

Damn right!