I love going to the beach. There are so many activities to enjoy. You can build sand castles, look for sea shells, go sun bathing, play in the ocean, bury yourself up to your neck and wait for the tide to come in… the possibilities are practically endless.

Simply swimming in the ocean is one of my favorite activities. I can enjoy just bobbing up and down in the waves for hours. Enjoy it, that is, until I realize I can no longer see the beach. At this point, I decide I’m enjoying it considerably less. There’s something about floating alone in a giant body of salt water that makes me worry. And, to make matters worse, something just touched my foot. Keep in mind, if you’re ever out in the ocean and something touches your foot, it’s always a shark. What else could it be? I don’t think seaweed floats around looking for feet to touch. Sharks are the only ones that do that. They are the only wild animal that have a foot fetish, and they can smell a pair from up to forty miles away.

Now that I can’t see the beach and I have a shark tickling my feet, I do the only thing I can; swim madly for the shore, scramble onto the beach, and pass out from exhaustion. I call this part ‘sunbathing’, and it’s my second favorite activity. It feels so nice to just lay on the beach unconscious, without a care in the world.

Once I wake up, I usually find myself back out in the ocean and have to repeat the steps all over again. This will generally continue for 3 to 4 days until I realize I need to crawl further up onto the beach to avoid the tide. Even though there’s a lot of work involved with this, I still like to keep reminding myself that I’m having fun.

After I’m done sunbathing, I enjoy scouring the beach for sandcastles that kids are making. Once I find a good one that’s almost complete, I like to pretend I’m a giant and smash it with my foot. Most of the time the kid starts crying because he didn’t realize I was playing giant. I would explain it to him, but I’m usually bored with the game by then and just walk away.

The beach sure is full of excitement and thrills. There are so many people doing so many different things that it’s hard to choose what to do next. Do I want to throw a Frisbee, kick a beach ball, fly a kite, or bury myself in the sand? These are all tough choices to make, and in the end, I usually just choose to bury somebody else instead. Why should I get to have all the fun? It’s time to start giving back.

To bury someone, I just look for a person that’s napping in the sun, dig a 4 to 5 foot hole next to them, and convince them to hop inside by shoving them in. They’re usually really confused and angry at first, but once they’re buried up to their chin, they become quite docile. After I do this, I feel good knowing that I’m helping someone else have a great time. Its no longer all about me. Eventually, they’ll say something weird like, “Dig me up”, but I’m usually kind of sick of digging at that point and tell them to look for someone else to mess around with. It’s strange how some people can just dig forever.

Now that I’ve been at the beach for 2 or 3 weeks, I figure it’s time to head to a dermatologist to get tested for skin cancer because I forgot to wear sunscreen. In all the excitement it completely slipped my mind.

I guess the moral of the story is, playing giant and bury people in the sand is fun, but not getting skin cancer is right up there too. It’s probably on the level with picking up sea shells. And, think about how exciting it’ll be if I don’t have skin cancer. In fact, sometimes I’ll forget sunscreen on purpose just so it’s more surprising if the test results come back negative. I love surprises.