Camping, out on the land

It never fails. You’re out camping and right in the middle of the night you feel an irresistible urge to go pee. The outhouse is only a few steps away but you dread losing sleep momentum by getting out of bed and scavenging for your shoes and lamp. You ignore it for a while. Yet, it keeps you awake. The pressure is too strong. It’s nippy outside, and getting dressed is a hassle. You eventually surrender.

It’s -30°C [-22°F] on the Arctic tundra. You have been cautioned to be on the lookout for polar bears, especially at night. So you try and speed up urination flow—however a futile physiological effort that may be. As you go on about your business, you anxiously scan the immense horizon glistening in the precocious pre-morning dawn.

And then it happens, just like you feared it would. The light cast by your headlamp hits two beady, fluorescent eyes gazing hungrily at you from some fifty meters away. Standing still, shaking, you stare. The beady eyes stare back, equally motionless. Your entire life flashes before your slumbering eyes. Then it jumps. Then you jump.