Sleddog, That is a pretty funny story-pathetic, but funny.

However, I've got to place some of the blame on the guy who took his inexperienced friend without first asking the right questions. The one guy may or may not have been just plain stupid, but for sure he was incredibly ignorant; and there is a difference.

I have friends I would never go camping with because I know they would whine all the time and not have a good time. Plus, if anything did go wrong, they would be pretty useless. This isn't to say I know everything or won't go camping with a beginner, but it helps to know what people really know or don't know before you go.

When someone says that their idea of roughing it is "no room service", don't even think about trying to talk them into going camping. They might say yes.

On one solo winter trip (full trip report posted two years ago), I left my fuel bottle in the garage (but had a canister stove as a backup); didn't check my old tent for wear and found out the hard way the coating on the floor wasn't waterproof anymore; and carried way too much stuff (I was really beat and wound up making a second trip back for most of it the next day, but wasn't all that far from the trailhead, so not that big a deal.)

Other somewhat dumb things-solo cycling and hiking in the wilds of NZ (if I had crashed or gotten hurt, no one anywhere had a clue where I was); overprimed my XGK once (fairly big fireball, no damage); and although not camping, set my XGK pump on fire on my kitchen counter while testing it for leaks (slight cosmetic damage to the pump).