GISHWHES, otherwise known as the best week of your summer

   The last few weeks of summer have always been crazy; what with getting ready for school, tournaments winding down, and trying to get in the last minute summer must do's. For the last two years though GISHWHES has been something to look forward to at the end of summer. One last thing to look forward to before it's off to school again.

If you have never heard of GISHWHES before, let me formally introduce you. Reader, meet the most fun you will ever have while also wanting to tear your hair out and cry while dressed in a candy bikini made out of only twizzlers and string. Now that you've met, let me explain.

GISHWHES or "The Greatest Scavenger Hunt the World Has Ever Seen" is an international scavenger hunt created by Supernatural's one and only Misha Collins. Here's what GISHWHES.com has to say. "GISHWHES is a 5-time Guinness World Record breaking scavenger hunt hosted by Misha Collins. Thousands of participants from more than 100 countries are placed on 15-person teams and for one week, through laughter, blood, sweat and tears, they acquire Items on a wild and jaw-dropping scavenger hunt list. The team that scavenges the most items with the highest quality of submissions joins Misha Collins on an all-expenses paid trip to an exotic locale. Prior Winners journeyed to Rome, a haunted castle in Scotland and British Columbia." 

Sounds pretty awesome, huh? Last year was my first year attempting this and I'm not even sure how I got involved. I'm pretty active on tumblr and follow my fandoms pretty well so it must have come up that way. Anyway, I was invited into a team when I sent out a request for one and was joined with the sweetest girls from all over the globe. I had girls from England, Abu Dhabi, California and so on. This year we couldn't get a team name fast enough and so I registered knowing I was going to be put on a random team. I was placed with a couple girls my age but mostly adults quite older than me and it was definitely to my advantage! These awesome people were so much fun to work with and had the resources to make it an amazing hunt. All of my teammates were so sweet and helpful and it was such a joy to work with them.

If you can't tell from the above pictures, I had a blast. These are just a few samples of some of the crazy items we had to complete in a week's time. I had to take a mugshot, make formal wear out of bathroom items, sketch a chalk drawing of an SPN producer, put together a puzzle with my mom while wearing mittens, have my grandparents teach me an obsolete task, get a fake Orlando Jones twitter account to four hundred followers, (I got 940 thank you very much), have hairy toes with Supernatural nail art, and the hardest task of all; make a bathing suit out of candy and string only. This was such a challenge and my mom and I spent hours upon hours putting this bad boy together. Not going to lie I definitely cried out of frustration during this one. It's intense. Last year, GISHWHES went on throughout the week and then during the last two or three days I spent seventeen hours in the car driving to college and sleeping the entire way. This hunt is not for the weak. You spend hours into the night editing video footage, cleaning food you needed for a sculpture off of the ceiling, and chicken noodle soup out of your nose from a leaf blower.

However if you ever get a chance to get involved with this you will not be disappointed. You will meet friends from all over the place who are just as frustrated as you are but it's so much fun that you don't even care! If you want to get rid of normalcy, break out of your shell a little, or like me are trying for one last hurrah before school you should do it. Throw caution to the wind and join thousands of others who are trying to make a difference in the world. Join us. You definitely might regret it a little but really, when even NASA is tweeting us what do you really have to lose?