Battery Drain-Camera Shot

So, it was a warm day, around 77, and kind of humid because we're getting hit with another El Nino storm tonight (thank you El Nino--we're digging the rain--my yard is a jungle). I thought since the evening temps were pleasant, I'd go outside and sit near the cemetery in the garden and write horror on my laptop. I lit a couple of lanterns in the cemetery so I could enjoy the atmosphere as I wrote. I brought out my camera so I could take pictures of the scene by lantern light, but the light wasn't sufficient, so I took a few with the flash on. I had just put new batteries into the camera before going outside. It showed full happy batteries on the screen. I took 4 pictures and it was half empty. I've had this happen in this corner of my yard every time I ever use the camera there--it acts like I'm in a super haunted spot or a cemetery. The ironic thing was, I was in a fake cemetery! I hit the timer on the camera to get a picture of me with the cemetery and propped it up on top of a lounge chair just as the batteries were dying and it kept turning itself off as a warning. The flashing red light went off repeatedly to show the timer was ticking down, but it didn't go off. I thought to myself, "I must have turned the flash off, so now I have no idea when it took the picture." Well, I went back to writing on my laptop and was writing for a good 10 minutes and forgot I left my camera on. I was getting up to blow out the lanterns and the camera and flash went off. It shocked me pretty good. I'm not sure how a timer can go 10 minutes before taking a shot, but this is it... And, the batteries were totally shot--how they stayed on those 10 minutes and took a picture, I don't know. I'm having one of those days where I affect electrical, maybe that was it?