GernBlansten

When you introduce non-natural scents into the wild, what do you expect curious omnivores like bears to do? They will investigate to see if they can eat it. Bears are scent driven. They use it to find food. Espcially if they can't identify the scent. They are very adapted and specialized to do this. It doesn't have to smell good, it just has to smell. What may smell good to you, might be offensive to a bear, or might be food. Likewise, what smells bad to you, like boot stink, probably won't even raise the ears of a bear. Nor will it mask the scent of food. Remember, bears will eat rotten flesh and human poop. Best to go into the wild smelling just as God intended you to, au naturale. Hopefully the bears have already smelled you and not connected that scent with food.

This sounds like a mid-trek Philmont moment. Scouts are tired, irritable and some strange dynamics start happening. In our trek, one scout who is autistic had a melt down during dinner one night and went off the deep end. The SPL pulled him aside and calmed him down then had a talk to all the other scouts about the incident. By the next morning, all was forgotten and the crew merrily moved down the trail.

Sounds like you already have. You have notified the CO and DE and they are aware of the situation. What else do you want?

Be careful of trying to paint Obama with large special interest donations without tarring McCain with the same brush. One reason Obama decided against the restrictions of public financing was his unprecedented ability to get small contributions from HUGE number of donors. Never has a campaign been funded like this and really takes the potency of the big dollar donations down a few notches. But there will still be big dollar donors for both candidates and thier parties who will expect some payback after the election. Until we can ban all donations and go with a purely publicly financed election, they will always be there.

Well Mr. Savage certainly has every right to his opinions and every right to spew them over the airwaves. We have every right to draw opinions on Mr. Savage's character and intelligence from those words or ignore him by not tuning in. If enough people tuned him out, he wouldn't have a radio show to spew it. What I can't understand is how Mr. Savage can be the 3rd most popular radio host. Isn't that really telling about the American public? That they actually tune into someone who spews such venom and bile? And these same people think "Girls Gone Wild" videos are indicative of the fall of our nation.

How appropriate! Day after day, Alone on a hill, The man with the foolish grin is keeping perfectly still But nobody wants to know him, They can see that he's just a fool, And he never gives an answer, But the fool on the hill, Sees the sun going down, And the eyes in his head, See the world spinning 'round. Well on the way, Head in a cloud, The man of a 1000 voices talking perfectly loud But nobody ever hears him, Or the sound he appears to make, And he never seems to notice, But the fool on the hill, Sees the sun going down, And the eyes in his head, See the world spinning 'round. And nobody seems to like him, They can tell what he wants to do, And he never shows his feelings, But the fool on the hill, Sees the sun going down, And the eyes in his head, See the world spinning 'round. Ooh, ooh, Round and round and round. And he never listens to them, He knows that they're the fools They don't like him, The fool on the hill Sees the sun going down, And the eyes in his head, See the world spinning 'round. Ooh, Round and round and round

Megadittos on the Cimarron Cops. They are highly efficient.

FScouter, That's the beauty of the ignore button. I don't use it, but others do. If you find a posters BO to be objectionable, then ignore him. I for one can handle a few whiffs of BO, but if I'm caught stuck behind a very stinking one on a narrow trail, I might take a break to let him get far ahead. I quit responding to GW posts simply because I don't want to be drug down to his level. He's baited me down there a few times and I regretted following him. I'd much rather soar with you turkeys

One refreshing thing about this political silly season is that the term flip flopper can be applied with equal venom and spite to either candidate. Kinda takes the air out of that old tired balloon.

I say don't censor his remarks. Barring obscenity or physical threats, give him his soap box to allow him to define his character to us. Those of us who do not wish to be entertained, can simply ignore him. Those of us who need constant reinforcement of the opinions we have drawn about his character, can continue to read it.

Our council camp provides both options, but the camps are really run as two completely separate camps. Even merit badge sessions are segregated. Our unit always goes for the patrol cooking camp. Seems the entire camp experience is built around preparing for meals and cleanup with merit badge sessions to fill the gaps.

"I often wonder how many scouts see our behavior here and don't want to do anything scouting related anymore as well... " That's what drove me away from scouting as youth. Bad adult behavior. It ain't fun when the adults can't even get along.

Two years before we joined our unit, I was told of a situation at summer camp where two of our unit leaders got into a very heated argument at the campsite which required the staff to intervene. One of the leaders was a real problem before hand with other leaders and I think the stress of spending a week together finally reached a boiling point. The net result was both leaders left our unit, the problem leader moved on to other units blazing a trail of destruction. Several of our scouts who witnessed the incident, didn't want to attend camp again.

I think Rooster, that you can "Go and make disciples", just don't be annoying about it.

Aren't councils separate corporations, franchises, of the BSA product? With those franchises, national grants the council exclusive rights to a region. If you want to open a McDonalds franchise in an area, you go to McDonalds national office and make a proposal. They tell you there's a McDonalds already across the street from where you want yours. You say you don't like they way they operate. They say tough. Go buy them, but you ain't gonna open one across the street. So I'd suggest that Daddy Warbucks puts his money into buying himself a slot on the executive board and getting the SE in his back pocket. He could essentially turn the old council into his vision of a council. Maybe even get a dining hall named after himself.

Don't worry Pack, the undertaker will have already harvested everything worthwhile from your desecated corpse and sold your Eagle award on Ebay, preferably not to a gay or athiest.

I believe, some scouter here posted that we do not own the BSA uniform, that BSA retains ownership of it, however we have the honor of paying for it, cleaning it, wearing it, repairing it, decorating it, and disposing of it.

All these gym exercises are great and will definitely help. But unless you get out and pound those dogs for miles, you won't properly prepare the most important body part for backpacking, your feet. I can go about 7 miles with no issues whatsoever, but after that, the feet start talking to me. At mile 10, they start arguing with me. At mile 14, they are yelling. Only way to toughen the feet is to get out and use them.

You got to pound the feet. Ain't no exercise in the gym that's gonna do that. Get out with your boots and start hiking. Gradually add weight and length to the hike. Then some altitude gain. Your feet will gradually get tougher, the skin like leather. Your entire body will adjust and get stronger. Before you know it, doing 10 miles with a 50lbs pack will feel like another walk in the park.

Picked up number one son from NYLT this evening. Overall he said it was great and wants to recruit other scouts from the unit to take it next year. He also said he'd like to staff next year. But on a funny side note, as I waited at the medic hut to pick up his meds, I overheard another scout waiting with his parents talk about the week. He told his dad, "man, they made us cook all our own meals. It's not like our troop. We had a duty roster and had to do different stuff at each meal". It took all my composure not to comment.

For the life of me, I can't figure out how my post was an insult. I pointed out that your relationship with your unit mirrors what many of us have, but according Bob White, we have hijacked the program from them because they are not intimately involved in owning the unit. My gracious host comment was meant to distinguish that relationship from one where a CO actively recruits and selects leaders, sets parameters for the program, not just provide a safe place to hold meetings. No insult intended, just commenting on how similar your situation is to most every other I've seen.

Sometimes. Buddhists don't have deities, yet can achieve what Beavah laid out, duty to something bigger than themselves. Buddhists can't meet the DRP yet BSA has a religious award for them.

We sent two crews to seabase this year, one to the Coral Reef sailing off the Keys (crew of 8 on a monohull) and one to the Bahamas Tall Ship (crew of 18, large catamaran). The adult leader from the Keys trip said the skipper really wanted to show the boys how to sail, navigate, seamanship, fish. It was the skippers first trip with SeaBase and was pretty stoked. The boys didn't reciprocate. They showed little interest in learning anything new. Drove the skipper and our adult leaders nuts. The other crew was skippered by an ex-Aerosmith band member on a giant catamaran. They really didn't get to do much of the actual sailing since the yacht was setup for single handed sailing but still had a great time. Lots of time just hanging out with their friends and a pretty cool skipper (in their minds). Like many said, its a vacation more than a classic scouting experience. Not that there's anything wrong with that. The scouts will get out of it what they put in.

SctDad, Your CO sounds more like a gracious host than an active CO. Does your CO take an active role in leader selection and recruitment? Does your CO use the program to fulfill an internal need for the CO? Does your CO have any input or care in how you run the program? American Legion Posts and VFW posts sound like great hosts for units, but I don't think they fit the ideal role as BW has indicated.

I think what Packsaddle is refering to is the recent moderation that involved my rather witty (if I must say) response to a typical insult by GoldWinger. We got warned by one moderator to watch it, then deleted by another. I don't have a problem with having my post deleted as it became irrelavent and nonsense once GWs original insult was deleted.