nolesrule

Forget references or letters. As a Life Scout they made me fill out an application for Eagle Scout. That wasn't listed in my handbook under any of the requirements. I tried to explain that it wasn't a requirement, but that wacky District Advancement Committee just wouldn't schedule my EBOR without one. A bit tongue in cheek, but the DAC does have leeway regarding how they handle requirement #2 in regards to soliciting recommendations. Their mistake here was not making their procedure known ahead of time, if indeed they did not.(This message has been edited by nolesrule)

"I'm glad the did away with the cuff zipper. I have a 28" inseam and can't wear ANYTHING off the shelf. I like a cuff that can be hemmed. " That. Unfortunately I'm an exact average of my mom's 4'11" and my dad's 5'7".

Hehe. Give a pregnant lady her favorite chocolate? I might lose some fingers accidentally.

Yeah, I thought about doing that. But I'm one of those pathetic scouters who knows nothing about sewing and relies on my wife to put patches on my shirt. Last thing I want to do is have her sew a pocket back on because I ripped too much seam. I do feel guilty about having her sew the patches on (especially since I needed a new shirt put together on 3 days notice due to that pen leak I mentioned). I really need to learn how to do it someday.

I like the tech pocket as well, but it is a major pain to get the POR patches on them. It's the "pen pocket" that I find annoying, and I always carry a pen. The seam they added to separate the pen from the rest of the pocket makes the main pocket almost too small to be usable.(This message has been edited by nolesrule)

The unit leader is permitted to announce the winners to the unit as soon as the election is completed, regardless of when the call out ceremony is. I was visiting a unit last night that happened to be having their OA elections, and the call out ceremony was performed by the election team immediately afterward. Might as well considering candidates have one year from the date of the election to go through the ordeal. Our lodge's next ordeal is just before summer camp, so the boys will have all 3 opportunities to attend an ordeal rather than wait until after summer camp and only have 2 possible dates.(This message has been edited by nolesrule)

"after I get him his eagle" [shakes head]

YKYBWTMB5AHBISTL (You Know You've Been Watching Too Much Babylon 5 And Have Been In Scouts Too Long) when you start thinking about how the Drazi would issue special purple or green ghosted CSPs at random to all their members every 5 years and that they are such a restricted item they are worth fighting over.

Siblings, whether boy or girl, should not be on any scouting trip (unless specifically designed to be a family event). As for the parents, I would use this as a recruiting opportunity. Explain to the parent that unless there is a desperate need to meet the needed adult requirement for a given trip, we limit the adults to those that are registered with the troop. Hand the adult an application and give them a list of openings that need to be filled (along with the responsibilities for each of them) and let them choose which one they would like to take. During my 7 years as a scout, I can't remember a single time a non-registered parent came on one of our trips except as a Webelos parent when a Webelos den joined us or on our official biennial family camping trips. I think the issue of women being welcome on a trip has satisfactorily been addressed in this thread.

The only things more mysterious than the Grey Council are Vorlons and the Order of the Arrow (tongue planted firmly in cheek).

I never touch the score sheets, except to score the SPL. I leave the rest to the SPL. I also don't talk to anyone other than the SPL during inspections and that's just to make sure he hasn't overlooked anything. It's his troop, not mine. I'm just a UC and I'm asked to be there to "make it seem more important" as one adult put it (and to follow the annual unit service plan for commissioners).... but I do let them inspect me as well, just to be fair.

Guess I'm not the only one here familiar with B5.

No SM recommendation needed. The youth need to take the initiative to complete the Brotherhood requirements after having been a member for a minimum of 10 months. I have found that in our lodge the units with the more active OA youth also have active OA adults. Are there any adults in your troop that are members of the OA? If so, they can help motivate the OA youth by attending events and providing transportation. If not, perhaps the unit should nominate a troop adult for OA membership.

I was just answering the question. If I met ReneScout in real life, I wouldn't say anything. The only time I ever turn into any kind of uniform police is when I'm helping an SPL carry out an official uniform inspection.

"The other has been to the '89 Jamboree" You went to the '89 NSJ? So did I, but I was 12 so my shirts only lasted a couple more years.

"Yah, nolesrule, I hear yeh. I just reckon it's overstating things to think about three months of scouting fun and activity and leadership as being "wasted." We do have 7 other methods. Some units just aren't as advancement-focused, eh? Boys are in scouts for 7 years, the year and a third of mandated time doesn't need to be a race. " Beavah, I agree with that and perhaps "wasted" was a poor choice of words, though I was only applying it to the advancement process and not the rest of the scouting experience. But just because advancement is just one of the methods of scouting doesn't mean artificial delays should be created (knowingly or unknowingly) for those that do want to advance. And I need to correct my math. It's actually a 50% increase in the time requirements, not 33%.

Roasted pineapple is absolutely fantastic. Sometimes when I'm grilling at home I will quarter a pineapple lengthwise, so the leaves can be used as a handle, and marinate in honey for a few hours prior to throwing them on the grill. The whole pineapple though is much more conducive to camping.

John, I think you can get a pass for historical purposes, especially since you earned the right to wear the flap from the now defunct lodge. But in the original poster's case, it's just not his flap to wear. I collect flaps and CSPs from the 1989 NSJ, which I attended. But I wouldn't wear a neighboring lodge's special event flap (as nice as that pink Aal-Pa-Tah flap looks) just because my lodge didn't produce a special issue for the event, even if some of them had been in the same jambo troop as me.

You should only wear a lodge flap for the lodge in which you are actively registered.

"All you watching out for well worn uniforms please don't judge me to harshly because I just got a new shirt and I often times have the legs zipped of my switchbacks so the knees are not very worn. " Same here. I had an unfortunate leaky pen incident a few weeks ago.

" I worry about the delay a bit for da youngest lads (though it's manageable) and I think it teaches the older lads to plan better and not expect adults to be at their beck and call. Just different. " I hope you're referring to monthly scheduled board of review dates. Monthly is frequent enough that it won't have much of a long-term effect on advancement. On demand (as in within 1-2 weeks) is ideal, but if you are already holding monthly committee meetings, then everyone needed to hold a board of review is already assembled. But quarterly is just not right. It forces 3-month waits on ranks that have no time requirement. It forces 6 months on a 4-month rank (Star) and if there is a 5 month 20ish day period because of poor scheduling, as is the case that we are discussing, that turns Life (and Eagle depending on how it's done locally) into 9 month tenures. That's 2-3 months wasted where a Scout can't fulfill the "while a First Class Scout", "while a Star Scout", or "while a a Life Scout" requirements. We always talk about not adding to requirements here, but by forcing a quarterly board of review schedule, they are artificially increasing the time requirement by 33%, whether they realize it or not.

You know, the really silly thing of having a rigid board of review schedule like this is that the troop already knows there is a 6-month requirement (and that it's possible to complete the requirements in that 6 months). They knew the exact date that your son earned Star when they scheduled the dates for their quarterly board of reviews. So why are they holding the board of reviews at 5 months and 3 weeks? They are effectively forcing a 9 month period on any scout that has met all the requirements except the 6 months because of some adult who couldn't bother to count out 6 complete months when making the schedule.

I've said this before and I'll say it again. Boards of review should be held as soon as possible once a Scout has completed all other requirements for a rank. I can understand if a unit might have a monthly board of review night on the schedule in order to be able to get the needed people together, but 4 times a year is just too few and unnecessarily holds up the advancement process. All that is needed to hold a board of review is the Scout and 3-6 committee members and 15-20 minutes in the same location. I've even seen them held during some afternoon downtime on a camping trip.

Thanks for taking my comments at face value. I hope it didn't come across as a rant, as that was not intended. I am going to follow responses in your other thread you started based on my post. It's one thing to be able to accommodate a few large minority religious troops in urban areas. But when you get to the suburbs and rural areas, you'd be hard pressed to find the same. We all know that most boys do not ever become scouts and not all cub scouts become boy scouts. Take that same regression and apply it to a small segment of the population in a non-urban density area and you become hard pressed to find those minorities at all in scouting. And when all the COs are churches, that makes it even more difficult. There are many observant Jews who hold the line of thinking that the appearance of violating Jewish law is just as bad if you actually did because someone else might think you actually did. Or, to give an example, eating soy bacon or sausage is the same as eating the stuff that comes from a pig because someone could assume it's the real thing. Along the same lines, that would mean a Jew should not enter a church, no matter for a wedding, funeral, Scout event or even voting, because someone could assume they are there to worship. Now, I'm not that strict, or I wouldn't be serving as a UC for units at a United Methodist Church and a Roman Catholic Church. Heck, if I knew I could get 10 Jews at a district, council or OA weekend, I'd be willing to organize a minyan for them and even bring a Torah for Shabbat services... you need 10 to have a formal service, otherwise it's just a handful of individuals praying individually at the same location. But from what I've seen the last 4 years since I've put the uniform back on, the numbers just aren't there, and I find that disappointing. And yes, I have thought of trying to start a Jewish unit in the council, but I've gone over the pros and cons in my head a dozen times and doubt I could get it to work for various reasons (and that would be a thread unto itself). Besides, I have a 2 year old daughter and a bun in the oven, so my hands are full these days.

"The BSA has become much to much dependant on churches as sponsors, so if a jewish boy wants to join a catholic troop odds are he will at least be exposed to that faith more than his parents would want and thats where the trouble begins. " Oh, it can get pretty wacky. Being Jewish myself, I was part of a troop chartered to a United Methodist Mens Club. Thanks to me, my brother, a cousin and a few friends, about 20% of the troop was Jewish. My dad was an ASM with the troop for about 10 years, and when I was 17, the troop even signed up a Jewish SM for 3-4 years (and he's still an active member of the committee). There was one point where my dad looked into starting up some units through our synagogue, but it interfered too much with the USCJ formal youth programs which are co-ed (this was before Venturing crews, which I think would have worked well paired with the high school age youth program). Back then the district, council and OA Lodge would make more accomodations for Jewish scouts and scouters, mainly because of the Jewish boys and adults in my troop were regular active participants in events. Now, as a UC, I don't see that anymore. You'd be hard-pressed to find any non-Christians in the programs and I think the reliance on religious institutions as sponsors has a lot to do with that. This weekend is Section Conference (SR-4) and we are the host lodge. I'm sure there will be a Sunday morning prayer service. I've been to a number of the watered down non-denominational prayer services over the years, and it just feels too much like a church service for me to be comfortable, regardless of how many non-Christians at the National Council approved it. I will be bringing my siddur, tallit and tefillin in order to worship on my own terms, quietly before breakfast each morning .... and I'll be passing on the sausage and bacon.