TAHAWK

You sweat 24/7/365. As a result, warm, moist air is migrating away from you body 24/7/365. If this warm, moist air reaches dew point at a place where there is down, liquid water will be absorbed by the down. The down will lose loft. It is almost impossible to dry down in the field. Unless you like vapor barriers and the resulting warm swamp, avoid down.

Just be sure the bottle has a really secure lid.

Insulation = still ("dead") air. According to the U.S. military, the following total garment thicknesses ("loft") are the minimum needed to keep the average, healthy sleeper reasonably warm inside a tent or other shelter that blocks wind. A sleeping bag is simply a special garment designed for sleeping. Otherwise, a layer is a layer is a layer. It is assumed that 1/2 of the loft is above the sleeper and 1/2 below. It is also assumed that the sleeper has a suitable insulating sleeping pad or mattress below him or her that will retain some loft despite body weight. Layers of dry cardboard can serve as a sleeping pad, as can suitable thicknesses of wool or polyester blankets. Low Temp Tot. Loft of bag 40f 3.0" 30f 3.5" 20f 4.0" Shake out your bag to fluff it up, and lay it on the floor. Wait ten minutes and measure total loft. 10f 4.5" 0f 5.0" -10f 5.5" -20f 6.0" As noted above, dead air does not know what the garment is called that traps it around you. If there is room, dry clothing or other layers worn inside the bag increases insulation. Crushing out the trapped air by stuffing in material when there is no spare room decreases insulation (like stuffing extra socks in boots). The insulative material needs to be loose. A smooth liner allows you to move around without tying your bag into a knot and is just as warm as a knapped (fuzzy) liner. Avoid cotton. Avoid down. One or more wool or polyester blankets can be used around the head and shoulders to trap air inside the bag if you have a sleeping bag without a hood that fits snuggly around the face. Double up bags to reach your loft goal. DO NOT breath into the sleeping bag. Like sweating, that would cause moisture to collect in the sleeping bag material, and a wet sleeping bag does not insulate nearly as well as a dry bag Avoid metal zippers as they may freeze shut or snag/tear the bag material.

You are not required to wear any recognition items on your uniform. This is the BSA guide on the subject. http://www.scouting.org/filestore/pdf/33066_Section3.pdf Wearing of childrens' awards by adults is covered. You are allowed to wear the Eagle medal and Exploring Silver Award medal on "formal occasions."

I strongly agree that WB should be a different course for Cubbing Scouters vs. Scouting Scouters. That Cubbing is critical to the survival of Scouting and, thus, just as important, can be taught in other venues. Scouters who refuse to play nicely should, after efforts to secure better behavior vis-a-vis Cubbing, made the occasion for addition by subtraction. Oddly, when there was a Cubbing WB, the openings were so few that a district was lucky to have a couple of WB-trained Cubbers. If we go back to separate courses, that error needs to be corrected. I monitored a Cub course way back when. The learners (Everyone participating is a "participant," including staff.) had a fantastic experience. Like the two previous versions, WB3 tries to teach the Patrol Method (which includes patrol and troop youth leadership) by modeling. I believe that when adults see adults leading, as they do 95% of the time in WB3 (and saw less in WB1 and WB2), they do not always "get" that they are supposed too see, in their imagination, youth leading. Because adults not allowing youth to lead has been a problem since BP started the movement, WB should be more concrete, direct, and emphatic about what constitutes the Patrol Method and that it is required, including youth leading Boy Scout patrols and troops. The instructions on tickets need to be clearer and that clarity should be in the directions suggested above. The current language allows subordinate goals that have no relationship to overall goals; they are not really subordinate. Based on what is allowed, tickets are not nearly as important as they were in WB1 or WB2 either as to goals or execution. Quality is needed, not quantity. If, as is said, the Outdoor Program best meets the overall aims of Scouting, it needs more emphasis somewhere in the training offerings. We have an "introduction" and little beyond that, Even the Fieldbook is no longer advanced Scoutcraft. Even WB1 was restricted to First Class skills, although staff regularly interjected more advanced skills.. We can and should do better towards offering exciting outdoor program- if not in WB then in an Advanced Outdoor Skills course. Running people through WB has become, at least in some councils, just another metric. "My" last WB patrol had four (of 6) members who had zero previous Scouting training and a combined five and a half months in the program in any status. But "The Course has to be filled." This follows the pattern of OA membership and advancement - meaningless numbers. Quality is important for staff and learners.

From the Boy Scouts of America (current language) “Your Scoutmaster and other adult leaders will help Scouts become good leaders, then will step back and allow the troop’s youth leaders to take charge of planning and carrying out activities.†“The senior patrol leader (SPL) is elected by the Scouts to represent them as the top youth leader in the troop.†“He [the SPL] appoints other troop youth leaders with the advice and counsel of the Scoutmaster." "Adults understand that their role is to create a safe place where boys can learn and grow and explore and play and take on responsibilitiesâ€â€and fail, and get up and try again.†[erroneous capitalization in original] This language leaves no opportunity or aurhorirty to the TC to have any role in selecting or removing the SPL or any other leader (Scout). In my experience as a unit, district, and council Scouter, unit bylaws create far more problems than they solve. At the most, a "This is how we do it" announcement is all that is needed. A TC is not a legal entity and does not create authority by passing rules.

Is it productive to spend energy and time being upset about the objectives of the corporation simply because they are not our objectives? I am happy whenever I find an employee who is helpful, as I am when I find anyone else who is helpful. I have encountered several such people among the employees over the years, including at National. I can tell you from personal experience that other non-profits often display the same dedication to payroll uber alles. Not the Salvation Army, by the way. Definitely the Red Cross.

Do the angry adults understand Boy Scouting? Can you get an "expert" (someone from at least 25 miles away who has a grand title, carries a briefcase, and wears a tie) to explain it to them?

You could casually tell him what Merit Badges you do not want him to do. Why don't you want him to do them? Because. ^___^

So we have some dangerous products/situations/conditions that are more PC than others. So? Deaths from tobacco are more than an order of magnitude above deaths from the non-PC drugs. (488,000 vs. 17,000) So far as I can seen, that is not an argument for tobacco - or peeing in the pool.

And he is blatantly failing to comply with BSA rules as noted above. Respectfully, Sentinel947, your point? Obviously, people still smoke, drink to excess, and drive over the speed limits. The prevalentce of unsafe behavior is not much of an argument for engaging in that behavior, much less modeling that behavior for Scouts.. One could also point out that smoking tobacco is more prevalent, as compared to the general population, among those in prison, those who inject illegal drugs, the homeless, and the mentally ill. Having lost relatives and others for whom I cared to smoking, I rejoice that tobacco use has fallen in the general population since the Surgeon General's Report came out. I support BSA policy that prohibits smoking in the presence of Scouts.

What bothers me about the "group" MB approach, even when the BSA rules are followed by individually testing each candidates on every requirement (which is routinely ignored) is the absence of the opportunity for one-on-one counseling. (And I know that "one-on-one" is a term of art in our YPT era) The candidate also misses the opportunity to call a new adult and arrange an appointment. As for any need to facilitiate or accelerate the obtaining of Eagle, we have already a ccelerated to over 700% of what the rate was when I earned Eagle. That reality argues that there is no need to find ways to make the path easier.

You recommend the madated process. OK. This process can work. Or you can get a slate dictated to the carefully selected, subservient nominating committee by the Council employees -- a slate of all Executive Board "suits" (AKA "community leaders") for the top slots. That HAS produced, in fact, for us, and for all three years of the new regime, the same top slate AND a failure to find a District Commissioner, Cub Roundtable Chair, Scout Roundtable Chair, Training Chair, Scout Training Chair, Advancement Chair, Scout Chair, Cub Chair, etc. But, hey, after twenty-eight months we got a Cub Training Chair -- who had never been on any training staff and means well. Did someone warn them that a purge might not work out and that it is easy to say "No" to strangers? Yup.

"BSA"is an iconic brand of motorcycle. But a BSA will go in circles. ^___^ My first, and beloved, SM smoked. This was the 1950's, but the medicos were already muttering darkly about the health impact of tobacco. Although BSA had no rule against it, as they do now, Mr Smith didn''t want us to know that he smoked so he tried to hide it. He would sneak off each morning to have a smoke to stop the shakes. Of course, we all knew. As BP warned, the Scouts saw about everything. We saw the shakes. We saw the stains on his fingers. We smelled the stink. We suspected that he wanted to stop. He died of lung cancer.at 56.

Scout activities are to be tobacco-free if Scouts are present.. As for the double-entendre stuff, part of growing up is learning "appropriate" behavior. Not everyone grows up. Those that do not grow up need counseling. "Appropriate" is a social judgment. A Scout troop is not the neighborhood bar.

The BSA-sold triangular neckerchief was made larger a few years ago. Our Scout Shop still has a couple of the older, smaller size in the Clearance section. It had been the same, tiny size when I got back in Scouting in 1981 until the up-sizing.

When I became a Scout, BSA had gone to a triangular neckerchief. My troop made its own - square - 33" on a side, Since then, I have seen every variatuion under the sun. The official policy, as badly written as it is: This leaves plenty of room for UP types to make trouble and wiggle room to fend them off.

Time flies. I meant at least fifteen. The 11th Ed BSHB dropped "Field Uniform" in 1999 in favor of "the uniform" and "the official uniform." The 12th Edition continued that nominclature. Do lots of people in Scouting continue to use "Field Uniform"? Sure. And "Class A" as well. ^___^ A "Dress Uniform" exists only for Scouters. Scouts only have the Uniform. But it's only an issue to the extent that it may cause confusion. A shared vocabulary helps communication. If you tell a Scout he needs to appear in "Dress Uniform," who knows what might happen. He might go out to buy a blue blazer and grey slacks. (I could lend him a tie.)

You are not worried personally or about your troop. You are worried about other troops? Have you encountered an example of the 'some" who "will use this new requirement an an evangelical green light"? I have met people from time to time since 1954 who feel that they are called to convert the Scouts in a given troop to thier religion. They did not seem to need any "green light" from BSA, having more direct source of inspiration. In Ohio and California, they were removed from leadership positions either by being replaced or by their units moving ao another sponser (to use the old word) without them.

It has not been called a "Field Uniform" for many years. As Stosh points out, it's "the Scout Uniform" or the "Official Uniform." Beyond that, Scouts wear "other clothing that is riight for the events of the day." Given the realities of the old "Field Uniform," it was probably best understood as another example of that sense of humor which labels the biggest kid in class "Tiny." Officially, there never was an "Activity Uniform" or a "Class _ " Uniform. There was, briefly, an "Activity Shirt" that was quickly gone for lack of interest.

While I have no personal basis to think ill of the "Assistant Scoutmaster" in question, the idea that serious violence within a family or personal relatiionship is always reported to the authorities is massively uninformed. Because, as Scouters, part of our job is to look for such things, we need to be at least somewhat informed. http://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/fvs02.pdf

There might have been someone else who said not to judge. "Out of the mouths of babes" and all that. And jblake has a point, I think. Can you be "reverant" without a supreme, creator deity? Apparently so since we have BSA-approved reverently atheistic Scouts. It used to be that we said that one's "Duty to God" was defined in the family. I find it hard to believe that B.S.A. is going to attempt to place the power to make that definition elsewhere. BP tried to help us: "The religion of a man is not the creed he professes but his life - what he acts upon, and knows of life, and his duty in it." We are all prisoners, to some extent, of our experience. "Reverent" may mean deeply respectful. Many religions teach that one should be reverent towards the religions of others, and BSA teaches the same, yes?

Over the years, I have seen this sort of thing (rage over anyone wanting even minimal accountability) in Little League, Scouting, PTA, a museum committee, a couple of decedent's estates, and a pyramid sales scheme. I was lucky to always be an observer rather than a party to these conflicts. Every time I have been in a position to do so, the finances start out and remain stirctly booked. Sad situation.