yaworski

NJCubScouter (should I be surprised by anything from Jersey?) blathered:

"Finally, as to yaworski's comments about men and 16-year-old girls, and gay men and 16-year-old boys . . . all ok because BSA youth protection policy does not depend on segregation of the genders (or sexual orientations) . . ."

Just wait until your two HOMSEXUAL ASMs take Tommy Tenderbutt out into the woods and give two deep leadership a new meaning.

I find it interesting that for years homosexuality was considered a mental disease but after pressure from the Hollywood crowd that was changed and now homosexuality is supposed to be considered "normal." However, rapists and murderers are now considered as victims of mental illness . Go figure.

"For some of the new people to this discussion, the priest who molested me and raped my brother was not a homosexual. He did not prance, he did not lisp, he was not overly macho, he was never seen in the company of anoher adult male, he liked boys he was a pedophile, a sexual predator pure and simple."

Oh boy, this tired old line. I'm sorry but he was a homosexual. He may have been a pedophile but he was a homosexual pedophile.

Let us also ask the question, would we want our 16 year old daughters to go camping with two or three heterosexual men? If not, why would we want our 16 year old sons to go camping with two or three homosexual men?

I've known more that a few homosexuals during my life, both the swishy, lisping type and those that could pass for John Wayne. Were they honest, hard working individuals? Sure. Would I want them as role models for my kids? Nope.

Why not? The same reason that I don't want doper or adulterer as a role model for my kids. I never knew a homosexual who could keep his pants zipped. Even those that were in so called "long term relationships" jumped from bed to bed so often that my head spun. The homosexual lifestyle appears to be one built around excess and bad choices.

"Those "of the cloth" are the hardest working and most dedicated people I know. Please don't belittle their contributions."

Sure they and you probably think that the Great Pumpkin rises from the pumpkin patch on Halloween.

"the Episcopal priests who are openly gay, Reform Jewish rabbis who are openly gay, etc."

Do they believe in God or are they simply looking for a easy job with decent pay and access to little boys?

There are hat presses available to keep the brim flat. BSA used to sell a nice one, the new one isn't as nice.

Rain covers are available from Brigade Quartermasters and U.S. Calvalry (both have websites but I don't know the URL) or just about any place that sells police uniforms.

Remember, it's a HAT. Hats are supposed to develop character. I'm not a DI so I didn't want a completely flat hat so my brim looks more like the hats on the AEF. Also, if it gets beat up enough, a hat can be re-blocked for about $25.

Paid up to 12 cents per message. That means anywhere from .001 cents to 12 cents. Why isn't this information on the company's web site. The whole site is a bit light on the information.

As for it being a pyramid, what else could you call it when participants are encouraged to hook new suckers so that they can make more money?

As for it being popular in Yurrip, Yurripeans have rarely impressed me as being the sharpest tools in the shed.

As for ads on radios, I hit the station change button and with TV, I flip to another channel.

Wow! 100 free shares in the company. What are those shares worth? A buck each? A penny? How many shares will be given out? What is the worth of the company?

I'm not impressed and I'm still skeptical.

That's what I want. Spam on my phone. It costs me two cents to receive a message so they had better be paying me 3 cents.

A pyramid marketing scheme. A product of questionable value. This has all the earmarks of a major scam. It may not be illegal but it is of questionable value.

Run away!

I think that it is horrible that parents will sell the product at work and the kid gets the bragging rights. Sure, the parents should help but there needs to be a better system.

Last year, my daughter sold 500 boxes of Girl Scout Cookies going door to door. The father of another Girl in her troop sold 500 boxes at his office (he works night shift and everyone is hungry) so his daughter goes around telling everyone that SHE sold 500 boxes of cookies. My daughter just about started a brawl when she said, "No, your dad sold 500 boxes you just sat on your butt."

My pack sells popcorn and does quite well at it. We sold $12,000 this year and $15,000 last year and $10,000 the year before that. The odd thing is that five boys sell 90% of the popcorn and they all do the lion's share of their selling door-to-door.

Perhaps units should recognize the top parents and the top scouts.

For the record, my son is one of those top five and in the four years that he was a Cub Scout he sold about $10,000 of popcorn.

We can't get more boys to sell. Or maybe we can't get more parents to get out with their kids and sell. Only about one quarter of our town gets hit with a door-to-door visitor. The prizes don't help because most of the kids seem to get everything that they want. Our council offers free camp if you sell $2,000 but that hasn't helped. We give 10% of the gross to the seller for Scouting expenses but that hasn't helped either. My son likes the idea that he gets a nice fat Wal-Mart card that he can spend as he wishes (within reason).

The folks around here like the popcorn. I see former customers and they'll say, "When are you coming around with popcorn again. I need more of that Chocolate stuff." (not everyone finds the chocolate stuff disgusting).

People say that girls have the edge on teen-aged boys in selling. Not if the boys act like salesmen and not hoods. When I was a teen, I did plenty of door-to-door selling and I did quite well. Why? Because I presented myself well.

If a teen boy comes to the door with his shirt unucked and his pants hanging halfway down his butt, who will want to buy. However, if that same boy comes to the door wearing a clean shirt that is tucked in, pants pulled up and his hair combed he has a leg up. Now add a proper sales presentation and you've got a 75% chance of a sale.

Sales presentation? Too many kids just go to the door and say, "You want to buy a candy bar?" They don't get my dollar. A kid who rings my doorbell and says, "Hi! I'm Johnny and I'm selling candy for my football team. We have Reeses cups, Hershey Bars and KitKats" will get my dollar.

Selling is a skill and needs to be learned just like knot tying.

Cub Scouts are supposed to only wear the official neckerchief but there is no penalty if they don't.

If you think that it will improve the boys' pride in their uniform, go for it.

Experienced Uniforms gives some good advice. I tried looking at his picture but I all I got was a notice that the page was unavailable.

I was taught to sew patches on uniforms by my mother who learned to do it during the Big One. :-) She was also the only person that I knew who could sew a baseball cover back on.

Experienced Uniforms is right when he says that sewing is not as hard as it is made out to be. Tailoring is difficult but sewing isn't. Once I have a patch in place, it only takes about five minutes to sew it down. Sometimes getting a patch placed properly takes longer than that (t-squares, ruleres, etc. :-)

I think that you can get by with even fewer than six stiches per inch depending on the patch and application. When I'm in a big hurry (like when I was putting a zillion patches on my daughter's Girl Scout uniform the night before a ceremony) I might only put three or four stitches per inch. I have yet to have a patch fall off or come loose.

When you "Bring the needle around the edge of the patch and back through the cloth" be sure to put the needle into the cloth under the patch. You don't have to go very far, just a few threads. Why? If you don't, it looks like a gian spider is holding your patch to the shirt.

Also, where the thread crosses the border of the patch, make sure that the sewing thread and the border thread go in the same direction. If they do, the stitches almost disappear. If you go diagonally across the border, the stitch will show.

One last thing. Trim the patch! Many patches, such as custom unit numbers come with a border of fabric outside the stitched border. (I used to think that was called "selvage" but I was informed that "selvage" only refers to the edge of a bolt of cloth that is made to prevent raveling). Trim that extra fabric. It makes the uniform look much nicer.

I looked at the new hat bands and I was very disappointed. What did I do? I searched ebay for a while looking for a good hat band but didn't find any. Finally I made my own hat band. Actually, I've made four or five so I can change them on a regular basis.

Two were made from women's belts that I got on sale. Find a belt that you like, cut it to the right length (about 2" overlap) and glue it or sew it together.

I've also made a few out of paracord. I like the look of the hat cords with "acorns" so I made one out of OD paracord. I tied the acorns myself with knot that I invented on the spot (I'm sure that it has a name). Then I wrapped the cord around the hat three times and tied each end around the bundle with an overhand know (Like a fisherman's knot). You can tighten or loosen the cord by adjust the position of the overhand knots. You will have to experiment to get the acorns to not dangle over the edge of the brim.

Each cord hatband uses about 10 feet of paracord. The first one took me about an hour to figure out how I wanted to do it. The subsequent ones took about 15 minutes.

Cord hatbands that I've made inclued OD, bright blue, gold, and purple.

"I forgot to add that common sense needs to be applied when buying a Scout uniform. "

Alas, common sense is a commodity in short supply.

Ed sed, " The thing to remember for Boy Scouts is to buy a uniform ths Scout will be able to wear for a lot of years. This way, the up fron cost might be high but in the long run, the cost will be low."

The bad thing is that too many people take the "many years" thing too far. I know one scout whose mother bought him a men's medium shirt. What's wrong with that? Well, I'm 6'2" tall and I fit a men's medium until I hit 190 lbs and this boy is a small 10 year old. The poor kid is swimming in it. The other side of the coin are the parents who don't buy their kids new shirt even though he outgrew it a year ago because "he'll only need it another year."

I know many women who wear a men's shirt because they are roomier.

Also, check out the "uniform exchange" that is mentioned above, his prices seem pretty good.

>> A scout should receive his Eagle Rank when he earns it. No chronological limit is specified nor do I think it should be.

As other have said, BSA patches are not iron on. You have to get them hot enough to melt that plastic which melts the patch. That CubMaster was talking through his hat.

I'm in the bad situation that my cleaner melted my patches patches to one of my shirts and now I'm changing units. Life is interesting.

It's also been my experience that most iron on patches don't stay on the shirt. They come off after a few washings.

I guess that much depends on your point of view. I think that the uniforms are expensive for what you get. However, when you think of the $150 jackets that many kids wear, the uniforms aren't that expensive.

The trousers are pretty bad. Quality and fit sucks. However, the legs are incredibly long so they'll fit for years if the tailor doesn't whack the bottoms off the first time around.

For my part, I don't own an official pair of trousers. For winter I wear a 1951 vintage pair of Army trousers, a perfect color match. For spring and fall, I wear a pair of 1968 vintage Army sateen fatigues, not a perfect color match but better than blue jeans. For summer I have some shorts from Columbia that work fine. My problem with the uniform trousers is not just the quality but also the fit. I'm fairly tall and I cannot get a pair that has a long enough rise without special ordering them.

BTW, for you chubby fellows (I am one), an extra inch or two of rise makes all trousers look better. Your gut doesn't flop over your belt and you actually look slimmer. Also, to help keep your trousers up, use a "Flex Belt", a rubber belt with nubs that hold the shirt down and the trousers up. They are sold in uniform and sport's officials stores everywhere (www.honigs.com)

A couple comments on this old thread.

To make it easier to place my service stars on my shirts, I marked where they go with a couple stitches of khaki thread.

The center of the stars go 3/4" above the pocket (well, if you do all the math it works out to 11/16") and they are 3/4" apart. Simply measure, mark with a pencil and then put in a couple tiny stitches.

The stitches are all but invisible if the stars aren't worn and putting them onto the shirt is a breeze now.

As for the stars being painful on bare skin, wear an undershirt. A snug fitting cotton t-shirt works wonders for making those polyesther shirts more comfortable on hot days. They keep the plastic from sticking to your skin and when the cotton gets soaked, it acts as an evaporative cooler. Loose t-shirts do not work as well.

for my part, I like the neckerchief over the collar but I'm in the minority. I think that it looks nicer because the neckerchief doesn't bunch up as badly. Also, it allows the neckerchief to do one of its original jobs, to absorb sweat.