King Ding Dong

Then she probably doesn't have insurance and she should be in jail. I was thinking the same thing. Like all the people that wanted to rent my house but threw a fit when the application asked for their checking account number. Huh? It is printed on every check you have ever written.

Pardon my ignorance, but are there really places you can just walk down the street carrying a shotgun ?

Always the optimist.

They still make them???

I suggested your approach last year. The problem a few pointed out to me was the principle of "never punish a scout for the failure of an adult". So as AC I would send email reminders a week before the pack meeting and accept the awards list from email. I guess I could also be accused of being an enabler.

So BD you are hanging around, nothing on the med form issues ?????

Thanks. In my opinion I need some both. I am not trying to fix the adult problem on the backs of the troop. I also think troop responsibility to the pack involves more than a single Webelos campout once a year. Working on selecting a new COR, yes have a Pack CC (but has a father in hospice right now). I will not do everything. CO is a PTO with its own involvement issues, so CM will need to come from within the pack. I saw somewhere a troop put an ad on Craigslist for a SM. lol

I not spoken to the SM about this particular award, but have asked him what he defines a Patrol Activity as. He says it is two or more scouts getting together for the purposes of scouting. Is he correct? I don't know. Is there more to it ? Does not seem like a silly question to me. Can two Scouts get together and take a bike ride on a trail for 15 miles and count those miles ? Does the entire patrol need to attend ? One patrol member doesn't even know how to ride a bike (I know amazing). At least two if not three cannot pass the swim test. A separate issue I am not entirely clear on is what kind of adult leadership is required. I see conflicting opinions. Two deep for day activities ( my CC thinks so) ? One, None ? I know I have read a patrol can take a hike without adults tagging along. What about bikes ? What about lap swimming at a pool with lifeguards ? Are patrol activities limited to the lowest common denominator skill set of the patrol ?

I do not have the authority to ignore National. Thanks guys for helping clear this part of this up. Under the auspices at this point seems to be at the SM discretion, until we can find further clarification. Before you get your panties in a bunch BD, I am not SM, do not feel ready for SM and have to many other things to deal at the moment to entertain that. You all may feel it is a silly question, but as evidenced by the replies to this thread, many people are confused by the wording and intent from national. Especially those that are new.

Condensed background: I moved back to the area last fall do am new to the pack and troop. By way of field promotions I have gone from asst. DL to Institutional Head of CO very recently. Very little troop involvement in pack beyond a few Den Chiefs and even that service I have not seen much of, but I could be wrong. In my opinion Pack is on verge of imploding because lack of parental involvement by enough that it is causing problems. As of this moment we do not have a CM. One of my goals is to get more troop involvement, partially to help where the parents are failing and partially to help show the parents what we are trying to build their children into. A few troop committee members do not think service to the Pack counts for SH, but SH to the CO does. In my understanding the Pack doesn't really exist as a separate entity. I do not want to dictate where a scout does his SH, that is up to the SM and Scout. I just want to know where I stand technically. A separate question is should I use SH as a carrot to get more troop involvement with the Pack. I don't think I should have to, but my main mission at the moment is to save the Pack so it can be rebuilt. We have had several leaders resign recently due to either burnout or lack of den attendance. At the moment I am not even sure we have a Webelos II Den. To few doing to much. There are days I want to throw in the towel on the Pack, but other days I do see positive steps forward.

Yes BD I am here, you got a response from national. Thanks for clearing it up.

Our BSA council has the same mom and dad can't tent together rule. I like to call it the No Marriage Rule or the Ricky and Lucy Rule. Total idiocy.

He should get a Brockabrella. These were huge back in the day. Don't know if they were marketed outside St. Louis, but everyone had one.

Does service to the Pack count toward 2nd-life service hours? For example helping run a Pack summertime swim party (run the grills) ? My understanding is they do as long as they are not a Den Chief for the pack.

Our license for Scouttrack up soon. Adoption by the 3 tiger dens has been great, less so by the other dens. Not many parents use it for tracking advancement, it ends up falling on the DLs. If the information is entered it is a big help for the advancement chair (me) Certainly more an issue for Webelos as the DLs take care of the beads. The UI certainly is crummy, but it does have advantages. Just not sure it is worth the $50. Any opinions on other Pack software ?

Certainly that cucumber scented crap would turn a bears stomach.

Unfortunately we have been given religous texts that are so confounding that we need teams of religous scholars to interpret them for us and tell us each week what they really mean. I so much would prefer a one or two page memo in language I could understand. I pray for such a document regularly, but my prayers have gone unanswered. A pamphlet would even do. I would settle for a updated revision in English every 10 years or so. I am sure God could find some volunteers to help out.

"Joe Vaughan has been Scoutmaster of Troop 724 since 1999. His military background shows as he directs his Scouts around the campsite, intermittently puffing on a cigarette." Anything amiss here ? "Nicholas Keim, 17, joined Troop 724 after leaders in his previous troop told him he’d never become an Eagle Scout, the highest rank attainable in the Boy Scouts" “(Troop 724) has really helped me to be more social, to find a part of me that wasn’t brought out in my other troop,†said Keim, who has been diagnosed with bipolar disorder. “There, I didn’t feel safe, happy or respected. Here, I have friends.†That doesn't speak well for the at least one other troop in the area. Hope it wasn't mine. We have a special needs member of our troop that did make Eagle, but he is not happy or respected or included by the members of his patrol. Another new scout with some issues feels the same way. Question, does the boy led, 300 feet patrol method work with special needs scouts ?

Exactly as written. Bytes as so expensive.

Little boys and girls act differently. A good DL can lead the boys with the parents just sitting by the fire. Not all of us are that good. The parents are also their for youth protection.

In the Bryan on Scouting post, The Advancement Team was only commenting on the camping requirement for the rocker, not the gold and silver devises. As I stated in the other thread, an very active and former district EBOR Chairman stated to me you must read every BSA requirement as a strict constructionist. The requirements for the gold and silver devices do not state the camping, riding, hiking, aquatics activities need to be under the auspices, so they don't. The adventure requirements devices do state under the auspices, so they do.

Can you describe the ruckus, sir ?

An interesting idea about integrating webs more with the troop. At the web II fall camporee where I noticed the older boys complaining about the obnoxious webs. They were joining the troop in six months. Does that six months add some maturity ? Does the whole crossing over part add a bit of seriousness to them ? Interesting thoughts on separating the webs from the Tigers because my son has been very nurturing to the younger cubs and maybe in the next six months to a year would make a good den chief for tigers. Rather than separate them, how about have the Webelos use their skills from the Forestry badge and lead the mini hike talking about trees and help the tigers make their leaf rubbings. Seems to me that approach would help the transition to BS better than separating them and also help show the new parents what we are trying to achieve in scouts.

I hear it costs $50 for a scout to get his picture taken with a VS model.

It should be required so we don't get lost on a hike on a council reservation with faded trail markers and maps with lakes that dried up 25 years ago. 10% of male population is color blind to some degree.