Posted on 03/18/2007 2:40:41 PM PDT by SmithL
My oldest son just sent in his Eagle application and is waiting for his BOR to be scheduled.
I'm wondering if it is time to add Wilderness Survival as an Eagle-required badge. I made both of my sons do the badge as a mom-required badge last year.
"There were two 15-year-old counselors but no adults present at the campsite."
You dog! You're going to the World Jambo? Any chance you could pick me up a patch or two?
Any FReepers going to the BSA National Annual Meeting in Atlanta this summer?
Prayers for Michael.
LOL! I think I'd just had a baby :-).
Congratulations on the Eagle Scout (to be), MM! Bill is a Star Scout now, and Assistant Senior Patrol Leader. Our second son is going on his first campout with the Boy Scouts this weekend. I believe I'll have everyone watch "Wilderness Bob's Outdoor Survival" DVD again before they go!
The three best things about the BSA Annual Meeting are:
luck of the draw in seating for the Region Banquets (I once sat between the curator of Norman Rockwell works at the National Museum and the Eagle Scout who had been selected for a six-month stint in Antarctica by the London Geographic Society); and
listening to some of the stories of Scouts who were receiving awards for saving lives during the preceding year.
The young man who became famous as the helicopter pilot shot down and taken POW during the first weeks of Afghanistan is an Eagle Scout from Texas. I think I've already written about his (unintentionally) hilarious description of being shot down and taken POW during the National Meeting in Philly a few years back.
What would you like? My personal Holy Grail is one of the red Iceland pullover Scout uniform shirts.
What great experiences you've had!
I'm sure my husband and the upwardly-mobile Bill-Scout would love to have patches. If you had one extra, Bill could give it to his Senior Patrol Leader, an extremely superior young man, who has the Coolest Haircut on Earth, or so I'm told.
(He seems to like our daughter, which is not a bad thing, as long as he gets a haircut eventually :-).
Tax-Chick: Any insight on the NC Scouting boards about how and why this young man may have wandered away?
It's unlikely it was because of a call of nature, because he took lunch with him. As the result of fishing, I discovered the bloodhound trail leads only from the camp to his candy and chip wrappers, and mess kit. It doesn't lead anywhere else. That's not good, and indicates someone else is involved, since a 12y/o can't cover a scent trail. I wonder how far the roads are from this site?
I am highly distressed, instead, with at least 99 of every 100 fourteen-year old Eagle Scouts I've ever met.
Thanks. Doesn't sound good that the scent trail disappears, but I'm not a tracker. I've only backpacked in two areas of the Blue Ridge Parkway. Both were close to roads -- but they weren't all in common use, and the terrain and vegetation could be disorienting.
Not much for suing unless valid, but if anything happened to the kid, they better sue the crap out of them. So many wrong moves on so many people.
I'll be certain and pick up something for the Tax-Chick Scouts when in England.
The newest interesting things I have are large "blanket patch" copies of the Centenary Patch (like the English version I sent for your Scouts for whom I didn't have Iraqi Scouting patches) in about fifteen different languages other than English.
The suggestions from "knows somebody who knows somebody" is that this boy didn't really want to be on the trip, because it turned out his closest friends didn't go. Speculation is that he might have wanted to cause a stir because of being "odd man out" with the other boys. Nothing is definite; third-hand etc. discussions.
The latest data make me wonder if he might not have called somebody on a cell phone to get him. (I know boys aren't supposed to have cell phones on outings, but his troop seems to have blown off some very important rules!) Are his parents together, I wonder, or divorced?
If we're all still FReepin' when Bill gets his Eagle, he'll expect a Scouting antique, too :-).
I've talked with Bill and my husband about your opinion on younger boys' doing Eagle projects, and Bill thinks it makes sense. He's talking now about being an Eagle Scout when he's 16, instead of 14. I'm sure it's relevant that the Coolest Senior Patrol Leader on Earth ("Would you like to marry my daughter, young man?") is currently working on his Eagle at 17!
I can track and am familiar with dogs capabilities. It's been dry there, so tracking should have been easy for a competent tracker. Now things have probably been messed up. Now a tracker would have to go wide to pick up any trail, and differentiate it from the path's of the search parties. Since the dogs have a clear trail between the camp and the spot, but no where else, there must be someone else involved. I'm assuming the dog handler's know their business and didn't clue them to a non-Scout member of the search party. They did have the kid's bedding, so...
Tom (#2 Scout) likes to tell other boys about his Iraqi Scouts patch.
Anything different from the local patches will be appreciated. Maybe in a few years, our troop will plan a Jamboree trip. We've just got a new Scoutmaster (put in several years with the Cubs) who's very enthusiastic.
MarMema,
Sounds as if you've got and SM that understands that the most important part of Scouting is outing and that means woodscraft.
Good luck to your son on the BOR.
As to making Wilderness Survival as an Eagle-required badge, that's perhaps a good idea.
That's a flagrant violation of Safe Scouting rules. The COR should be thinking about a change of SMs.
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