Use the book as the bee does…

Well this week has been a fairly non-descript week in America. I like to think that that has been fully reflected by this week’s post title. No I don’t understand it either.

Just to show how non descript this week has been, I start this week with Terry Robinson’s epic battle to end the leader’s introductory meeting by 9.40pm (for goodness sake – how did this even make the cut). So by now, you will have realised that I am clutching at straws, but you’re reading on, so I’ll keep writing.

Every Sunday evening, a bunch of senior staff members, and department heads give a series of talks to the leaders of the Scout troops that are in for the week. I go as Asst. Sailing Director, because my boss has stuff to do at the camp fire, which runs concurrently with the meeting. It has appeared that as the season has gone on, our Leader’s meetings have gotten longer and longer. Mainly through contributions from talkative department heads (myself included).

One of our Asst. Camp Directors, Terry, decided this week that we needed to get the meeting over and done with sooner, so that the staff could actually get some sleep before the morning. As I sat down after my Sailing talk, Terry announced to the staff that he would have this meeting wrapped up by 9.40. Usually, we aren’t done until 10. ‘You reckless fool, Terry’ was my reply. It seemed to me like trying to drive a car at 5 miles an hour over the speed limit to get to the takeaway before it closes.

As the department heads had finished, Terry stood up, with a whole third of a meeting to go. Up to this point, the meeting had taken an hour and three minutes, and the time was now 9.33. Terry had seven minutes to complete the meeting. As Terry stood up, everyone could hear the Rocky fanfare in their head. Terry approached the podium, and a full band marched in playing the full orchestral version of the entire Rocky theme. Well that’s how it sounded in my head.

Oh, I know you are all dying to know if Terry achieved this Olympian feat. And yes he did. By 40 whole seconds…

You may remember last week I spoke of an amazing man by the name of Todd Warner (a man so amazing, that he has eight days in his week, he has an extra day between Saturday and Sunday). This week, one of our departments was short staffed, so our amazing colleague stepped into the breach, and taught Citizenship in the Nation. I have never had so many comments of praise and amazement about a class in this department. What he was doing with those kids this week I don’t know, but whatever is was, it was amazing…

Now, I wouldn’t go as far as saying that I am an odd person, but I am an odd person. In this week, the 8th week of my American experience, I finally succumbed to experience homesickness (or domestic nostalgia as the Boy Scouts of America call it). Now this sounds perfectly normal doesn’t it? But it’s me that we’re talking about, and of course I wouldn’t suffer homesickness in the normal way.

Most people would miss their mum, or their family, or maybe even their friends. Now to be fair, I do miss everyone to a point, but not so much that it has caused me to feel homesick. Not even being separated from Monty, my cat, caused my homesickness. No, in actual fact, what did I miss most? Ernie, my car! What kind of weirdo am I?

I really miss driving. Pat (our Health Officer) described my approach to cars and driving, like 17 year old boys approach to the fairer sex. And to be fair, I really do miss my car. So much that it almost hurts. I am weird.

Since about week 4, our ‘big’ sailing boat has not worked quite properly. No one here (including myself) really knew what was causing this. Whilst I am more than capable of running a competent sailing program, but I don’t know an awful lot about repairing large boats. The vast majority of my sailing experience is with small boats.

So I E-mailed the boating manager back home at the NTC. My theory is, that if Ian Jones doesn’t know it about sailing, it’s not worth knowing. He came up with a variety of options, that I have been playing with, to no real effect.

One of the options, was that there was too much weight at the front of the boat. I have looked throughout the foreward cabin, and found to excess weight that wasn’t their week one. And the anchor on the foredeck isn’t that heavy.

This week, I finally decided I was bored of not being able to sail close to the wind, so I stripped the foreward cabin. When I did this, I found that there were two forward compartments that I didn’t know about. The first hold was empty, and the second hatch lead right to the bowels of the hull. And what did I find? Gallons upon gallons of water.

No, I don’t know how it got there. And no, I don’t want to know how it got there. Needless to say, I think I may have found the source of excess weight that was causing us issues. Marvellous. We are emptying out the boat tomorrow, so you can find out how successful this was next week (what a subject to look forward to…).

Lastly, this weekend I got to visit a town called New Hope. How to describe New Hope… Oh yeah. It’s basically Brighton without the beach. And American. You’ll get the idea of the town, when I tell you that the town’s flag is a rainbow…

‘So Andy,’ asked many staff members today, ‘how was New Hope’. To which I replied, ‘Eclectic.’ To write about all of the establishments that I visited would be highly Scout INappropriate. And I’m not talking about alcohol for a change. All I can say is, that Pat has some… er… interesting hobbies.

After our eclectic visit to New Hope, we went to a local vineyard to do some wine tasting. Obviously we were all asked if we were legal. Of course I said that I was. Well in England at least. Who’s worried about US Federal Law… Now, I am not a big wine drinker, so I didn’t dare break the local laws and try any of the wine. Nor did I prove how light weight my alcohol stamina is by feeling a bit dizzy after trying just 10 wines. Lastly, I wouldn’t know that I have a taste for sweet wines…

Well, I hear that the weather is now improving from torrential downpour to light drizzle, so I hope that you are all okay, and that Britain is no longer sinking into the Atlantic. Hello to all my friends, family, and especially Monty, and most defiantly my car, Ernie the Escort.

Countdown to Britain (as of Monday 0900): 352 hours.

If you think that this was a mediocre entry, and that I am a bizarre person, why not leave a comment starting your message with the word ‘weirdo’.

If you think that this was a mediocre entry, and that I am a sub-bizarre persin, why not leave a comment starting you message with the word ‘asparagus’.

Quote of the Week: [Please imagine in a slightly Southern male accent] ‘Give a girl a chance, and they don’t smell too fine either,’ said a Scout in response to my comment that being amongst men all day every day for three months is fine, but women look and smell a lot nicer.