Life is about change, isn't it? Yeah, it is. Can't stop it so might as well work on controlling as much of it as you can, and generally, that is very little. One of the things I am able, to a degree, to control is my appearance. And one of the things about my appearance I can control is my beard and mustache. Hahahaha, they're not a lot but, hey, they're mine.
And so after some thought and reflection I decided to do away with the fuzzy chin (for a while). It seems to grow to a certain point and then sorta stop. Running in place as it were. And I was getting tired of it anyway.
It didn't look all that bad but it didn't look all that good, either. Seems, as I mentioned already, that my hair gets to a certain length and then it stops all on its own. No bushy ZZ Top beards for me. And, bottom line, it was getting to be more bother than a better.
And so I made it vanish. Hahaha, whadya gonna do when you get really bored, eh? I did decide to keep the frizzy little handlebars. Even though they are not all that great looking.
I tried out the 'bars for maybe two days but I realized I was walking around acting like Snidely Whiplash. Y'know, twirling the ends of my mustache. Even I was getting annoyed with that.
So I rethought the whole thing. It wasn't that good looking and so, I decided it was gone, too.
I'm not saying this is any better but it sure ain't any worse. And so I'm back to Square One. Back to the original. Until the next time. I am not someone, as you probably know already, who likes shaving on a daily basis.
And so life changes and you roll with the world. And you trim your 'Stache.
Life is rolling along and I get a text from my Granddaughter, Lexi, asking for my address. She says she has something to mail to me. Alright, I am not the brightest bulb in the marquee...far from it. But I had a sneakin' suspicion that she and Cade were up to something...something involving the Air Farce.
And then, just a couple days later this package arrived for me in the mail. Naturally I did the Christmas thingie where you squeeze the package ever so gently all around trying to discern what might be inside. And I got a pretty good idea. Hahaha, I didn't spend all that time in the Army and over in Kuwait for nothing.
Even though I had a good idea of what it was I withheld judgement until I could open it.
And that was the next step. I gently cut off the end and then, with bated breath, I slowly opened the package and peeked inside.
Hahahaha, Good One, Lex and Cade.
You got me. It was an Air Farce Cap, Lanyard and T-Shirt.
This might be the ONLY time I ever wear this combo.
I did not feel comfortable in it at all. I closed the blinds so no one could see me wearing it. Hahahaha, I was expecting it but even having a good idea of what was coming didn't really prepare me for the horror of it.
Hahahaha, nicely done!! It was good of Lexi and Cade to think of me...even with an Air Farce outfit. But, to be honest, I'm more comfortable with this cap. And I keep hoping that someday I will find an appropriate Marine Corps cap that I can wear without feeling foolish.
Hahaha, this was before I trimmed up the 'Stache. Good decision that, eh!?! Hooah!!
And I'm still doing puzzles. And still having a good time at it.
I'm not up to doing a 1,000 piece puzzle. These 300-500 piece puzzles suit me just fine. And this one brought with it a little surprise. When I opened up the box I found that someone had thoughtfully placed all the outer edge pieces in a separate baggie.
That made it uber easy and quick to get the frame done and then get started on filling it in from the outside in.
But, to be honest, I'd rather they hadn't. They're just 300-550 piece puzzle and, really, you do need a little bit of challenge doing them. Having the outside pieces already separated seems a bit much. But, to be honest, when I had finished the puzzle and was ready to box it up I went ahead and put all the outer pieces into the baggie for the next person. Maybe they'll be the ones to break the cycle but I just felt I was paying this one forward.
And, bottom line, it was a fun putting this one together as it was all the others. Just a bit quicker.
And I enjoyed it.
I like to leave the puzzle on the table for a day or two and just enjoy it. The small pictures within the picture thing. Like these little witches stirring up some trouble in their cauldron.
Or this neat Victorian House. I'd hate to be paying their electric bill. Man, that would be scary as all get out!! But how cool to have a four story house with a great front porch. And the Jack-O-Lanterns providing the decorations around the outhouse.
No bats in their belfry. They're all out flying about in the night sky. While they're scary-looking as Hell, bats are actually a definite real world asset. Besides being the only mammals that can fly, they're really good on pest control. They eat bugs that attacks pecans, almonds, rice, cotton, corn, coffee sugarcane, tomatoes, cucumbers and beans. Hooah!! And they help to pollinate plants.
Good enough for me but, still, don't like'em. Just keep a healthy distance from me, please.
Speaking of scary stuff, Troop 47 hosted the Yaquina District Cam-Por-Ree this year at Wapiti RV park. They called it the Zombie-Ree and all the events were themed around Zombie nonsense.
Here's the patch everyone who attended got.
And here's where it was held. Pretty neat, eh!?! It was in the open fields at the south end of the RV Park. Plenty of space to stretch out and have fun.
And plenty of room and materials for Scout Craftsmanship, or Pioneering Skills. Like this Flagpole. Pretty doggone neat.
The District Executive, possibly the youngest in the Nation, was there and Carol and I got to say Howdy to him and chat for a while. Behind him is the Monkey Bridge Troop 47 made.
The Scouts got to practice all kinds of camping skills like making a fire with steel wool and a flint. Oh, and a little newspaper scrap, too.
Everything was based on teamwork. This event required you to move the bear from one to the other of the three metal objects. You had to move him by maneuvering him by pulling on your respective line. So to move him towards you, you'd pull and the person opposite you would have to let out a little of their line.
Teamwork.
This looked like a lot of fun. They had to balance the bowling ball on the sheet of plywood with the ropes they tied onto each corner. Then they had to move it about 40-50 feet without dropping the ball off the plywood. This took a LOT of teamwork. If you dropped it you had to go back and start over again.
I think at this station they had to tie knots.
And here, well, I don't know except it involved taking down this tripod. I'm sure there was more to it but I don't know exactly.
Oh, hey!! Here they are on the Monkey Bridge.
And they even had a catapult to use. Funtastic!!
At this station, the scouts were blindfolded except for one team leader. They had to go and pick up the body parts while blindfolded and wearing one oven mitten. They could only use one hand and had to listen to their controller. Not as easy as it sounds.
Here they had to lash a 150lb punching bag dressed up as a Scout and then tow/lift him up about 40 yards and then back again. It got heavy.
This is Christian's first Executive position and he is working hard at it. He's got a lot to learn and a lot to overcome. He's so young I don't know if he even has to shave yet. But being young and inexperienced are just two of the hurdles. He also has to overcome the bad taste left in everyone's mouth after the last District Executive who was more talk than action.
But he's jumping right in and he is listening to advice and then making his own decisions. Smart move. Anyway, I had several old Scout Books and so I made them a present to Christian, sort of learn from the past to move into the future. The book he's holding is the Handbook for Scoutmasters from around 1913. I gave him several old books that I had. A nice little library to help him get started.
Doing a lot with the Pack these days and, yeah, the Pack is changing too. It's growing for one. We've had a lot of new kids join. And there is room for more growth, too.
But it's also changing in that the Pack Committee voted to allow girls to join the Pack beginning in September of this year. Life is about change, right? I've got mixed feelings about this. Sometimes it feels like the future is steamrolling over me and I can't stop it. And it's not always going in a direction I would agree with.
But we had an unusual Den Meeting last week. A number of the Den Leaders were unable to make the meeting so Hannah, the Cubmaster, decided to step out of bounds and take the Pack down to the beach, a quarter-mile away, and let the boys run wild.
And off we went. Carol was designated as the Trail Blazer and led the way with Isaiah.
Once there, she stopped everyone at the head of the stairs at the beach access to wait for the rest of the Pack to show up.
It's Oregon. Just 15 minutes prior, when we made the decision to walk down to the beach the sun was shining and the air was light. We get to the beach and there is this.
Not reassuring.
But it didn't bother the Knotheads. They were off and running.
Me? I don't see the fun so much of being on the beach and I stayed, wisely I think, at the top of the stairs. Two plusses. Plus #1 - I didn't get all sandy and frustrated. Plus #2 - I didn't have to walk down the 4,000 or so steps to the beach cuz you know as well as I do that if you walk down them stairs...you gotta walk back up'em.
When we finally got everyone back up from the beach we got a group photo. Just a normal group of Cub Scouts and their parents.
Yeah, right!!
There was a post on FB about what 70s Sports Car would you choose to drive down a road and they had a picture of a curvy, up-and-down two-lane highway stretching off into the distance. My first thought was of the only real 'Sports Car' I've ever owned...
My 1972 Mercury Capri.
It was the very first new car I ever bought. Mary and I bought it in 1972 as we got ready to make the trip across the Nation from Whittier, CA to Fort Monmouth, NJ.
Stick shift with great road handling, it could hug them curves, it also came with, at my personal request, an 8-track. Hahahaha, that's right!! Just as the 8-tracks were heading out and cassettes were coming in I once again missed the 'coolness' boat and bought the outgoing trend instead of jumping on board the latest cool thing train.
D'oh.
But it was a cool car and fun to drive. We had it all the way from 1972 until around 1981. I wish, like a lot of the cars I once owned, that I still had it. But, as I've noted, things change and so does the car that you drive.
Vroooom...
And so I'll bring this Chapter to it's natural ending.
Change is inevitable and not always pleasant. Regardless, it's gonna happen and I guess you need to accept it, adjust to it and control it as much as you can. Which is, in my case, not a whole heckuva lot.
Still, life goes on. As the great philosophers, Lennon and McCartney would say: O-Bla-Di, O-Bla-Da, Life goes on, Brah, La la how the life goes on.
Hooah!!
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