I’d unwittingly volunteered to do a Webelos Weekend and spent far more time preparing for it compared to any program I’ve ever run.  The theme was “Mad Scientist Training Weekend” and kids completed the Science related activity pins.

Highlights:

• A fight between the Scout professional and the event staff over the breakfast drinks between water and juice.  The compromise: Tang
• A leader asked if I could leave the pavilion light on as he graded papers saying he was a college professor.  I checked back and he was grading papers titled “and now you try: identifying nouns”
• The evening meal for the kids was a mini-pizza and pasta for the adults.  A leader asked if he could bring out his propane stove to cook something and the administrative head shot it down.  He later approached me and offered me an Omaha Steak in return for some black-market grilling.
• My dad was pressed into running a station after a station lead texted out sick.  Normally he doesn’t smoke on Scout trips as the outdoors calms him, apparently Cub Scouts don’t as he decimated cigarettes between groups in about 8 seconds.
• The evening presentation involved five rapid-fire demos that Joe and I did involving Newton’s First Law of Motion and atmospheric pressure.  Joe and I made up a neat presentation where he breaks a brick over my hand with a hammer without injuring my hand to which no one responded.  HE BROKE A BRICK OVER MY HAND.  But when I used a playing card to seal a graduated cylinder everyone was stunned.  After the presentation no less than 5 kids approached doubting the card’s efficacy until they tried it.  Each was completely uninterested in how a brick broke over my hand.
• I had to drive home to grab a broom to clean up the next day and picked up Max so he could go for a run in the park.  He was very interested the trip until he arrived, took a massive dump and ran back to the car.  I think my family’s dog may be responsible for a series of shit-n-runs.

Go Webelos.