Wednesday, July 27, 2005

Call me a bastard

But I'm supposed to feel bad for these guys?

BOWLING GREEN, Va. - They were deeply devoted to the Boy Scouts, traveling thousands of miles to the woods of northern Virginia for 10 fun-filled days of fishing, archery and storytelling beside the campfire. One of their first tasks: Set up a large tent.

But the task went terribly awry when they lost control of a giant tent pole and it hit some nearby power lines, killing four Scout leaders as horrified youngsters looked on, said Bill Haines, a Scout executive in Alaska. [my emphasis]

[. . .]


Now, I don't know about you, but I was a Boy Scout (until they threw me out, but that was another story). I learned (before our first campout) that before you pitched a tent, you checked for any obstructions above, anything that might fall (branches, rocks, etc.) on you overnight, shit like that. Didn't anybody check? Look up and say, 'wow, will the center pole clear the wires?' or 'hey, there's wires, how tall is this tent?'. Nah. Leave us to just stick that pole right up there and . . . zzzzt! Idiots. If there's any consolation, these guys won't be imparting their obviously vast 'knowlege of the outdoors' to anyone else's kids. Who knows what these guys would fuck up out in the backcountry?

"Oh yes, son, go pet the big kitty cat."

Morons. Call it throwing the skimmer in the gene pool.

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