Will Someone Please Move Their Jeep?

WASHJAM is a big camporee, a scaled down version of National Jamboree for Boy Scouts put on by Chief Seattle and Pacific Harbors Councils. Troops from all over WA, OR, ID, MT, UT attended the first one five years ago. The first WASHJAM was expecting about 1500 youth and adults but by registration close there were only about 1000 registered but by Saturday, there were over 2000 in attendance.

This WASHJAM was attended by the above 5 states as well as a troop from Canada. The word put out was to expect about 3000-4000 youth and adults. On Saturday night at the Grandstand, it was announced there were over 5000 of us and at one point the figure of 5500 was given. As you can see, this is not a small event.

Bigfoot, EagleMom, and That Weird Woman attended WASHJAM. They were invited by an Asst. Scoutmaster to have dinner with them as there would be a lot of food. The 3 had planned to have hot dogs from the back of the van in the parking lot. That Weird Woman asked how many total were in the troop and since they had 10 it seemed a good idea to offer the hot dogs as a bonus to the meal. They had taken 16 hot dogs for the 3 of them.

As everyone was just hanging out until the chili and hot dogs were done, the boys from the troop got some TP from one of the Asst. Scoutmasters and covered a Jeep as much as they could. This Jeep was parked in their camping area but did not belong to any of them. No vehicles were allowed in the camp area, gear trailers were. A Ft. Lewis Security man came around trying to locate the owner. He was asking the troops next to the Jeep if it was theirs. They said no but thought the man had gone over into another camp area when he got out. The Security man told the Scoutmasters he did not care what happened to the Jeep as long as it was not scratched, dented, damaged in any way but if the boys wanted to TP it, cover it in plastic wrap etc, he saw no harm in the prank as it was just "protecting" the Jeep from bird droppings, dust, etc. Boys being boys heard this and you know what they did! They got TP from an Asst. Scoutmaster and covered it. Someone took a picture of them doing it and turned it into the Sub-camp director.

Dinner is over and the boys are playing with another troop in an open field. The Sub-camp director came over and had words with two of the Scoutmasters from the next troop over. It was getting a little loud. The Scoutmaster from the troop we were with went over and calmed it down a little. Another Scoutmaster from the troop on the other side was called over. He backed up what our Scoutmaster was saying about the OK to "protect" the Jeep. Our Scoutmaster went and removed the TP before That Weird Woman could get a picture of it for the newsletter. The Sub-camp director said it was teaching the boys to be disrespectful of others. As far as any of the Scoutmasters, and Asst. Scoutmasters were concerened in the 3 troops involved, it was a harmless prank. The Jeep was not damaged in any manner and it may have taught a lesson the man who parked it illegally in the first place. You follow the rules and DON'T MESS WITH SCOUTS.

In the Name of Coffee...

Our compounding lab work got stuffed in a drawer at the end of our lunch break today. In the name of needing coffee, or anything in my stomach, I ditched my friend today. I would say I ditched her during lab, but this was almost 30 minutes after lab and we still weren't finished.

Thank you to the morning Pharmacy Tech class, Jill and I made a pretty green pain relieving capsule. Measuring out the sprinkles, fine. Measuring out the acetaminophen; run the calculations and crush tablets to smithereens. Measure out 18 grams of baking soda, and you get an hour long fight with a delicate piece of crap we call the scale. Or, according to our lead program chair, a balance. Either way, the thing is a countlessly broken piece of DELICATE EQUIPMENT.

Since the majority of our 90 minute lab session was spent on measuring out baking soda, the punching of #2 size capsules went well into our lunch break. Our entire lunch break.

And good-ole-I-haven't-eaten-since-nine-this-morning was working with the ever so dilligent I-always-study-Jill, I left her for something in my stomach.

In the name of coffee, our lab work was set in a drawer with our names on it, to be finished tomorrow.

Educating Kids About the Intenet-Priceless

I came home from school thinking this would be a very good day to walk with Beadgirl up to the bakery outlet close to our house. I didn't expect to never make it there thanks to some loser moron imbusil player on Runescape who was ACTUALLY TRYING TO STEAL MY DAUGHTER'S ID!

Beadgirl said she would come with me after she decided what to do with her Runescape account. She got a message informing her that her account was reported for scamming other people. Not just once, but to the tune of 24 times. Beadgirl is not, and has never been, the kind of person to pull crap anywhere like that. The person "handling" the "case" told Beadgirl she would need to submit her user name, password and email. For some reason, the account would need to be "played" by the "moderator" so that they could see what was said. If the reports were false, Beadgirl would be rewarded in points, or game money, or whatever it was. But, we would not be able to see information about the incidents.

Hello! The Runescape policy openly states that NO employee will ever ask for that information.

I told Beadgirl to ask if an IP address check can be run during the replay. That will tell us where the log-in to her account came from. She was told by the person on the other end that IP searches could not be done. We wouldn't be allowed to see the information. Not only were we not able to ask for an IP search, we weren't allowed to get time/date stamp information.

This Mamma Bear came onto the chat. In the end, I drove this "undercover moderator" on the other end of the line nuts. This person decided to tell me Beadgirl's account would be blocked. Whatever. The Runescape information openly gives information on moderators. There are no undercover moderators. Jagex employees will never ask for sensitive information, and they do watch for foul play.

My message to Runescape predators:

Don't mess with my kids. You will REGRET IT!

To parents:

There are loosers everywhere, especially the internet. Education is our ultimate Power Tool.

Patches? Who Said Anything About Patches?

I can't figure out why a Boy Scout uniform would need patches. Especially when the uniform has to be worn for seven days at summer camp. Oh please. The shirt doesn't need patches. How can the shirt need patches. It's not the last minute yet.

The conversation I needed to have yesterday:

"Mom," from the vocal cords of Bigfoot, "I YOU need to put patches on my shirt so I can take it to camp."

Everything comes out of Bigfoot's mouth as YOU instead of I. HE needs to do nothing. YOU, meaning I-the mom, need to do everything. I will eventually break him of this habit. Just like I will learn to type without stupid mistakes or the backspace button.

"Which numbers does it need?" I'm thinking it is the shirt that has repeatedly gone home with another Boy Scout, is full of Steam-A-Seam spots, and has come home twice with missing numbers. This is not the shirt Bigfoot has in his mind.

"All of them."

"What?"

"Yeah mom, ALL OF THEM."

"Where is your shirt with the patches?"

"I don't know. I need patches on the blank shirt so I can go to camp."

If I had this conversation yesterday, new patches could have been purchased and the larger shirt would have been properly assembled.

The troop leaves for camp tomorrow. Through today's course of events, lessons have been learned. I learned the Scout Shop is closed on Saturdays in July and August. Patches are not available in a single thrift store in this condemn blessed county. Shirts are no longer available in the thrift stores. Boy Scouts is not dead, just not showing up in thrift stores. Red numbers aren't showing up in stores either. That Weird Woman was told at one thrift store that scout patches are actually being thrown out when shirts do come in. Not cool. Bigfoot has his first lesson in sewing today. He has learned how to use a seam ripper, needle, thread and threader.

He may take all night, but the shirt will get done. The Mom-Fairy may show up and finish it tonight.

Did This Really Happen to Me?

Now that I have six five weeks left of school, I am wondering just what happened this week. I went from a great start to total a total chaos of mess.

Monday was a great day for me. The pin-stripe black suit went on. My resume was printed, on pink resume paper of all things. I normally don't even fathom the idea of printing a resume on anything other than a shade of white and heavy-weight paper. This time, I needed to tap the "extensive" supply of paper at school. My choices of color extended to green, gold, gray, and pink. Right off the bat, green and gold are out of the picture for me. I could have handled the gray if it wasn't a dark gray. Pink ended up being my option since it was the only paper I cold find that would actually make the ink look good on the paper. For some reason, that pink paper ended up being a good thing. Peninsula Community Health Services is working on my background check for externship right now. I don't think I even had a ten minute interview with the lead technician at the clinic and she told me to head over to the administrative offices for paper work! I got my externship!

Tuesday, I learned it is darn near impossible to pull from an ampule, chemo style. My first round in the chaos of Tuesday's lab involved the flinging of an ampule with it conveniently breaking open for me. not only did I not get it the first time, I screwed it up the second time. How anyone pulls anything from a 2ml ampule in a vertical flow hood successfully, I may never know. It reminds me of the Tootsie Pop owl. I never did finish my chemo lab on Tuesday.

I learned on Wednesday that it takes 2 hours to fill 6 retail style prescriptions. New patient information; fine. I can handle that. New Dr. Information? Why am I having to create 6 new doctors in the system? Oh, and to whoever wrote the Robitussin prescription: We don't have it in tablet or capsule form on the school shelves. We only carry it in OTC strength and in syrup form. It takes 100mg to administer a minimum level dose. There is no efficacy in 10 to 20mg of guaifenesin every 4 hours. Let alone, 30 tablets will not do the job. Did you not read the PDR when you wrote the form, or did you just make it up? I had to deal with this crap on Wednesday. Thank you.

I was about to blog about all of this Thursday, that is until I got home from school. That Weird Woman was sick. I had dinner to make, and a conference call to sit in on at the same time. By the time I was done with everything, I was feeling awful, right along with the rest of the family.

I don't like running route when I am feeling sick. I wake up late, drive slow, and make mistakes. Not being able to get back to sleep afterwards due to a caffeine high doesn't make the situation any better. This would be the particular case when I have a demo gig for the day. So today, I fell asleep after route, and woke up late for demo.

Since I hadn't read my sales info, I decided it would be a good idea to stop at Cash & Carry today for gloves. Boy, was that a life-saver. I never needed them, but would not have picked up a food-service grade plastic tray if I had not gone in for gloves. I never did need the gloves, but did need the tray. Actually, I was supposed to have a cooler, but never got that in the mail like I was supposed to. Just like the store I was supposed to work was supposed to receive a memo about today's demo. Sure. Whatever. the store did not know I was coming. The produce manager didn't really want to help me out. There was no product in the store, and he was very adamant that he doesn't carry it what so ever. My confirmation letter sent me to his store, but the forms were printed for another store. My scheduler couldn't figure out what was going on. The other store had no product in stock for me and wouldn't have any for tomorrow either.

So I found my car making its way back across lovely Bremerton to the parking building where I park for school. Since I found my Friday afternoon free of working, I could at least make use of the time for open lab. I, along with two other classmates did make a very nice ointment of sugar, peppermint and clove. Measuring out 15 grams of petroleum jelly is not really my idea of a good time, but the practice was useful.

So, if this was the week I went through, can someone please wake me up now?

Bigfoot's Week

50 miles in the Olympic National Forest
6 Days of HOT weather
Swimming in the lakes and rivers
Wild animals
Drinking glacier water
Thunder and Lightning
1 Forest fire started by the lightning
1 Hail Storm
A wet sleeping bag from having to use the bag's sack as a bear bag.
Pizza somewhere near Hoquiam
Tired feet

I Finally Got It Finished Today!

Today was one definitely of those hectic homeschooler days. I woke up late for route, causing me to meet my rider late. Ok, so I made up for that with a route completion time of 1:45. Nice. I haven't done that to date yet.

Ok, so I came home, decided I needed a nap, woke up late for what I could afford. I still had this dear TB paper to write. Even at 8am, I still couldn't push out even a paragraph. I guess that wasn't too big of a deal since I had to get myself and the car off to a rear brake job. Got the car to the shop, after turning around for the checkbook and my purse. On the way over, I was reminding myself to ask for a fuel filter along with the brakes. I was in perfect hectic homeschooling form and forgot.

Well, that gave me something like four hours to finish the paper that I still only had half a page done. Of course, once I got to school, I couldn't use the computers in the Pharmacy Lab right away. I ended up having to use the resource room. That's just fine until I have to plug my ear plugs into a tower below the desk. I'm not too fond of playing Twister to listen internet radio while working on a paper.

At least I finally got my paper finished today. All fourteen pages jetted out of the school printer one hour before the cut off. Nice.

I walked out of the module today with straight A's! YES! Six weeks left!

I love it when I have a hyper-under-control day. I get so much stuff done, even if things seem a little crazy and hectic.