This and That

There’s no overall theme or topic here other than to catch everybody up on some outstanding questions and updates to the blog.  And some random and nonsensical thoughts about whatever.

GSWAC (Not a Council) Survey Update

I decided to ditch the GSWAC (Not a Council) Survey series.  For them to have any validity, I need at least a thousand respondents at the very minimum.  The two largest Facebook groups – one with 29,000 members and the other almost 19,000 – do not allow polls to be posted.  In fact, one doesn’t even allow links to blogs!  I had to really scrape and beg to get over 800 for the last survey, so I think it’s going to be too hard going forward to get what’s needed in order to make this series worthwhile.  I’m bummed, because I thought it had a lot of potential, and I know the answers were used by people in various levels of Girl Scouting.  And I had gone to the trouble of making a cool graphic for the series too!  Oh well. 

BSA

Some of you may be wondering why I haven’t taken on the BSA issue.  I haven’t because I believe it would be counterproductive.  I have views and predictions that I know could be viewed as antagonistic to BSA supporters, and I don’t think my thoughts would change anyone’s mind.  You might think I’m taking the easy way out to avoid controversial subjects or conflict, but I don’t see where there would be any sort of constructive discussion that would come out of it, and I always try to bring something to the table in this blog when I criticize or point out things that could be improved.  Plus, I have no experience with BSA whatsoever other than my own interactions with BSA leaders through the years and listening to my friends’ experiences.  I know very little about their program other than their history and what I perceive as an outsider.  I don’t have any sons, so there’s no interest from a personal standpoint.  They say write what you know, and I don’t know BSA.  So there ya go.  Note:  Any comments trying to stir up something about BSA will not be approved.  If this frustrates you, I suggest WordPress.com’s free plan for personal blogs.

Hiking

I haven’t posted anything about my hikes in quite some time, but there is one in the works that will be interwoven with a review of a backpacking trip that our Cadettes (and we brave leaders) took this past June!

National Governance

It’s been a year since the last National Convention, and most likely the National Board will be announcing the deadline for proposal submissions for the 2020 National Session soon.  I plan to discuss this in a future post.  As a side note, if you had told me less than two years ago that I would know the Blue Book backwards and forwards and had discussed national governance topics enough times for their tags to show up in Top Tags, I would have thought you had me mixed up with someone else.  Ann Robertson maybe?  Just kidding – nobody would ever mix me up with Ann.  She is much classier!  😛

Greenblood in Training?

When I was in Girl Scouts growing up, I always envisioned the die-hard Girl Scout leader’s uniform consisting of a SWAP hat (bucket style of course), a bandana, and a denim patch shirt worn over a camp or Girl Scout related t-shirt.  Unless you were on OFFICIAL business, and in that case, the occasion called for an OFFICIAL scarf.  Sometimes they could play the guitar.  I had never heard the term “Greenblood” until a few years after I had started as a volunteer, but I still had that vision of the ultimate GS leader stuck in my head.

Fast forward to about a week ago, and I found myself ordering a denim shirt from the online GSUSA Store.  I thought it would be neat to turn it into a patch shirt because my patch blanket is beginning to fill up, and I like the way my friend Carol’s looks.  Then it hit me.  I made a SWAP hat a few years ago just because.  And during the aforementioned backpacking trip and without even thinking about it, it seemed natural to tie a bandana around my neck.  I did it again during our troop’s recent trip to Stacie Simpson’s Adventure Camp Overnight event (there’s one in the spring and you should go if you’re in the area).   And I took up classical guitar lessons this past summer.   Oh no!!!!!  What is happening to me????

Extra Spaces

An article titled “Nothing Says Over 40 Like Two Spaces after a Period!” popped up on my Facebook timeline the other day.  I read it since I’m over 40 and I do use two spaces after a period.  Use only one space?  When did this come about?  Who made this OFFICIAL?  I like my two spaces!   But I asked myself, “What Would Ann Robertson Do?”  So I opened a new browser tab and headed on over to the Girl Scout History Project.  I skimmed through the front page.  Darn it.  She only uses one space after a period.  But wait – I see two spaces here and there!  Well regardless, they’ll take my extra space when they pry it from my cold, dead hands.

Next thing you know, they’ll say you don’t have to use Oxford commas.