Scouting Hours

Starting this year I will be recording the number of hours that I spend on activities, meetings, outings, camp outs, summer camp, scout projects, event preparation, meeting preparation, and finally any other Scout related task. I do not expect any problems with accurate tracking as I have now accurately tracked the first three weeks of January but I am not sure if this will happen. But the only thing I can do is to try to strive for recording hours for every one of the items listed above.

It should be interesting to find out the total number of hours.

As of 17:15 on January 24, 2012 I have already done 78.5 hours. So I think my average will be approximately 100 plus hours per month for a total of at least 1200 hours.

I still have a campout coming up so I will most definitely reach 100 hours this month.

Yours in Scouting Service
Mark West
Assistant Scoutmaster
Troop 1316, Troop 1616(aka 669), Troop 125
Tustumena District/ Denali District/ Eklutna District, Great Alaska Council
NSJ '05 Youth Participant NSJ '10 Subcamp 7 Youth Staff NSJ '13 Subcamp Staff
WSJ '07 Youth Participant WSJ '11 International Service Team(IST)
Eagle Scout OA Brotherhood Honor Big Horn Denver Area Council NYLT QM
Philmont AA '08


If you are paid to do Scouting, you are called a professional. If you
are not paid to do Scouting, you are called a Volunteer. If you pay to
do Scouting, then you are called a Scouter

Assumptions and their effect on society

Scouting Thought of the day:

Don't ever, ever, and never assume something about someone, the only thing you can guarantee from assumptions is that they will come back to haunt you in the end and it means that you will never know or have the ability to fully understand those that surround you.

Eventually assumptions lead to anger, depression, hurt, less involvement, and bullying. So the question today is why do people make many assumptions about so many different things. The answer includes some of the following:

1. Stereotypes: we all stereotype some one at some time in our life, it is impossible to not do so. Remember that just because a person can be labelled or grouped a certain way doesn't mean that the label or group fully represents who they truly are.

2. Emotionally controlled: Many people out of the three basic thought patterns which include ethos, pathos, or logos, will spend most of their time in their pathos state of mind. First let me say that not just one of these states of mind will create a better time but using all three will make you a better person. Even with that you will have one primary mind state. Ethos is appealing to ethics or using previous credible situations and having advanced knowledge of the subject. Pathos on the other hand is purely related to the emotional side of our thinking process. Emotions all us to find ways to deal with feelings and the nuances that go with those feelings. Finally logos is the appeal to logic or use of rational and concrete based thoughts to determine how to proceed.


3. Pattern based thinking: I admit since that I spend so much more time in the logos state of thought I regularly and probably on a too often basis will end up using patternized thinking. Using patterns can help us make sense of the world around us but also have the disadvantage of making unique individuals or those that go against the norms of society seem radical, outcast like and have a inability to handle matters of group and societal based concerns.