Re:Master at Arms Badge for Boy Scouts (1925) [pdf]
by ddoolin on Wednesday May 11, 2022 @04:37PM
(#31345420)
I wasn't at all worried BEFORE that swim test, but afterwards I can safely say that was legitimately difficult and pretty terrifying. Especially when you realize the lake we did it in was full of leeches, which was completely foreign to me at the time.
Re:Master at Arms Badge for Boy Scouts (1925) [pdf]
by nytesky on Wednesday May 11, 2022 @05:00PM
(#31345705)
Ah summer lake leaches. Stuff of nightmares. My understanding was as long as you didn’t touch the mucky bottom you were in the clear? I swam in New England lakes for 20 years and never had one myself but saw several.
Probably why I did the mile swim several times, treading water to keep leach free builds endurance.
A few years later I went to a different summer camp as a senior patrol leader and finally got my swimming badge along with canoeing and rock climbing - that was a great week too. Point being: there's value in the "boring" stuff, maybe even more so now that I'm established in my career and looking for a little more peace these days. Lately I've been strangely interested in weaving and am thinking of making a simple loom - maybe this goes back to my basket weaving experience when I was 10?