You know you are a Boy Scout when...

As you know, there are all types of facintating groups on Facebook. I found one today that had me rolling on the floor - "You Know You Are A Boy Scout When..." It includes a list of 162 ways to determine whether or not you are. If you aren't, you probably won't even find this entry remotely funny. For those of us raised in Scouting and for whom it is a way of life, it's pretty funny.

Here's a link to the group http://tiny.cc/gEyh4 and my commentary follows on a couple that have the most personal relevance to me.

5-You can relate anything you do to a camp story.
I find myself way too often starting out a story with "remember that time at Scout camp." That's fine for my friends who lived through those adventures with me. For everyone else, it just makes me seem weirder that I already am. Beside how many girls have tons and tons of Boy Scout camp stories?? What I've discovered this year is that apparently Scout camp is the only place where I have any street cred.

39-You see the dirt in your food, but eat it anyway.
Part of my Boy Scouting street cred is the three times I've been to Philmont, a 127,000+ acre Boy Scout ranch located near Cimarron, N.M., in the Sangre de Cristo mountains in the northeastern part of the state. Now, when I was on my first week-long Mountain Women trek, as well as the longer, and much more strenuous, Rayado trek, we started our adventures with the "five-second food rule." If any type of food fell on the ground, it was still good for five seconds. By the middle of the twenty-one-day Rayado trek, I think we were up to five minutes or longer. As long as there wasn't anything crawling on it - or at least nothing that couldn't be brushed off - the food was fair game. I'm not sure my tolerance would be quite as high now.

44-You couldn't imagine dating someone non-scouting.
For most of my life, the joke in my family is that there is a rank requirement to date and marry an Eidam daughter. My brother-in-law is an Eagle Scout. He and my sister met while working on staff together at Seven Ranges (though they didn't start dating until summer camp was over). And Joe proposed to Penny at the chapel at Camp McKinley (where my parents lived until yesterday, now they're at Seven Ranges). The current bf is not an Eagle Scout. But so far, my parents seem to like him, so he might get in without the rank requirement. Though my sister was nice enough yesterday to point out that the family is going to have to take a vote in order to make it official. I told her she better make it soon.

50-As a Scouter your fire starting tools of choice are flint and steel and camp fuel (which gets pour on when the kids aren't around).
Is there another way to start a fire?!?!?!?! Camp "fuel" always worked, especially when the OA guys were the ones responsible for the campfire.

61-You are known by your scout name to more people than by your real name.
My father is known fondly as Ranger Skip. Though his given name is Philip, he has always been known as Skip in Scouting circles. And since he's worked for the Scouts since 1996, pretty much everyone calls him Skip. I can't tell you the last time I heard someone call him Phil. (My mom does call him Vincent - his middle name - when he's in trouble.)

84-You know you're a Scout when you and your significant other met while working at camp, and over half the people at your wedding were scouts.
This one goes back to my sister and brother-in-law. Deciding what to wear to their wedding would have been easier for well over half the attendees at their wedding if the invitation had "Class A Dress Preferred."

92-You know you're a Boy Scout when you refer to the chipmunks on campus as "Mini-bears."
Gee, I thought everyone called chipmunks "mini-bears."

105-You come home from a jamboree and walk down the street at home and want to say hello to everyone you walk past, because it just feels natural.
My parents are friendly anyways, but I'm sure they felt this way after coming home from serving on the staff of the national jamboree.

152-You know you're a Boy Scout when you have the ability to fall asleep anywhere, anytime no matter what's going on around you.
This is how I can tell that I'm way too removed from Scouting in my every day life. In high school, it was a joke that I could sleep anywhere. Top bunk with the overhead lights blaring in Riddle Cabin. Next to the campfire. In the back of the van on the way home from our backpacking trip (there may have been some other things going on back there, but I'll never tell. Hey, it was a co-ed group and the grownups couldn't watch us all of the time). Now I have horrible sleeping abilities and am lucky if I can fall and stay asleep in my own bed.