TU Rob

We're one week out from a week long mission trip to the Pacific Northwest. My sons and I have been involved in a local scouting troop for a few years. I had actually joined up with my older son in the fall of 2019 when he was 6 years old. We hung around for half that year, then Covid hit and we were not allowed to hold meetings for a long time. By the time they were able to meet again, he didn't show a lot of interest, and I didn't want to force it. I was in the middle of changing jobs and the kids were changing schools, so we tried to keep the extracurricular stuff to a minimum for a little while. We had been trying out other activities along the way. Sports, Music, he's an A+ student and always has high 90s for his average grade in class. When I mentioned going back, he said he never really had fun there. I didn't want to push him at the time, but I was thinking that not every activity is always about fun and games, and sometimes you need to go outside your comfort zone.

His little bro is 5 years younger, so when he got old enough to join at 6 years old, we all joined back up. I knew the youngest would take right to it and love it. He's very spirited and outgoing. My older son, the middle child, is stuck between an older sister that just graduated high school and our youngest who is about to turn 8. What got him wanting to try it again were a few of his best friends from school were checking the troop out as well. We've been back in for almost two years now, and I have seen a lot of growth in him. Being around older boys as well as his friends his age, all of the different skills he's learned, plus he has come out of his shell so to speak.

Last fall our troop leader floated the idea of a mission trip to the dads first, then to the older boys in the troop. Several were interested, and we explored it a little more. We are going to an Indian Reservation in Washington state that our church's youth group has been to several years in a row for a mission trip. The boys have been active in the planning stages, making decisions on what activities we'll be doing, planning events to have for their kids club activities in the afternoon, and what all needs to be taken with us and what we needed to have shipped out there.

Most mornings we will be on work crews, and after talking with my daughter who has been out there the last 3 summers, it could be any variety of things. From painting houses on the reservation, yardwork, splitting wood, roofing projects, trash clean up etc. Our boys aren't old enough to get on a roof for liability reasons, but we'll probably end up doing most everything else.

We arrive late Friday night in Portland and are spending the night in a hotel there. The main reason I posted this on the OB is the outdoor activities we'll be doing along the way. We're going to Multnomah falls to hike some, and another nearby hiking spot that I'm drawing a blank on the name at the moment. Then we have to swing back to the airport to pick up two guys that were not able to fly with us on Friday, and we're driving 3+ hours out to the middle of nowhere to the reservation. We're going to stop at a fish hatchery place on the way that has some sort of underwater viewing area for large sturgeons. And eating dinner at some place overlooking the gorge.

Later in the week on our off day from the work crews, we are going to Mount Rainier to hike and maybe do some snow tubing. At the end of the week the tribe we'll be serving is having a pow wow, where we've been told there will be all local foods served. I think I heard Elk, Salmon, something else, and freshwater eel. So I'm sure we'll have some adventurous teenage boys try the eel. I'll be sure to come back and post some pictures.

Oh and the coolest part, we get to sleep in an old school teepee for the week. We take the boys camping quite a bit, but it is all in modern tents or hammocks.

6 is ribbed for her pleasure.

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Mike Leach was right. Just shorten the season to 10 games and run a 64 team playoff.

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This would be great. Except I might stop at 32. All conferences go back to 8 conference games, plus 1 P5 and 1 G5 game. No more scheduling FCS schools. Allows for rivalry games between schools in different conferences and one cupcake. Season starts after Labor Day, ends Thanksgiving weekend.

This year it would look like round of 32 on Dec 5th, round of 16 on the 12th, round of 8 on the 19th. Take Christmas week off, semi finals on New Year's Day, Championship on January 8th or 9th, depending if you want it on Friday or Saturday. No more Monday night championship games.

The one that sticks out to me was a buddy of mine growing up in Mississippi, his dad had a conversion van. We'd ride around in the back of that thing, it had no seats, just an old mattress. There were some seat belts along the side wall, so we were buckled in, but sitting on a mattress. Looking back now, I'm guessing the old man had a side piece and it was his shaggin wagon.

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feel like this is a pretty common sense take but I'm seeing more and more stories like OPs.... again the narcissism in boomers is wild to me. The need for family events to follow their instructions, center around them etc. Couple this w the weird phenomenon of them being a generation who constantly dropped their kids off at grandmas and now wont do shite w their grandkids and you really get stories like this. Today is about me frick your kids and family

seeing it in my own mom and just kinda created respectful distance

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And then you have what I've dealt with, and that is a grandmother who shows little to no interest in our kids. Not narcissism, just laziness and apathy. When ours were younger, there would be times they would go spend the night at my mom's, but then she had an affair, divorced my dad, and got remarried and had no time for us. The breaking point for us to quit asking to come over and visit and bring the kids was when she confided in my wife that she couldn't watch our daughter one night when we had plans because her boyfriend was coming over. And wanted my wife to keep it a secret from me. Thankfully my wife said we keep no secrets in our marriage, brought our daughter home, and there was a long period after that where we just quit trying. Her priorities were elsewhere, and if that is what she wanted to do, fine with me, just don't complain if you're not in our plans for a while.

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Anybody know the best option as far as shoe/brand to help with Achilles issue with that type of usage.

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Is it just that they're digging into your achilles, or are you getting calf tightness and tension in the achille? I had the latter issue, and went to a running store to get my feet measured and they recommended a support/motion control shoe for me. I like Brooks Adrenaline to run in, but everyone is different. Best bet is to try on different brands and see.

I’ve got a few different Peter Millar, but my go to are J Crew slim untucked. Similar material and fit but at a fraction of the cost. The only downside is the collar isn’t as crisp.

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WTF is the obsession with weather girls on the OT?
Are y'all multi-tasking - jerking off while watching the 6:00 news?

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Walmart neighborhood market that I go to for most groceries just underwent some renovations. Prior to that, they had 2 self checkouts with full conveyor belts on them. I don't mind this type because I can unload the cart all the way, then roll it forward to the bagging area and fill it back up as I scan things. After the renovation, they are still physically there, but never open. Instead there is a little corral of self checkout kiosks with one employee watching them. The most you can get bagged is maybe 3-4 small grocery bags, then you're trying to put them somewhere while you continue. Give me the first option and I will gladly use it, and if I only have a handful of items I will use the second option. Outside of that, I like for a person to ring me up just because it is the traditional full conveyor belt setup and I can completely unload the cart.

Publix near my house is the same way. 3 self checkout stations, but the bagging area is so small.

We're taking a small group from our scouting troop out to Washington State in a few weeks for a mission trip. Long story, but most of our group is able to fly out on a Friday and a couple have to wait until Saturday. This is going to give us about 6-8 hours to kill that Saturday before we pick them up from the airport, and were looking into a few sites to go for a quick hike. Our troop leader has tasked my son with deciding on what adventure to take. He had a few recommendations, so I wanted to ask here to see if anyone has been to any of them and if you'd recommend any over the others. Also if you have other places you've been and think some teenage boys would enjoy, please let me know.

Multnomah Falls, Latourell Falls, and Forest Park were the ones he had found online. Proximity to Portland is most important, as we have to be back at the airport around 3-3:30 that afternoon to pick up the rest of the group. Looking at maps, they all look fairly close, but in my mind we don't want to go too far out of the way and deal with traffic considering the schedule. Both of the falls are east of PDX, and Forest Park is west of there, so not knowing traffic patterns or other issues, I'm thinking we'd rather hit both of the falls as they are closer together and not double back to try to go to Forest Park.

We're planning on seeing Mount Rainier later in the week, so that wouldn't be necessary on this day.

Definitely YouTube. Pretty sure you can have multiple streams going at once too. I've had one football game on the TV and one on a tablet at the same time, although that was in the same house. So many places these days have Smart TVs and I've been able to log in and watch when we're on vacation just fine.