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WIWAC

Started by ol'fido, November 17, 2011, 12:41:12 AM

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NIN

1985. Operation Summer Condor, Michigan Wing. 

The conops is that its a cadet leadership activity in the guise of a field training event.

Cadets are asleep around the firepit Saturday AM when some sorry SOB drops an artillery simulator in the firepit. (lets just say that dumping the arty sim *in* the firepit is NOT the best idea... the ash and stuff gets over EVERYTHING. Lesson learned by the sorry SOB.)  Everybody is now awake.

Cadets find a note from the staff. "Pack your trash and head out.  Here are the coordinates for the next training evolution. Be there by 3pm."

The cadre are all in the woods, camo'd up (hush, BDUs weren't authorized for like 6 more years) and following along, observing.  Its a leadership reaction course without any boundaries. Who takes charge, who communicates, who is paying attention, who is vying for the leadership role, etc.

The staff shadow the cadets all the way from Camp A to Field Site B, documenting all the arguments, fights over the map, the senior NCO basically abrogating his leadership role to the more junior cadets who knew how to land nav, etc.

It was a hell of a lesson for a lot of people. Throw a really unstructured event at people who are expecting to be led around by their nose all day and spoon fed things.

Darin Ninness, Col, CAP
I have no responsibilities whatsoever
I like to have Difficult Adult Conversations™
The contents of this post are Copyright © 2007-2024 by NIN. All rights are reserved. Specific permission is given to quote this post here on CAP-Talk only.

AngelWings

Quote from: BillB on July 12, 2012, 01:26:14 AM
Every and I repeat, Every cadet that has seen photos of old cadet activities or heard the war stories said they wish CAP was still like that. One said that CAP was getting boring with so many restrictions. But when you ask what restrictions, you will not get any two cadets to agree what they are.
What we need as cadets is those cool senior members who are willing to do crazy things for us, and occasionally go under the radar with a few "unauthorized" things to be like the old days. I've seen a trend where certain senior members get very motherly, turning the program practically into a day care center.

Garibaldi

Quote from: AngelWings on July 12, 2012, 03:59:06 AM
Quote from: BillB on July 12, 2012, 01:26:14 AM
Every and I repeat, Every cadet that has seen photos of old cadet activities or heard the war stories said they wish CAP was still like that. One said that CAP was getting boring with so many restrictions. But when you ask what restrictions, you will not get any two cadets to agree what they are.
What we need as cadets is those cool senior members who are willing to do crazy things for us, and occasionally go under the radar with a few "unauthorized" things to be like the old days. I've seen a trend where certain senior members get very motherly, turning the program practically into a day care center.

I sense that an FTX will be interrupted by a rogue "soldier" in the near future...perhaps one who has gone AWOL and was last seen in my AO... >:D
Still a major after all these years.
ES dude, leadership ossifer, publik affaires
Opinionated and wrong 99% of the time about all things

Eclipse

Quote from: AngelWings on July 12, 2012, 03:59:06 AMWhat we need as cadets is those cool senior members who are willing to do crazy things for us, and occasionally go under the radar with a few "unauthorized" things to be like the old days. I've seen a trend where certain senior members get very motherly, turning the program practically into a day care center.

I believe the term you're looking for here is "adults with something to lose" (you know like a house, car, 401k, etc.).

You can't have the days of WIWAC from the 70's and 80's without the prevailing attitudes of adults of the time as well.   Today's hover-parents
are always looking for someone else to blame when things go FUBAR.  WIWABS, you'd run out your front door at 9 in the morning and be home for dinner, and as long as the cops didn't drive you home, mom & dad didn't ask too many questions.

When I was in school, if you smarted off to a teacher, you were likely to get smacked, especially high school ("Three hits or three hours?!...I'll take the hits...") and a lot of stuff was "fixed" between kids on the schoolyard where "drama" began and ended.  If you got in trouble, you just hoped the dean saw fit to keep it in the halls, because dad wasn't going to be suing the school for smacking his kid, he'd be lighting into you as well.

These days, kids are made of tissue paper and everything is handled in "discussion groups", "anger management sessions", and the courts.

That's not really compatible with unit CC's and cadets getting too "creative".

"That Others May Zoom"

Garibaldi

Quote from: Eclipse on July 12, 2012, 04:42:47 AM
Quote from: AngelWings on July 12, 2012, 03:59:06 AMWhat we need as cadets is those cool senior members who are willing to do crazy things for us, and occasionally go under the radar with a few "unauthorized" things to be like the old days. I've seen a trend where certain senior members get very motherly, turning the program practically into a day care center.

I believe the term you're looking for here is "adults with something to lose" (you know like a house, car, 401k, etc.).

You can't have the days of WIWAC from the 70's and 80's without the prevailing attitudes of adults of the time as well.   Today's hover-parents
are always looking for someone else to blame when things go FUBAR.

When I was in school, if you smarted off to a teacher, you were likely to get smacked, especially high school ("Three hits or three hours?!...I'll take the hits...") and a lot of stuff was "fixed" between kids on the schoolyard where "drama" began and ended.  If you got in trouble, you just hoped the dean saw fit to keep it in the halls, because dad wasn't going to be suing the school for smacking his kid, he'd be lighting into you as well.

These days, kids are made of tissue paper and everything is handled in "discussion groups", "anger management sessions", and the courts.

That's not really compatible with unit CC's and cadets getting too "creative".

Agreed. Most of "my" cadets are home-schooled, which is an anomaly that is becoming more the rule than the exception, and as such, the unspoken agreement is to treat them with kid gloves when it comes to "discipline" or "under the radar" activities. I try to let them have some leeway without letting rules or bodies get bent, sprained, or broken, but sometimes if something they want to do is questionable, I try to come up with an alternative that's just as fun. I've moved into an observer role more than an active monitor. I'm not advocating a return to 1980s bottle rocket wars and running around the woods with Airsoft rifles and camouflage makeup, not by a long shot - different rules, different times. I really don't want to have to justify myself to the CC, DCC, or someone's parents as to why I had a cadet up in a tree because they misunderstood my instructions. However, we do take things far too seriously in CAP because of the threat of lawsuits and such. I try to find a balance between following the rules, accomplishing the mission and having a good time. Since I pushed the envelope as a cadet, I know what buttons they are trying to push with me, and I can stop things before they become a serious problem without sacrificing anything in the name of The Regs.
Still a major after all these years.
ES dude, leadership ossifer, publik affaires
Opinionated and wrong 99% of the time about all things

AngelWings

Quote from: Eclipse on July 12, 2012, 04:42:47 AM
Quote from: AngelWings on July 12, 2012, 03:59:06 AMWhat we need as cadets is those cool senior members who are willing to do crazy things for us, and occasionally go under the radar with a few "unauthorized" things to be like the old days. I've seen a trend where certain senior members get very motherly, turning the program practically into a day care center.

I believe the term you're looking for here is "adults with something to lose" (you know like a house, car, 401k, etc.).

You can't have the days of WIWAC from the 70's and 80's without the prevailing attitudes of adults of the time as well.   Today's hover-parents
are always looking for someone else to blame when things go FUBAR.  WIWABS, you'd run out your front door at 9 in the morning and be home for dinner, and as long as the cops didn't drive you home, mom & dad didn't ask too many questions.

When I was in school, if you smarted off to a teacher, you were likely to get smacked, especially high school ("Three hits or three hours?!...I'll take the hits...") and a lot of stuff was "fixed" between kids on the schoolyard where "drama" began and ended.  If you got in trouble, you just hoped the dean saw fit to keep it in the halls, because dad wasn't going to be suing the school for smacking his kid, he'd be lighting into you as well.

These days, kids are made of tissue paper and everything is handled in "discussion groups", "anger management sessions", and the courts.

That's not really compatible with unit CC's and cadets getting too "creative".
Sadly, that is too true. The way people handle things has changed greatly. Sometimes it is easy to forget that people are crazy with their lawsuits and their ways of dealing things. It'd be nice if I could head back in the day just once to witness some of the cooler moments of CAP and witness a generation that wasn't so weak as todays.

NIN

Quote from: Eclipse on July 12, 2012, 04:42:47 AM
That's not really compatible with unit CC's and cadets getting too "creative".

As I've said before: As a unit commander, if I'd have had myself as one of my cadets, I'd have had to kick my own ass.
Darin Ninness, Col, CAP
I have no responsibilities whatsoever
I like to have Difficult Adult Conversations™
The contents of this post are Copyright © 2007-2024 by NIN. All rights are reserved. Specific permission is given to quote this post here on CAP-Talk only.

NIN

WIWAC ("All war stories start out with 'No @##$%, there I was...' much like all fairy tales start out with 'Once upon a time..'. There are more similarities than differences between war stories and fairy tales." From: "Don't Be A Jerk, Learn to Talk Merc" in SOF Magazine, circa 1984)

I'm in CAP about 6-8 weeks, tops. Haven't been to encampment yet. Its the last week of June and we're doing our annual unit fundraiser at the Warren City Fair (car parking/crowd detail).

The Warren City Police have an old Hiller (UH-12E4, the 4 seat variant with the bench across the back of the cabin and the pilot all alone in front of that) they use for patrol duties.  One crappy rainy day they fly in and land in this roped off area next to the fair. One of my squadron officers knows the cops, and looks around.  Everybody in the CP is headed out for a break and nobody wants to stand guard on the police helicopter.  I haven't learned the fine military art of "shamming" yet, so there I stand with that C/AB look that says "Quick, volunteer me for something that isn't fun."  He says "Ninness! Go out there and guard that aircraft!"

Well, I'm an Airman Basic, all I say is "yes sir!!" and make great haste to the corral they have parked in to stand guard in my poncho.

The pilot and observer get out, and they're walking toward the fair to get some food. The O says "Hey, thanks man, make sure its topped off, eh?"  as they head out.

So I'm standing there at a strict parade rest, keeping any and all random tire kickers ("Punters") and assorted rug rats at bay, while answering questions about the aircraft as authoritatively as I can ("Why, yes, you can mount missiles and guns on this aircraft..").

Eventually, the crew comes back and both the pilot and observer thank me for guarding the aircraft following my full report of the public's awe. (I later realize that this is my first chance to see what a non-flying crew chief gets to do. Little did I know that some years later I'd be doing similar duties on AH-1s and OH-58s..) 

They spin up while I keep people back, and the door pops open and the Observer is waving someone over. I look around, nope, nobody else.. I look at him, point at myself "Me?"  He nods vigorously.

I run over to the aircraft which is making a hellacious racket, ducking like I've seen them do on M*A*S*H many times.

"Yeah?" I shout over the din at the Observer.

"Get in!" he shouts back.

"What?" I ask, not sure I heard him right.

"GET IN!" and he holds the door wider. I climb in and settle on the bench seat while he pulls the door closed and throws the seat belt across me. "Buckle up!"

Suddenly we're in the air, climbing vertically at an impossible vertical speed and an equally impossible (tiny) forward speed. My brain shifts gears.  Of course, this is what helicopters _do_ and why they're not _planes_.    No worries about stalling due to lack of airspeed. Just keep the rotor blades turning.

The pilot cranks the aircraft around to the left and we begin a circuit of Halmich Park, the site of the Warren City Fair. I look down and there is our CAP Command Post, and all the folks in fatigues there are looking up at me.  I grin "Ha ha, suckers!"

The flight lasts literally about a minute. Its a turn around the park, and back to the landing spot, and after I alight, they're gone, back on duty.

Of course, by the time I get out, everybody in the squadron who wasn't actively parking cars at that moment is standing right there, expecting its their turn to get a ride.    "Sorry, boys, just me."

Yeah, baby. I got to fly in a helicopter in CAP *before* I got to fly an Orientation Flight in a CAP plane. Is it any wonder I turned out this way?



Darin Ninness, Col, CAP
I have no responsibilities whatsoever
I like to have Difficult Adult Conversations™
The contents of this post are Copyright © 2007-2024 by NIN. All rights are reserved. Specific permission is given to quote this post here on CAP-Talk only.

Stonewall

#128
I know we have cadets that were born in 2000, maybe 2001(?), but for me, the nineties seem like yesterday. 

WIWAYS (When I was a young senior member) in my 20s, I took a lot more risks than I should have.  Of course I had been raised as a cadet in the 80s and I didn't take the rules as seriously as I should have.

One of the cool things I did was gave 6 cadets what I got as a cadet.  When I flew with the Golden Knights in FLWG in 1989, just 4 or 5 years later I coordinated Golden Knights flights for 6 of my cadets at the Manassas, VA air show.  The SFC I met as a cadet had been promoted and was the Golden Knights SGM and remembered me.  No paperwork, not parental signatures, just a hand shake and they were off.

Another things I did was became close friends with some of the older cadets.  I mean, I was a 20 year old senior member, cadets were just 3 or 4 years younger.  I am still CLOSE friends with a lot of them.  In fact, one is my kids' God Father.  He happens to be a PJ now.  But together, we tore it up out in the field with the cadets.

Me, another young senior, and 2 cadets who had turned 18 and were heading off to Virginia Tech took some time before they left and hiked through the Shenandoah Mountains for 3 days.  That was awesome!

That's me in the hat and the 2 cadets in the back.  This was in 1995 at "Old Rag" where we took a short break.


Here are Leo and Adam (the 2 cadets) filtering some water...


Here I am during some unorthodoxed field training out in Manassas, VA around 1995 as well.


Later, in 1999, this young chap planned and executed one BA survival weekend (3 days) at Massanutten Mountain.


Colin demonstrating how to collect water.  He was 17 and led the entire 3 days of training.  He is now a Special Forces A-Team Commander


Uh, yes, that's a squirrel.  He taught us how to catch, kill, and eat it.


Sometime in 1997 leading a cadet across a stream at Ft. Belvoir, VA.


Mid-nineties teaching a cadet how to use a signal mirror.


I won't even mention this picture.  But yeah, the female cadet at the bottom is a Platoon Leader of an Airborne Combat Engineer platoon and is Sapper tabbed.


One final picture, I promise.  The same C/Lt Col that led the survival training and is an SF officer now is in this picture with me. The two of us  are talking to then CAP/CC BGen Rich Anderson.  Crappy pic, it was a polaroid.
Serving since 1987.

NIN

#129
I think this was WIWAC (or it was "WIWABNS"). Definitely pre-1991, cuz we were still in gumby suits and jungle fatigues.

Sq bivouac, we're teaching the cadets how to "dent cook" using a sealed can.

The training includes the proviso: "Do not get distracted.  Pay attention to your can and get it out of the fire the instant it pops all the way out."

So we're standing at the fire later that evening, and the cadets have been "dent cooking," and the senior member in charge, Jeff Clark, looks down and see's a can in the fire that has been missed.   It is bulging at both ends, looks like it is mere seconds from exploding.  Jeff shouts "DOWN!" and we all hit the deck, expecting to get splattered with Beefaroni or Dinty Moore at any second.

So Jeff gingerly fishes the can out of the firepit and off to where it can explode like an EOD guy (we're all expecting him to get exploded on at any second).  He angrily says "Alright, who's can was that? Who!?"

This kid from our sister squadron gingerly raises his hand. "It was my can, sir."

Jeff launches into a safety lecture over the class he'd literally just taught on this subject not an hour or so before.  The cadet cannot explain adequately what he was exactly doing from the time he put the can in the fire until it was discovered. I think he would have been classified as ADHD or borderline autistic by today's standards.  He was a bit of a numbskull.

This is the same kid, on the same bivouac, who got asked "Cadet Smith[not his real name], why is your zipper always down?" to which the cadet replied "I don't know sir. Maybe because I have an unusually large groin." 

(Note: It is hard to keep a straight face in these circumstances)
Darin Ninness, Col, CAP
I have no responsibilities whatsoever
I like to have Difficult Adult Conversations™
The contents of this post are Copyright © 2007-2024 by NIN. All rights are reserved. Specific permission is given to quote this post here on CAP-Talk only.

ol'fido

There used to be a little airstrip down near the Garden of the Gods in Southern Illinois that was used by the U of I agricultural station. We called it Dixon Springs International Airport, Five flights daily from Columbia and points south. >:D Seriously, we would be camped out there and here an airplane flying real low nearby. The next thing you know a landing light would come on just south of the strip, see all the vehicles and people parked there, the landing light would go out, you would hear power come on and the climb out, but see no other running lights whatsoever.

Anyway, one morning were sitting around the campfire and someone decides to throw a can of Spaghetti-Ohs or something like that in the fire. Well, for the next half hour or so, we kind of played a game of chicken. After the first guy did it, someone else would throw a can in the fire and everyone would watch and try to guess when it would cook off and be the last to get away. You also won if you stayed there, BUT SUCCESSFULLY DODGED THE SHRAPNEL.

That was also the bivouac where we had a cadet get stepped on by a cow during "war games".
Lt. Col. Randy L. Mitchell
Historian, Group 1, IL-006

C/Haughey

Being involved with CAP since late 2010, I can say I am thoroughly jealous of all your stories and wish that today's CAP was like how it appears to have been... Cadets did what was fun, with no worry of proper supervision and didn't have SMs as involved in CP.

Any advice on how to bring some of this *real* fun back?  >:D (Other than "don't get caught")  >:D
C/2nd Lt Haughey
Cadet Commander, 089th MACS

C/Lt Col, AFJROTC
Cadet Commander, FL-20056

BillB

Cadet Haughly
I think you would be amazed by the amount of senior supervision there was back in them-old-days. But regulations allowed much leeway in the cadet program. Also many of the seniors were former cadets. The motto was "If I couldn't get away with it, you can't". At an activity, seniors knew what the cadets were going to try do befoe the cadets even thought of it.
There was a different attitude towards cadets and the cadet program. As a holdover from World War II to some extent, cadets were viewed as future military officers or enlisted specialists. Now as one senior member involved in the cadet program said. "cadets are just children".
Gil Robb Wilson # 19
Gil Robb Wilson # 104

EMT-83

BillB, it's not just CAP. Society has somehow evolved into thinking that we must protect our children from anything bad that could possibly happen, and cater to their every whim.

I recently had a conversation with one of the guys in the fire department on this very topic. He spends $350 per month so his kids can have iPhones. He wouldn't think of depriving them of these toys, because all their friends have them. Besides, if they were ever kidnapped or lost in the woods, the GPS would save them. Holy crap!

I swear he was having chest pain when I told him that my kid has a $10 per month phone with no texting or data. He knows his way around the woods and is tough enough to kick anyone's ass that might want to mess with him. You know, life skills.

/rant

Stonewall

Quote from: EMT-83 on July 13, 2012, 12:47:14 PM
BillB, it's not just CAP. Society has somehow evolved into thinking that we must protect our children from anything bad that could possibly happen, and cater to their every whim.

I recently had a conversation with one of the guys in the fire department on this very topic. He spends $350 per month so his kids can have iPhones. He wouldn't think of depriving them of these toys, because all their friends have them. Besides, if they were ever kidnapped or lost in the woods, the GPS would save them. Holy crap!

I swear he was having chest pain when I told him that my kid has a $10 per month phone with no texting or data. He knows his way around the woods and is tough enough to kick anyone's ass that might want to mess with him. You know, life skills.

My kids are 6 & 4 (in 3 weeks) and they are the ONLY ones of their peers who don't have video games.  I'm not old school or hard on them, because I know that they will always have access to that stuff around their friends.  TV is bad enough, but we ensure they are limited there too.  The 8 year old down the street is still on training wheels but he can play the hell out of whatever game system he has.  Oh yeah, he also wears a PFD when swimming, which hates to do.  The fat girls next door are NEVER outside, so I can only assume that they're stuffing their faces with treats as they are glued to a screen of some sort.

My son actually told me earlier this week that he was sad because his other friend down the street never wants to play because he just wants to play with his "boring DS", which I am assuming is that portable play station thing.  I grinned like a proud papa and took him for a bike ride after dinner.  My kids spend hours a week swimming, climbing, riding bikes, skate boarding, and just last Saturday my son thought it was time to start surfing.  We attempted, but the surf was too rough for a kid his size.  I'm not preparing my kids for the Zombie Apocalypse, but holy hell I'm not using video games and TV as a means to score cool points with my kids.  My kids CRASH when it's time for bed.  I mean, they are unconscious within 2 minutes when they get in bed.  They sleep through the night and wake up every day ready to conquer the world.  That's how we should be treating cadets.  Wear their butts out with positive activities and push them to their limits.  Not bubble wrapping them and distracting them with play stations before they're in first grade.

/my rant
Serving since 1987.

NIN

Quote from: Stonewall on July 13, 2012, 01:12:02 PM
That's how we should be treating cadets.  Wear their butts out with positive activities and push them to their limits.  Not bubble wrapping them and distracting them with play stations before they're in first grade.

/my rant

You know, I have seen this.

At USAC annual training, we get kids there for BCT who appear to spend all day (and night) on the couch jamming HoHos in their faces while defeating the next "last boss" in some video game.

At least for a few days, these kids look like zombies at PT in the AM, and they somehow have the energy to play grab ass during canteen and such.  And they become discipline cases because they can't keep their hands (and their beefs) to themselves.

The Cadet Ranger School students, OTOH, are pushed pretty hard all day long, and they don't seem to have any problems with unstructured time.  Instead of playing around at canteen, they're back in the barracks squaring away their gear for their next evolution, boning up on their study materials, or catching extra Z's. :)



Darin Ninness, Col, CAP
I have no responsibilities whatsoever
I like to have Difficult Adult Conversations™
The contents of this post are Copyright © 2007-2024 by NIN. All rights are reserved. Specific permission is given to quote this post here on CAP-Talk only.

Eclipse

#136
+1 - a real, legit problem.  The instant gratification provided by electronic devices and games is literally like "kid krack" in the adolescent brain.
I'm as connected as you can be, and when I'm taking notice of people being "in the hood" all the time, you know its a problem, and worse, it's
not generally for work, or something else important (CAP, etc.), it's this incessant status updating and checking that keeps everyone involved in "next" and
"there", and out of "now" and "here".

This is especially a problem with kids who are ADHD or are hovering in  the area.

We've got one family friend who's son is an only child and so spends a significant amount of time by himself.  They drive about an hour to get to our place that has a pool, 2 acres of backyard, a nearby park, and he literally walks in the door, opens his laptop, and jumps on Minecraft or some other nonsense - this after having been on the notebook or his mom's phone the whole trip in.  My kids look at him like "let's go play".

My kids have a Wii, older DS', netflix, and some limited internet (filtered and monitored), and all of it has time limits.  Then they go to their friends houses and the "world is their playground", with few limits (because it's a good babysitter), and little filter.  Nothing warms my heart like the 9 years olds with ipod Touchs or DSi's who have figured out how to connect to the wifi and have unfettered access to the dark places on the internet.

Luckily, at least in the immediate vicinity of the neighborhood, their friends' parent lean the same way of "get out of the house", though then they come to our place with the kids, they spend their time with their nose in their phones.

"That Others May Zoom"

Stonewall

Quote from: Eclipse on July 13, 2012, 03:36:51 PM
My kids have a Wii, older DS', netflix, and some limited internet (filtered and monitored), and all of it has time limits.

That blows my mind.  Really.

It reminds me of how people say "I really limit the bad stuff I eat" as they're pushing 50% body fat.  I am not here to say what anyone else does is right or wrong, but I witness too many parents saying the same thing, but when you REALLY take a look at it, those limits are not REAL limits.  "I just grabbed a mini-snickers from the HR office."  Yeah, but you "just" grabbed a Super Big Gulp and a bag of Doritos between lunch and dinner, too.

"My kid is limited to an hour of video games a day at home."  Yeah, but he just spent 3 hours at his friend's house doing the same thing.
Serving since 1987.

Eclipse

#138
We can't control the whole world, nor can we think that we can control our kids' every moment.  All we can do is provide them the safest environment
we can in the situations we actually control and then instill in them the understanding of the reasons why we make the decisions we do, with hopes they will make good decisions for themselves (from an age-appropriate perspective).

I'm also a proponent of not hovering, so we toss them a GMRS radio and let them go to the park by themselves (since they were 7 and 8 ), ride the hood, library now on the rare occasion, etc.  Things some of their friends' parents won't consider.  We occasionally do an "adventure" where dad takes them
places that look "interesting" on low-scale urban exploring, sometimes not necessarily the safest places to be crawling around, but I'm hoping that they will run with that as they get more freedom.  My town has more than a few interesting paces that could lead to stories similar to the above - stuff I hope they do and that I don't find out about until they have their own kids.

If ours go to "Johnny's House" for a couple of hours, we ask what they did, if they reply "played Wii", then the one in our place stays off for the night, etc.

If they've decided to wear a groove into the couch in the AM on a Sat, the TV's will stay off until they've had some outside time in proportion. 
In the summer they are at camp all day, which is a tech-free zone.  (Decks of cards, believe it or not, are the hottest thing right now.) Pool three days a week, field trips, dodge ball every day in the PM, and then they are in Cub Scouts, drop-in Chess, soccer, one does hip hop class, so they have maybe an hour or two a day, tops that is really "free".  No email, no Facebook, and
OpenDNS keeps most of the internet at bay.

They will comment to us about the choices some of their friends make, and whether it's lip service or how they really feel, what we're hearing is where we want them to be.

"That Others May Zoom"

Garibaldi

I joined CAP in January 1981. This was the beginning of the video era. We had a Coleco game, you know the one, cost $400 and had Pong and a skeet shooting game. Computers were something that sat in a large air-conditioned room at NASA guiding satellites. Cable TV was in its infancy still; HBO had just gone to a full-day schedule (used to come on at 5pm or so and end around 2am). VCRs were still really expensive.

Point is, WE DID NOT HAVE ELECTRONIC TETHERS. As everyone has said at one time or another, our games involved physical activity and ran on the most powerful graphics card ever invented: the mind.

I was allowed an hour of TV a day. During summer vacation mom ran us out of the house until lunch, then again til dinner.

Our first computer in 1982 was an Atari 400. I spent hours playing with it, but even then, when a friend came over we went outside to do whatever. Even during summer break...well, I think that's when I started becoming addicted to sitting around. But I was still active when I had to be. I kept up with the physical fitness requirements for the cadet program. On trips to various air force bases and campsites we didn't have our noses buried in an iPod or a Nintendo DS or texting anyone. We talked, and joked, and sang jodies and eventually fell asleep. Human contact.

It makes me sad that I see kids with their parents and they have their noses in their phones or have earbuds stuck in their ears. I ran into a guy I work with at the mall and he introduced me to his family. His son barely looked up from his new iPhone as he mumbled hello. His father and I both shrugged. Sign of the times.

I think that ADD is an environmental issue, really. I was flipping through the channels one Saturday morning and was astounded at the fast-pace of cartoons and commercials. No wonder kids can't focus. I saw a McDonald's commercial and it took me 29 of the 30 seconds to figure out what it was about...the little golden arches logo showed up about 2 seconds before it ended. In the lower right corner. We are conditioning kids to be ADD. If something doesn't grab and keep their attention for more than 30 seconds, it's off to the next thing. If I ever have kids, I think that I will do what some of you have done, and that's keep the electronic devices away. No iPhone, no PlayStation, no Xbox, no Nintendo DS. No DVD player in the back seat. Maybe an iPod, but only at certain times. And sure as hell, no distractions during family time.
Still a major after all these years.
ES dude, leadership ossifer, publik affaires
Opinionated and wrong 99% of the time about all things