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Butch Furse
A senior couple came off a camping trip and reported their campground featured sleeping in tepees. They were “wowed’ when they found the campground had tepees even with wooden slat floors. So much for roughing it.
Their amazement of wooden floored tents brought back memories of our first camping trip at a District Boy Scout Camp in the hill country along the Platte River. It was my first week-long camping jamboree and at the time I was the youngest member in our troop.
Naturally, I was loaded with camping gear and ready to rough it. I also carried a lot of naivete’ along with an old canvas waterproof sleeping bag from my uncle’s WWII Army days, my new water canteen, a pot full of new cooking gear, clothing and even a pair of pajamas.
Another young scout and I were on the low end of the totem pole when it came to being assigned our waterproof wall-tent. All the other scouts became “true scouts” by sleeping on the ground in their tents with a dirt floor. However, our wall tent had a slated wood floor and even a couple of cots to sleep on. What kind of “roughing it” is this?
That question was answered two nights later when a heavy rainstorm struck the campground. While other members of our troop were scrambling to find a place of dry ground flooring in their tents, I recall turning on the flashlight to find water flowing through a small ditch about six inches under our wood slat flooring in our tent. Observing our “dry situation,” I rolled over and went back to sleep realizing the once-disappointment missing of “roughing it” was actually a blessing.
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Lots of people plan their vacations in July. With streamlined planes, trains and automobiles, we’ve got things so speeded up you can take a two-week vacation in three days. Some people even use their vacation to find out where to stay away from next year, but the best place to spend your vacation is just inside your income.
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Back in the 1800’s this comment was made: “An honest politician is one who, when he is bought, will stay bought.”
RL Furse is publisher emeritus of the News-Register
