An interesting thing happened this morning as I was making my morning coffee (I work from home when not traveling). I was scooping the coffee into the french press, and the though occurred to me that I love the smell of fresh coffee. I asked to myself, "why and what reason" I love coffee so much. Then it hit me, as sometimes it does. My memories of being a CIT in the mornings at Camp Skycrest in the dining hall, making instant coffee to enjoy with breakfast, or huddling around the pot with other… Continue

I was at first heartbroken seeing the movie "Meatballs," years ago, and learning that pulling someone's shorts down to his ankles at camp was not invented at Skycrest. But there's a difference: in "Meatballs," the object is humiliation of the shorts-wearer, while at Skycrest, shorts-pulling while simultaneously shouting, "Skycrest Shorts!" represented a statement about the cheapness of the shorts such that they could be pulled (and maybe some humiliation, too).

By 1977, Danny "Mosquito" Hillman… Continue

I added 60 + photos from 1960's Check them out. I had wanted to put them in a separate album but software appears to not allow segregation like that...

It has come to my attention that my posts are readily available to anyone who googles me (kind of embarrassing). That's why I've decided to stealthily add a few letters to my name. Do not be alarmed by any future changes I might make, like making my photo low-res. Also, feel free to refer to my not by my real name, but any one of the array of nicknames I adopted during my tenure on the Hill ("Little Professor, Pseudo-Professor, Clean-Freak, Mr. Sanitoid, pain in the a-- twerp, etc).

This blog p… Continue

For those interested in a bit of reminiscing, here's a link to some downloadable bugle calls. Many are familiar to us:

http://www.fas.org/man/dod-101/sys/land/bugle.htm