You have seen us up and down the country in our bottle green berets, our khaki shirts adorned with various badges making us look as if we are undercover Christmas trees topped off by a coloured scarf, and of course our shorts wow we are a weird type. We are invariably thin but strong with very bony, knobbly knees. We are surrounded by others of our kind which look just like me and are just as mental as me, naughty boys with an undertone of discipline and respect, boys whose knees are just as muddy as mine and just as bony.

One of their favourite pastimes – indeed, is generally accepted as the favourite among all Boy Scouts is to place a small tenderfoot in the middle of the hall and in a well-timed rehearsed rush trample the tenderfoot underfoot, who is helped up at the end of the onslaught with a wide smile upon his grubby face. I suppose it is natural that many people see us as crazy. we do plenty to warrant such a response. We go camping, in shorts, mind you, while there is frost on the ground. We sleep on this frost tipped ground not under the canvas of a tent, but the stars knowing that if the heavens open there is a tarp next to us. We cook beautiful smelling meals in ovens fuelled by fires roaring side by side. These shorts are useful again when we run tremendous distances from base to base on a orienteering course, or enable us to climb the trees unhindered to hide from a rival patrol. 

We analyse a map from North to South in search of potential hikes containing high adventure. We cycle to destinations instead of driving because we want to stay healthy. We sing, dance and play musical instruments around a fire till the wee hours of the morning .Being a Man of the Shorts we cannot deny as they shimmy up flagpoles to replace the lines of after the cubs pull them down. We are examples of extreme outdoorsmen who build an entire camp out of rope and poles which serve just as well as any other table or chair. Too often have I seen these shorts travel through the air as the wearer flies head first off a jetty into a lake. Who are these boys cladded in khaki shorts you may ask? We are the screwiest bunch of lads imaginable; we are Scouts.