5. Not Fair!

5 Not Fair! The next meeting of the Beaver Scouts was in the gym at school. Miss Blake was waiting for us. "I hope you all memorized the Beaver Scout Handbook," she barked. "I did!" shouted Andrea, who always does anything grown-ups tell her to do.

"Can I get a drink of water?" asked Neil. "No!" barked Miss Blake. "Water is for wimps. What if you're out in the desert and there's no water? Today we're going to learn survival skills." "I thought Beaver scouting was gonna be fun," I grumbled under my breath. "It's not about fun, buster!" barked Miss Blake. "Beaver scouting is about survival! It's dog-eat-dog out there." I didn't know that dogs eat other dogs. But what did dog food have to do with anything? "Let's warm up with some jumping jacks!" barked Miss Blake. Ugh. I hate jumping jacks. Who came up with that idea?* "Jumping jacks are fun!" shouted Andrea.

"ONE... TWO... THREE... FOUR..." We did about a million hundred jumping jacks. I thought I was gonna die. By the end, Andrea was the only one who was still jumping, so Miss Blake gave her a decal. Not fair! "On to the obstacle course!" barked Miss Blake. She had set up a long line of upside-down desks, buckets, brooms, barrels, and all kinds of other junk. We had to crawl under, around, and over all that stuff to get to the other side of the gym. "This is going to prepare you for the real world," barked Miss Blake. "Go! Go! Go!" One by one, we ran the obstacle course. I thought I was gonna throw up. "I don't see how this prepares us for

the real world," I grumbled. "Enemy planes are dropping bombs on you!" barked Miss Blake. "Get down low!" She used a stopwatch to see how long it took each of us to get through the obstacle course. Naturally, Andrea had the fastest time, so Miss Blake gave her a ribbon. Not fair! "Next, it's time to jump over chairs!" barked Miss Blake. "Jumping over chairs is fun!" shouted Andrea. "Why would we ever have to jump over chairs in the real world?" complained Ryan. "What if you're in a jungle and you get attacked by alligators?" asked Miss Blake. "You'll need to jump over them to escape."

"I would just punch their faces in," I said. "That's inappropriate, Arlo," said Andrea. "I don't approve of violence." "What do you have against violins?" I asked. "Not violins! Violence!" I was just yanking Andrea's chain. But Little Miss Perfect could jump over more chairs than anybody, of course. So Miss Blake gave her a badge. Not fair! "Let's move on to the climbing wall!" barked Miss Blake. One wall of the gym had little knobs

all over it so we could grab on with our hands and push up with our feet. It was still really hard to climb. "Climbing a wall is fun!" shouted Andrea. Needless to say, she was able to climb the wall faster than anybody else. Miss Blake gave Andrea a belt loop. Not fair! "Next, it's time to climb the rope!" barked Miss Blake. There was a thick rope hanging from the ceiling of the gym. "Climbing rope is fun!" shouted Andrea, who immediately started climbing as if she had been doing it all her life. "Why do we have to climb a rope?" asked Michael. "When are we ever going to have to do that?"