Anyone in contact with Faro?  Been a month since he was on the forum.  Hoping he is ok since he was struggling with health issues.

xRalphx wrote:Has anyone ever received 'samples' from Troll and Toad ?

I received a package yesterday which contained 4 D&D mini's that I didn't order. The package was marked as Commercial Sample.

I find it strange that they would ship that stuff overseas to Belgium. Is that a known practice of Troll and Toad ?

You must be a preferred/favorite customer.
I have never gotten anything from them for nothing and have gotten less than I should have before too.

My kid is in Cub Scouts. It's pretty much the usual stuff, though I wouldn't be surprised if the Boy Scouts do the social networking thing. Ah, I miss the good old days....

Ah, I see the concern is not with the books' contents, but rather potential lead poisoning.  Hmm.... wonder what this says about the technique my dad taught me on how to put a lead sinker on my fishing line by clamping it closed with my teeth.  

Crazy what they regulate now days. We used to play with mercury in our hands and roll it around.  At my son's old school someone dropped a thermometer and the mercury got on the floor so they closed the school for a week while a HAZMAT team came in to clean up and eliminate the hazard.

Rabbit_67 wrote:Ah, I see the concern is not with the books' contents, but rather potential lead poisoning.

Ah but that is just what the government wants you to think.  What they are really concerned about is kids using books such as the Boy Scout Handbook to learn how to tie competent knots and by doing so, use that knowledge to someday become one of those perverted serial rapists that likes to keep teenage women bound and gagged in their homemade basement dungeon.

Crazy what they regulate now days. We used to play with mercury in our hands and roll it around. At my son's old school someone dropped a thermometer and the mercury got on the floor so they closed the school for a week while a HAZMAT team came in to clean up and eliminate the hazard.

No kidding.  We did the same thing.  I remember once we did an experiment that produced hydrogen as a by-product.  We siphoned it through a tube into a balloon.  When the balloon was full, our teacher moved it near a lit bunsen burner and it made a pretty impressive explosion.  Nothing harmful mind you but very loud.  We all got a kick out of it.  Nowadays, that same teacher would probably be fired for endangering children and creating weapons of mass destruction.  

SimperingToad wrote:Yes, back before they were becoming Brown Shirts for the Gesta... er... Fatherl... er... Homeland Security.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/14/us/14 ... ml?_r=2&hp

It's a police and fire training course like they have in lots and lots of school districts around the country.  These classes do all kinds of things related to those fields...most of them pretty mundane, but some of them pretty interesting.

In this article, the writer chose to cover the most interesting day of the course.

I guarantee you it was the day in that program where the kids got to do lots of special activities.  

If the reporter had shown up on the day the kids practice writing accident reports, the article would have been about how the kids do nothing but crash derelict cars into each other.

If the reporter had shown up on the day the kids practiced rolling up fire hoses or put on bunker gear the article would have been all about kids practicing to save people from the World Trade Center.

Reporters don't write about the day the kids studied for a test on fire ladder safety, or watched a movie about traffic tickets because that does not make an exciting news story.

ADDITIONAL:  The article talks about Explorer scouts having been abused by police officers.  That's because the boys and girls in that program are older teenagers and they also do things that school kids would not do...like ride along on actual police patrols and assist at special events.   I'm not excusing the cops who do this, mind you.  I'm just pointing out that it isn't like the activities in this article are where abuse might occur.

Rabbit_67 wrote:Ah, I see the concern is not with the books' contents, but rather potential lead poisoning.  Hmm.... wonder what this says about the technique my dad taught me on how to put a lead sinker on my fishing line by clamping it closed with my teeth.

Y'know what a child can legally purchase?  Chain saws*.  They even have toy versions so the little tots can get in some practice:
http://www.honeybros.com/gbu0-prodshow/04649340000.html

I know what you're thinking, I felt the same way.  "My God, won't someone think of the children?"  Fear not, the government has stepped up.  Toy chain saws with lead-based paint will no longer endanger our little ones.

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*At least, I could find any laws to the contrary via Google.  If you have sensible anti-chain saw laws in your region, kudos.

deimos3428 wrote:Y'know what a child can legally purchase?  Chain saws*.  They even have toy versions so the little tots can get in some practice:
http://www.honeybros.com/gbu0-prodshow/04649340000.html

I know what you're thinking, I felt the same way.  "My God, won't someone think of the children?"  Fear not, the government has stepped up.  Toy chain saws with lead-based paint will no longer endanger our little ones.

---
*At least, I could find any laws to the contrary via Google.  If you have sensible anti-chain saw laws in your region, kudos.

Yeah, they can't even get a bb gun any more.  I got my bb gun when I was 9 and I've carried a pocket knife with me every where I go since I was in 5th grade. (OK, not the airport any more).

ashmire13 wrote:In one of my final years at school a chemistry teacher at our place had an experiment go wrong, blew out several windows, many of the class were injured with several ambulances arriving from memory.

You are just SO lucky - my school was crap in comparison