Hey Blog! As part of my Jamboree journey, there are certain activities the unit needs to complete. These are the camps and unit days, which are spread throughout the year and a half to go before we’re off to Poland. Because of the long pause, which I am now rectifying (five days in already! See, I can do this), I have two such events to tell you of – the two night camp at local Scout site Drum Hill, in March, and the day in Derby in June.

The camp was fun. We had everything from balloon tying (great fun) to bridge building (even more fun) to cooking dinner (still fun) to archery (also fun!). Everyone had been asked to bring cake to share, with the result of us all having far more cake than was good for us, but hey, it’s a Scout camp, you can’t go wrong with a bit more cake! We got to choose our unit uniform and badge, with final designs to be voted on at the next event, and chose our nickname: Derbyshire Dragons! Not sure why dragons, because there aren’t any in Derbyshire that I’m aware of (if you do happen to live locally and have a pet dragon or know where one is to be found, please let me know and I will correct this bit), but the idea was seriously cool. Who wouldn’t want a massive dragon on the back of their hoodie, with flames on the head and wings on the arms?! This won out against dragonflies (which there are plenty of around), dodos, donkeys, and dinosaurs. In addition to all this, there were teambuilding challenges, practical tests, and lots of time to talk to the other 39 people who are going.

The next camp will be later this summer, but I’ve already had another meeting with the group, because there was a day in June. This involved a morning walking around town, taking pictures with creative licence to fit a number of prompts: climbing a mountain, underwater adventure, and hole in one to name just three. Bonus points were for more elaborate attempts, or thinking outside the box. It was really good fun, and talking to strangers on the street was good practice for life in general and also for Poland, where there will be several thousand of them speaking all sorts of different languages. Also, every photo had to be with the dragon mascot each team was given. My team somehow won, on bonus points, after racking our brains for creative ideas and occasionally stealing one from another group that were going round. Then we had to make our way to a park, for lunch, and immediately afterwards, paddlesports.

Bell boating will always have an important place in Scouting for me – it was what I did in my first ever Cubs session, eight years ago. I’ve only done it a couple of times. It is still amazing fun, though, and helped solidify my love of water (that’s actually such a bad ironic joke, as well as a paradox). Returning to the same stretch of water, in the same craft, was wonderful. We went further than ever before, I think because there were more of us, and almost made it through the rapids. On the return, we were able to souse the other boat’s crew by splashing them with paddles and tipping bailers on them, and rotated being figureheads on the prow, swimming to the stern and coming back forward. I also helped keep time so we all paddled together and kept going straight, and we all joined in shouting “one, two” in such a loud and bloodthirsty voice those on the other boat apparently got scared. The downside of such brilliant boating was we all had to go and have a shower before going back to the park to do a final decision on the badges. In the end, we have gone for one with a green dragon with yellow spines, curled around a British and Polish flag, on a field of blue. The unit hoodies are purple, and will feature that dragon on the back that we were so thrilled about before, just a little smaller. And without the flames. Still, I think we’ve got a fantastic group and a fantastic dress code, almost ready to show up in Poland. Just a little more learning on Duolingo to go.

I have also been selling my wood turning to raise funds. The next instalment, in September, is currently a major focus. Besides all the other focuses that need my attention. I hope I can manage it, but I think I need some more opportunities and ideas to fundraise before then. Hmmm. Well, I’ll think about that later, but for now, do widzenia (goodbye!).

Hey Blog! Once again, I have returned to the cricket pitch this year, and now I’m playing for the Under 17s, I thought I’d let you know how this season has gone.

I have relayed the specifics of cricket before: hit ball with bat far as you can and run, other people catch ball, throw ball to hit sticks, when sticks get hit you get out. Of course it’s a bit more complex than that, but the principle is the same. There are three jobs: batting, bowling and fielding – the latter being the one you spend the most time doing, as it takes up half the game. The fielding team is also the bowling team, but it switches after an innings (half the game) and then you bat for the rest. Generally, it’s 11-a-side, and this is how I play all the matches at the moment. Since you bat in pairs, ten wickets means the end of the game as there isn’t a last pair. However, this is rare because at my level, there are only 20 overs (sets of six balls) in an innings, so as the rate of wickets is low, we’re generally only about 8 men in by the end of the game.

While I haven’t been able to play many matches, having had exams at the beginning of the season, I have attended all the training I could, and my batting and bowling have improved as a result. My biggest difficulty has been that my style of bowling needs to go higher than the roof of the net where we practice, so I have had to experiment, diversifying into spin bowling. In batting, I need more practice sending the ball in different directions, rather than just attempting to hit it the same way most times. Unpredictability is helpful in getting runs and wickets both. My most likely method to get out is still to be bowled, however, so I need to work on my defensive shots as well.

As I was in exam mode for the beginning of the outdoor season, I haven’t played that many matches and as a result haven’t been able to make much of a contribution overall. I’m good with that – if I wanted to be in the middle, I’d have to practice a lot more. And with the finger that I broke last year, I both lost some training time and am careful not to break it again. One of the coaches has broken a finger so many times it doesn’t open properly, and I don’t want that when I play the piano. I get enough small bruises as it is without adding phalangeal trauma to the mix! So sit back, clap, and watch the game.

Hey Blog! Over the past few months I have been doing some additional volunteering, mostly for my Duke of Edinburgh’s Award but also for the experience and some community service. Where? The local Oxfam Bookshop, in Belper.

Books, as one may guess, are a big part of my life. Not a day goes by without reading something. What is the best way to buy books, that is at once a lucky dip, has choice, and is cheap? Second hand bookshops. I was drawn in by the 99p specials that quickly filled my shelves instead of theirs. I have gathered so much that honestly, I need a clear-out because all my bookshelves are nearly overflowing, so maybe a return of some of the old ones is in order.

The DofE requires you to volunteer for at least six months if you’re doing Silver. I was aware that Oxfam Belper offered this, and so went in to ask – one of the people running it being an old Cub leader of mine. Once accepted, I was able to do a quick bit of training online (including: be polite, help customers, don’t pick up heavy boxes you can’t lift, and wear shoes…) and come in to work. Mostly, this has been Tuesdays, as I had to be in town anyway, but it has since changed to weekends because that’s when it’s busiest and they need most people. I have worked downstairs, in the shop and the storerooms behind, but I have also been to the online department upstairs where the more expensive and niche books are sold.

Unfortunately, it isn’t all sitting around and reading books. It’s much more work than that. There are prices to stick on books, people to direct to particular books, books to sort into children’s, adults’, throw away and dozens of other piles. There is the layout to learn, and the constant restacking and replacing where customers buy from. Occasionally the shop needs decorating, before the school holidays for instance. This means lots of standing on chairs hanging up spellbooks (currently we have a Harry Potter theme going) and carefully folding paper aeroplanes to go with them. I have sorted through CDs and DVDs, removing those that have been on display without sale for more than a few weeks, and filling up from the stock in the back room. It’s been a really valuable experience for me and I feel like I have done some good for society, or rather everyone who reads books (the best ones, of course! Except if you have a rich oral tradition which is essentially the same thing, just in vocal form rather than paper form). Getting part of a major award at the same time is also a bonus!

Am I going to continue working there? For now, definitely. I’m continuing after the DofE period runs out as well, like I did with Young Leadering at Beavers, and it all forms my version of national service – the Kit’s Voluntary Service, or KVS if you will. I prefer this to joining the army. Part of it also fosters cooperation and friendship, which removes the need for armies anyway. Currently, I will remain in the bookshop, trying not to read instead of help, and soak in the thousands of words that pass through my hands.

Warning – attempting to contact a Reading Kit when it is face first in a book, lost in a made up world, can be problematic and unsuccessful; it may say “yes” without hearing the question and take a long time to return from the pages. Approaching and engaging a Reading Kit is difficult and must be undertaken at your own cost. Habits: solitary and reclusive when in possession of a book. Reward for capture of its attention: comprehension of the intent you bothered it with.

Hey Blog! Back in April, I went on two amazing trips, one walking, one sailing. And both in the same week. Let’s see how tired I was at the end of it all!

The sailing trip was with the Island Trust, the organisation I’ve sailed with before. I was back on Johanna Lucretia, JL, the boat I’ve sailed on twice previously, and it was a blast. I think I’ve almost broken the storm curse, because for the first time we were actually able to get out of Plymouth Sound and go somewhere else by sea. First of all, we headed to Fowey. Pronounced Foy. It’s a beautiful little place, built on the side of a natural harbour formed by a bend in the mouth of a river, protected behind high cliffs. In the sunshine, at a mooring, with blue-green water all around you, tunes on the radio and a bunch of other young people who all like sailing next to you, it’s fantastic!

After a day in Fowey to visit the ice cream shop (I can wholeheartedly recommend!) and practice rowing/paddling round the boat, while simultaneously avoiding the remains of the storm that was passing down the coast, we made our next move to Falmouth. This was a long sail in almost flat calm, so a chance to sit back, enjoy the sunshine, and learn some navigation techniques – calculating bearings, position fixing, nautical chart reading, and course plotting. And practice riding the bowsprit as the ship is moving – which helped for the next day…

By the time we got to Falmouth, I had ticked off another buoy from the long list of different types – this one being the isolated danger mark, with the important double black sphere topmark – managed to accidentally inflate my lifejacket by pulling the emergency release cord while bending over the bowsprit trying to take the inner jib down, and sailed up a winding river that was as verdant green as a tropical island, past millionaires’ yachts and a decommissioned warship. We stayed the night there, playing games and chatting, and watching a seal that had come up to the end of the pontoon we moored at for a rest.

By the morning we were back underway on an epic sale the full distance back, in one go from Falmouth to Plymouth. We achieved record time for JL, making it in less than 10 hours, and almost broke the speed record, going at over 8 knots for parts of it. There was a good wind and quite a swell going back, and we heeled (tilted to the side) some way at times. I was chosen to do a swift and much-needed takedown of the inner jib sail while going at least seven knots – scary, but a brilliant experience and very helpful for any future escapades in rough weather at sea. You don’t notice the rocking so much when you’re hanging over the water, tying up large quantities of canvas. The wind brought us back into harbour early, ready for the cleanup on the last morning.

After getting off the boat, a lift to the train station, and two train journeys from Plymouth to Ambergate, a lift home, and a shower later, I was off again. The bag was (thankfully) already packed – all that was needed was to change over the washbag and sleeping bag, and I was back out to go on a DofE practice expedition. Though I was falling asleep on the train, once I got back in the car I was (somehow) ready for another two nights of camping. And long walks to get between the campsites.

The rules for a practice expedition at Silver level are that you must do all the regular DofE things, but you only need to do two nights and two days, as opposed to the two nights three days for the qualifier. While the expedition had in fact started in the morning, I wasn’t able to join it until the evening, which still called for some jiggery pokery with regard to logistics. However, we managed it. Staying the first night just west of Bakewell, we walked south to Nine Ladies stone circle and the nearby campsite. The next day, a trek to Cromford, the High Peak Trail and halfway up a hillside. All wearing enormous rucksacks which probably slowed us down considerably. We could have walked a longer route if we hadn’t needed to take quite so much. As it was, we made very good time and finished much earlier than all the other groups, both for Silver and Bronze. We still need to do it all again elsewhere – in August – but having taken part in this, tired as I was with the previous week of sea, sun and sail, I have no doubt that we can manage the real thing! I’ll tell you how it goes then.

Hey Blog! Well, that idea of doing a post a day for the next week failed. However, I’m not going to let it fail entirely, and therefore will do one post a day for the next week – but several weeks late. Better late than never, as the saying goes!

Here’s the first one now.

This post is about how I do GCSEs and iGCSEs as a home educating child. You may have heard some of this before, if you’ve been reading for a long time, but here it is for the newer readers – plus bonus material never before seen outside my mind.

So, I had thirteen papers between my six exams this year. As I have no access to a school exam hall other than as a private candidate – which is very expensive, not often granted, and still probably inconvenient – we used an organisation called Tutors and Exams, which we found a few years ago. T&E offer sittings for almost every exam, and the most easily accessed centre of theirs is, for us, in Birmingham. I attended the opening of this centre, two years ago. There are three floors: the ground floor, which is for the invigilators to do their mysterious rituals to identify candidates, and the two upper floors, where we all sit to take the exams. I have used exam rooms on both levels, this year and the past two, so I’ve had both experiences. Surprisingly, it’s not that hard to make friends going into exams; this despite that “candidates may not communicate with, ask for help from, or give help to, other candidates. If you wish to speak to an invigilator, please put your hand up and wait for one to come to you” as I have memorised from the speech they do every time you go in. I’ve heard it thirteen times this year, enough to do that now.

The Invigilator Announcement is all pretty obvious. No devices, no technology, no books (unless allowed by the board, as some do – that would be lucky, because you can select any part of the text you like, but unlucky, because I’d just end up reading the book rather than writing the answers!), no talking, and no time. Or so it feels. Exams go very quickly, but thankfully I find the going in easy. Not if I’ve had time to think about it – it’s unnerving and makes lunch not feel like a good plan – but once I’m there, I’ll be fine. Morning ones are definitely easier to go to, but do have the drawback of needing to go down the night before just in case the trains aren’t running in the morning. Also because I’d need to get up at a ridiculous hour of the morning to get there on time, and it’s much easier if the hotel is five minutes round the corner. Whatever the situation, by that point, Mum’s probably (read: definitely) more nervous than I am.

During the exams, I haven’t had any issues. Basically, all one has to do is look at the paper, don’t look at anything or anyone else, concentrate, and if you don’t have an answer immediately think of all the variables you know and work out what else you can find with them first. There are some cases when I have found the exams a bit tricky, but I’ve never seen a paper which is unexpectedly hard or easy. The principle of starting from what you know works for English as well, with just an added pinch of creative flair. Imagination will serve you well in that, if you can keep your imagination under control – this was my greatest downside in the practice papers, because either I fixed on the first idea I came upon, without considering, or stayed to think of multiple ideas and then became paralysed by indecision, wailing about which one to choose. It was only in the last few days that I consistently began to both think of multiple ideas (the first one is always the one that everyone thinks of) and choose properly. And write well. If anyone could read my handwriting.

Now that I’ve finished all the exams – all thirteen sittings of them – and am into a free summer, I find the huge weight of study that has been there for four years, from the start of studying EM to the end of the Physics paper, has gone. I have forgotten what it’s like to not have things to do, but whatever it is, it’s not the same as just doing nothing, which is practically literally all I have done since. I really need to devise a plan for my future, and not just one in my head – one that others can actually read (mind reading not having been developed successfully by me yet, despite all this knowledge). More on that in the next post.

So here ends Fantastic Exams, for they are all taken. The final test I have to take is living life to the full, which doesn’t end this year. I guess that’s what I need to do with the rest of this summer!

Hey Blog! One Friday in February, I went to Derby Museum and Art Gallery (DMAG) to attend the opening of the revamped archaeology and nature galleries!

DMAG is a museum I have attended for a long time now. It was the place where a lot of groups and activities went on when I was younger and I used to roam around the museum taking in all the exhibits. It’s near the cathedral and contains artefacts from ancient Egypt to the mediaeval, from Derby to the other side of the world. It also has a large and interesting art gallery, as is in the name. But the galleries for the archaeology department and the nature department hadn’t been updated in any significant way for years, so last year the museum decided to give them a change.

Previously, the archaeology part felt very like a 1960s chronologically ordered nutty-old-professor-trying-to-explain-to-a-bunch-of-schoolkids local, white-walled small museum. There was some fascinating stuff, from the bronze age log boat to the carved stone sarcophagus to the gold noble of Henry the Fifth, but it was set out in a way that was only interesting to people who were already interested; that is if you didn’t already understand the history and value it you would skip straight to the Viking swords and miss the other cool stuff like flints and tiles with Roman dogs’ pawprints on. The nature section was fascinating, though again it felt very formal though without the mass of information you get at bigger museums, with a hippo skeleton and drawers upon drawers of specimens of rocks and beetles and other wild stuff, as well as Mr Fox, the one taxidermy animal that was not in a case for people to touch. He’s now retired, and his “retirement party” was the excuse to get a whole bunch of people together for the reopening!

The party was a large one. There were people from all the derby museums, from organisations that have funded the new galleries, and people like us who had come up with an idea for an exhibit – Derbyshire Scout Archaeology team strikes again! Back in 2022 the Youth Committee had turned up to help design a temporary exhibit while the gallery was being refurbished, but eventually this never materialized while the gallery was closed. Instead, a small section was devoted to the idea of youth engagement in archaeology and how the DSA has furthered this. Included are a few badges and some information about us, so hopefully more Scouts will be inspired to join us. As Dad was staying around to pick us up after work, we couldn’t stay long, so I spent most of my time while not on tour listening to the speech and talking to someone from the Museum of Making about one of their projects to create bronze spearheads. But what about the galleries now?

Apart from regular turnover of artefacts and exhibits, nothing was removed. Quite a lot was added. There is a lot more colour, now, and the order of the galleries is changed so you’re meant to walk in the other direction, but the best thing is they have been melded into a combined, two-room Science and Nature gallery. I would not have thought of this – but it has been expertly handled and the look of Birds-of-Paradise specimens near the ceiling looking down on Roman dice is one that I’m sure will stick in the head of many viewers! If only we hadn’t had to leave so soon; it’s a pity I didn’t have half the time to look around that I would have wanted, but I hope to go back soon and have a proper look around the place. By the brief glimpse, it should be very good indeed!

Hey Blog! I am so sorry to all of you. It’s been ages since I posted anything – far longer than I would have liked – and that’s mostly my fault. I have been doing a number of exams and the accompanying study has made it hard to find time to write and post anything as well as make time for myself. Though to be honest, I have had time, just not chosen to use it effectively. It’s been about three months when I promised they would be every week, so please accept as apology one post a day for the coming week. Some will be things I’ve done in real time, and some will be about past events. I’ll begin with the last one I wrote before the long break – which follows.

Hey Blog! Yesterday we went to Nottingham to have a look around the caves there!

Just a train ride away, the city of Tigguo Cobauc is a brilliant destination. You may be wondering where that is. Well, it’s Anglo-Saxon for “place of caves”, or “place of cavy dwellings”, and is the name given to the village of Nottingham in works by Alfred the Great’s biographer, who lived only a few years after his death. Yep, it was known for the underground dwellings over a thousand years ago, and probably a long time before that. The geology is interesting: there is a sandstone ridge under the main part of the city, providing a source of soft stone which is easily workable into caves. There are no natural caves in Nottingham, so everything is the work of centuries of human residents who have built below just as they have built above. The largest publicly accessible system is now the city of caves tour exhibit, which is the one we went to yesterday.

The caves are not deep, or large, nor do they form long passageways. The most common use is a family cellar, though there are a number of wells, pub cellars, and occasionally a house dug entirely into the rock. Think Hobbit hole, then take off the round door, and dig into Nottingham sandstone instead of The Hill. Part of the tour we went on was around a mediaeval house, which had been turned into a tanning workshop in the Tudor period. This was then forgotten about and rediscovered when the shopping centre, now demolished, was built over it. Initially, the developers’ plans were to fill the entire structure with concrete, but a quick piece of archaeological investigation confirmed this was an almost perfectly preserved tannery, with everything except the smell – which would have been substantial when it was operational, partly composed of barrels of human urine and dog faeces. Luckily, the realisation of its rarity prevented any development, and the site is now protected, as a scheduled monument.

However, even since the 1500s, the caverns have continued to be used. Most recently, in the 1940s. Some of the properties of sandstone are its crumbliness, which made it easy to dig through in a hurry; and its shock-absorbent factor, which made it able to withstand high pressures – like the concussive blast of a bomb. All in, the perfect thing to make air raid shelters out of as soon as WWII broke out – even better, as the sand removed to make them could be used for sandbags to protect homes! This was the last major expansion of the networks, but was hardly ever used, as the city was only bombed eleven times during the war (and it is likely that ten of those were because the pilots couldn’t identify Derby, which was a more important target due to the aircraft production factories there!).

It’s quite a system. Every detail, carefully wrought out of the rock centuries ago, makes up the story of the history of the town. I’d love a house where I can dig out my own secret bunker; perhaps I need a house in Nottingham! It’s a fantastic place to visit and I can thoroughly recommend the café round the corner. Do pay a visit, as they are fascinating!

Over the years, watching TV programmes have been some of the best inspiration. Time Team and Digging for Britain = archaeology obsession. Sewing Bee = sewing obsession. Bake Off = baking obsession. Fake or Fortune = art obsession. Yes, the last of these. A remarkably good programme. The premise of it is simple – someone sends in an application of an artwork that they think could be by a famous artist, and the enormous BBC team tackles documents, pigment analysis, provenance, old photographs, technical details, and many other elements of the painting and the artist’s life. The professionals then send their evidence – either a certain, well-assembled file of conclusive proof or an incredibly sketchy and slightly hole-ridden list of conjectures with which to persuade the official body of experts who consult each and every artwork to determine whether it is genuine. Many times the attempt fails – the work is a fake, or authentic but not by the master artist in question. But there are also times when it is a lost treasure, which people have been missing for years.

Inspired by the program, I have been on the hunt for art. It still seems incredible there are quite so many lost masterpieces hanging around on people’s walls, but nevertheless there are a good number in public galleries. This means you can go and visit them, and two locations in London that are both referred to as good places to look are the Cortauld Institute and the National Gallery. I strenuously urge a visit, to both, but perhaps not on the same day. After wandering around looking at paintings all morning and afternoon, you need to go back to your Youth Hostel and have a rest before dinner.

On the type of art, specifically painting, that I like best – well, it’s a bit like music. Most modern art is, to put it tastefully, abstract, undefined, and uncertain. This means the best art (in my opinion – art is subjective of course) is probably before the mid-20^th century. However, on the earlier end of the spectrum, I think much of the best art is after the Renaissance. It is probably overly simplistic and grossly offensive of me, but it seems almost all art pre-about 1700 is either of old men or religious scenes, and in large doses this is quite a lot of old religious gentlemen. I admire the precise, photographesque exactitude of old art, but consider that almost too perfect and much rather the more relaxed styles of the later periods. However, the opposite, where the artist has stopped caring about any relation to reality, is also less appealing to me. Perhaps my favourite period is the impressionist movement, but I’m not sure. What I am certain of is that I can’t paint half as well as any of them.

It was a nice trip to London, with some fantastic art, and I sincerely hope there will be more like it in future!

Hey Blog! I’m going back to the very first weekly post I uploaded here, and giving you an update. Things have come a long way since then!

My week now looks something like this.

Monday: Chemistry, and Physics, online classes with Southwest Science School, iGCSE level. After this, English Language and or Literature (with Mum), and/or Maths (online program, usually done with Mum, but most of the time I understand it perfectly and there’s no need to discuss).

Tuesday: Biology online class, again with Southwest Science and again at iGCSE. More English and maths. Yes, I know, a bit repetitive but that’s what’s needed at the moment. Helping at Beavers as a Young Leader in the evenings. Hopefully going forward there is another volunteering opportunity, which I need for my Silver level on Duke of Edenborough’s award, though the day and time is not fully confirmed yet.

Wednesday: Sometimes, a day out with friends. About once a fortnight, piano lesson. (Practice is every day, or supposed to be, and about 40 minutes). Usually a continuation of the rest of the week’s studies, and revision of one or two sciences.

Thursday: More of the six subjects for this year’s exams. Explorers meetings or DofE in the evenings, the former usually either active or creative, the latter mostly planning the route and the equipment needed for the expedition.

Friday: Anything I haven’t done yet in the week. Last year, cricket training was on Friday evenings, however this year it’s expected to happen on Tuesday evenings once we can play outside, as in the under-17s I’ll be training with the seniors. Feeling old already. The plan is a slightly easier and more relaxed day to end the week, but in reality it’s more likely to be the maddest, most rushed day of all as I am desperate for everything to be done before the weekend.

Saturday: There is often something extracurricular on this day, i.e. YAC, Scout camps, days out. Sometimes, however, I just want to laze around at home, reading. This is the best day for anything interesting which does not involve academic study or keeping up with friends and relations.

Sunday: Most often the quietest day. I should be done with everything, and the most common day for family outings. Currently, as it is winter, cricket is indoor and happens on Sunday afternoons.