CuriousMe

It's surprising to hear that, all other feedback I've heard was that Bridgemen were very, very well received at East.

Bridgemen don't drink until after practice or performances. I've heard some alumni corps make different choices, but we practice and perform sober.

My Mom and Dad both marched Jr Corps (OLPH Ridgemen and the Marionettes respectively), Dad marched Skyliners after that. All three of us kids marched Jr. Corps, with 25 years between us in 5 different corps. We were a drum corps family, I grew up listening to drum corps albus and don't know what my first live show was because I was carried to it.

A very similar thing happened in '85, '86 and '87. There were a lot of age outs in '85, and then in an effort to push the envelope of what could be, in '86 they decided to increase the hornline from the standard 60 some odd members (this was back when the corps limit was 128) to 80+ and have an incredibly minimal guard (I think there were 12 gals in the guard in '86). So, in addition to losing most of the hornline to age outs, they increased the line size by twenty members. We had A LOT of rookies in '86 (including me!). It was a very tough year and a testament to all the rookies who came back for what became a historical year in '87. FHNSAB...

Of course, but when has that expectation been there for the general public? I grew up in a patriotic family, we flew the flag, we learned how to care for and respect the flag, my Dad, and my Grandfathers were vets. I've never heard of stopping your car for the NA off of a military base.

Stand respectfully till the National Anthem is finished, sure...I'm on board. Stop and pull over my car if I'm driving by with the windows down? That's new to me (and I was a scout, learned all the proper flag handling, etc). It seems to be a bit of overkill....

Am I able to read the entire post, or am I just allowed to read that line?

And there's the crux of our difference of opinion. I think he was honest without being rude.

I'll take "too much honesty" over "only telling me things I want to hear" every single time.

From the amount of times the "50 million dollar school" was mentioned in the replies to his post....my guess is that folks got their nose out of joint because Cadets chose not to stay at their shiny new high school. He wasn't speaking about his "preference" for the south or not....he was saying that he runs in to more housing issues in the south and because of that the corps avoids touring there. I still don't see that as a slam.

Yeah, this paragraph of his post didn't make the "news" article (news being a very generous term for that article) "Pass the word. We will travel. If we can get a location within an hour of the stadium we are fine; an we will pay if we have to. Now, we do have some stadiums we can move to during the day, but we want the drivers to stay asleep, we like to be self contained and we like to work hard." The whole point of the post was to ask local Cadet Alums/Supporters if there were alternate sites available. Which there were.

He was looking for a solution....new housing sites, that's how this nonsense started. But if you mean a solution to the larger problem....housing sites in the south. What solution are you thinking of, getting all southern states to start school later? Get them to change their focus on their own football and marching band programs to free up rehearsal sites? I know many consider George to be "all-powerful" (after all, he single-handedly destroyed drum corps right?), but I think these issues are beyond his scope of influence.

Does the fact that I included it give a hint that I still see nothing wrong with saying it? This is from someone who has lived both in the NorthEast and the Deep South. He didn't say that the south was bad, he said that the corps has a hard time getting the facilities they need in the south. That's not an insult, it's a statement of history.

He didn't say there was anything bad about the location, he said it didn't fit their needs. If people choose to from zero to outraged in seconds flat, that's their choice. Except he wasn't looking to say anything about the specific site other than it didn't meet their needs. He was saying the same thing about the south, that they often have trouble finding sites that fit their needs. He was commenting on why the Cadets don't come south as frequently (which people do ask of him, ie "Why don't Cadets come to XYZ region of the country more often" That doesn't mean the south is wrong or broken, it means that the Cadets have trouble in the south finding sites that fit their needs. Again, if someone is looking for a reason to be outraged, I suppose this is enough. But otherwise, it's a non-event.

What personal feelings did he share? He stated why he hesitates to bring the corps down south. He talked about the fact that their housing/rehearsal sites weren't meeting their needs and asked if there was someone who had a location that would. But we agree that the indulgence of sharing personal feelings on the internet is a favorite pastime. In this case it's most evident in the people venting their spleen about how offended they feel for being told a housing site wasn't meeting the corps needs and that the corps has had this kind of problem often in the south.