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I just got an email from the Bristol (RI) July 4th Committee. The parade will go on as planned. It will be different. There will be no marching units or anyone walking for that matter. It will be vehicles only with some providing entertainment. People along the route will have to social distance and wear masks. It sounds like an innovative way to keep a tradition alive (Bristol claims to be the first community to celebrate the a Fourth of July and has the oldest parade) and where I believe 13 maybe even 15 of the WC corps have marched in Bristol at least once, I thought it might be of interest to some folks on DCP.

I think it's cool trying to keep a tradition going and I applaud them for that. But at the same time the new rules just remind you what World we now live in...at least for now. This pandemic is not slowing down. But hoping a vaccine is on the way in 2021.

Haley Mills looks much more 1988 Suncoast Sound "Symphonic Dances for the Contemporary Child." She's just missing her Earth Ball.

Actual marching is an art that few staff understand how to teach and more importantly how to clean it. Which is why we see less and less of it. Takes a lot of time to teach, and learn correct technique. Problem is that there are few who know the basics of marching.

June 25, 2002, 9:21am ET - Tour Day 33 Ledford, NC We had our first show last night in Columbia, South Carolina. We worked extremely hard for the last few days leading into the debut and it paid off. Even though we lost some rehearsal time and our preshow run-through due to a thunderstorm, we turned it on at the stadium. We placed 4th with a score of 74.15 last night. The Cavaliers - 81.45 - all captions The Cadets - 79.55 Blue Devils - 78.00 Crossmen - 74.15 Carolina Crown - 68.45 Spirit of Atlanta - 66.90 Magic of Orlando - 70.25 We watched a video of the performance on the bus and I really was impressed to see how much improvement we’ve made. The drill is rapidly increasing in clarity. It was a great first show and start to the season. (Next post is June 27.)

Let me put the most encouraging coronavirus news I saw today at the top this time: the U.S. reports having conducted 640,000 tests in the past 24 hours, and that's the most ever. So no matter what anyone says, we're not slowing the testing down. Not a joke. I wouldn't say I never kid, but I'm not kidding now. (And if we could just boost that number about 10% and then keep it going every day for a month or so, we might finally get a handle on this thing.) Partly as a result of that, the U.S. also reported its highest ever number of new cases today: 42,000. But that case record we broke today is just one day old. Yesterday, the U.S. also reported its highest ever number of new cases ever: 39,000. And yesterday's number of reported tests was not a record. However, the number of deaths reported today, 646, is down both from yesterday (722) and from one week ago (693). (That death total of 646 ignores numbers from New Jersey, which has now gone back through its death records from the past three months to find Covid-19 deaths that were missed in the original reporting. That state today announced it found more than 1,800 deaths not previously counted. As a reminder: this process is exactly how all disease statistics are handled every year. For example, the annual numbers you've seen reported for the flu are not the numbers that were reported at the time.) On the other hand, though, the largest hospital complex in the country (or maybe the world), the Texas Medical Center in the Houston area, maxed out its regular ICU capacity today. As its administrators predicted yesterday, they're now at 100%. They have been planning for this and have some surge capacity. Unfortunately, based on current trends in that area, TMC says they expect to run out of those additional ICU beds in less than two weeks. Also: Arizona what are you doing?

Dang; my first deleted post. Do I get a "gold star" or an ice cream sandwich? I stated in the post that it wasn't a political statement. Would that qualify as "passive aggressive" behavior? P.S. In the spirit of DCP, never forget #GeorgeHopkins!

Never been to it and this styled parade would never interest me. Even more traffic than normal and a bunch of vehicles and floats doesn't excite me. May the weather be nice for those who are interested.

Although you are right I do not think the product will be anything less than amazing I was actually talking in way of creativity in HOW the activity goes on and what corps will have to do or what the new norm will be . ( providing there is a 2021 season ) my interactions with all parties are hopeful but cautious in thinking.

Re Parking and Barking: Some of us remember when all corps stood stationary for 2 -plus minutes right in the middle of the show. It was called "The Concert". Most of the time this section consisted of music that would have been nearly impossible to "march" to, given the tempo requirements and skills of the time. Nobody complained since it was also usually the production that actually sounded best. For the audience, it was tantamount to being inside a full ensemble arc in the parking lot. Here's an example. Scroll ahead to 5:30 or so:

You can watch the rebroadcast of this talk with Cadets Brass Captionhead, Matt Stratton, with Jay Bocook, Wayne Downey, Jim Prime Jr., Michael Klesch, and Doug Thrower on FB here :

Interesting... The EU is in discussion with J&J to reserve some portion of the billion doses of s vaccine J&J plans to produce of its product currently in trials. The US already has a similar deal with AstroZeneca.

Saltine crackers with shredded cheese on them Before the San Antonio regional in 2005 Capital Regiment, baby!!!!!

No grits & I'm from the South; texture issue. Prefer hash browns especially the Waffle House flavor. 🙌

When I think of fake cheese, I think of Cheez Whiz (ugh) - even though I had eaten plenty of Kraft singles in my youth. I suppose Mac and Cheese is fake as well - had a lot of that. There was one time at Laguardia Airport where I came off a flight and had to wait for hours for a connecting flight only to have very few food options in the terminal (pre-renovation). There was a fast food stand with one of those rolling hot-dog oven things. Few hot-dogs were left but I was so hungry. I asked for one. The person behind the counter asked me if I would like some American cheese on it. It sounded so good in my famished state. He then brought the hot-dog on a bun to a nozzle and squirted liquid cheese on it. My stomach turned. It was so disgusting to look at. I had to concentrate to prevent myself from projectile vomiting in Laguardia airport. I paid for it and just left it on the plate.

Grilled cheese sandwich made with butter flavored Crisco and fake cheese.

I work in clinical trials and in fact on COVID-19. I cannot speak on behalf of my company so this is my educated belief: I believe it is almost certain we will have several effective, approved and ready vaccines by January, as well as dozens of drugs that will effectively treat at least some of the most serious symptoms. It is almost unthinkable to believe that no country in the world will have a successful vaccine at this point, because the entire scientific community is working together with powerful computer models that are essentially running trials on computers before they even make it to human testing. That’s why we have five government sponsored vaccines that are all likely to work, albeit in different ways. Never before in human history have we seen multiple clinical trials, in multiple countries, for the same virus get to approved Phase 3 trials as quickly as this has. Let alone at risk manufacturing. If you only watch the news and don’t understand clinical trials, to be fair, you cannot possibly appreciate how fast this is moving. There are over 100 different clinical trials happening simultaneously all over the world. Unprecedented. They all fall into a few different buckets of approaches, and each one has scientific efficacy. In other words, there is reason to believe that each approach will be effective. I think the biggest hurdle may be housing. Attendance will return, streaming will be much bigger than before, but where do kids sleep? Will school systems open up their buildings? That to me is very fragile.

Slightly off topic but what an absolute gift the Supreme Court gave to us the other day! I hope LBGTQ participation continues at a high level in drum corps

Endless PB&J sandwiches at Sky Ryders, where the summer heat usually melted the peanut butter into a soupy mess that had to be poured onto the bread.

English, circa 2009: "Marcos Zapata was a thief Who once did steal, and roam the street Until a heist of his went bad He was shot (bang bang bang) and left for dead. Before his last breaths of life The witch saved him from the death of night And so arose Relampago! (thunderclap) To fight away the evil foe. And so begins our hero's story Of life, of death, and return to glory."

Sorry to reply to your post in reverse order, but that is how I roll. But my few minutes of research found that there are factions who seriously intend to dismantle entire police departments. One such idea was to eliminate the entire Minneapolis police department over the ensuing year, replacing them with some alternative service composed of people who actually reside in Minneapolis. Wait. The point is to create a lie to grab our attention? Then tell us what the real agenda is? After your "hydroxychloroquine BS" posts awhile back, I would never have expected you to defend anything less than absolute, factual accuracy in such public policy communications. Why should this be treated differently? The DCP demographic? What is that? In a thread devoted to combating racism, is it too much to ask for you to leave your -isms out of this conversation? Oh, okay. If reducing crime via other means could reduce the burden on police so as to permit their downsizing, in a package of changes that pay for themselves, that would be good. Unfortunately, reducing the burden on police is not possible at the moment when cities all across America are under attack. In fact, recent events might cause people to decide that they need a larger and more militarized police force to guard the residents, workers and visitors of cities from riots, looting and destruction of buildings.

I have a problem when people say they want to "demilitarize" the police , and eliminate funding for "military hardware". Organizations like police,fire ,etc. have to able to function in any emergency situation,be it man made or natural. That requires a clear "chain of command". That, in and of itself ,requires a quasi military model. Same thing,what exactly is "military hardware " ? Everyone seems to have have their own definition. At one time,the standard procedure in N.J. ,when dealing with an "active shooter (s)" situation, including schools,was for a police officer to wait for back-up. Not now. An officer is expected to go in immediately. That requires more "fire power" then a semi automatic pistol. Police have carried shot guns for years. Given their "spread", they aren't well suited for "close quarters" with "civilians" possibly in the "line of fire". Hence,an AR-15 or something similar is now standard in police vehicles. Does every police department need an armored vehicle ? No. But the terrorist attack in Jersey City last December showed the necessity of hainvg this type of equipment available on at least a County basis.

Then what does it mean? Last I heard, "defund" means stop all funding. And when you cut off all funding to something that costs money to operate (like a drum corps, for example), it ceases to exist.

Let’s keep the politics out

Anyone else noticed that the people rioting, looting, and destroying businesses and cities are not wearing MAGA hats? I found that interesting 🤔

Mod hat here... Please refrain from crossing into the political area with posts.

That was a low point of that year, but there were stretches that yr or 04 where we had cookies and canned pudding for many meals. Cold McD’s burgers at least once. Corps crashed and burned hard in 2006 and folded.

I do not take the words “defund the police” to mean abolish the police. If there are people saying to totally abolish the police, they are twisting the original intent of the catchphrase. The catchphrase, much like black lives matter, isn’t the best in how vague and potentially misleading it is, but it does get people’s attention which I believe is the goal.

Undercover maybe....