OA work weekends are events driven partly by planning and partly by force of personality on behalf of the youth and adults of the lodge.  Normally, a non-trivial part of the latter is Mike Shavel and his attention to people’s needs that borders some people wrongly interpret as obsequiousness.  He has attended near every lodge event for the past five years, sometimes going to comical extent to do so, “I traded two vacations for the right to be away on Mothers’ Day” and such.  Mike was away this weekend and event turn out was unusually high.  The weather held up and after a successful auction, I spoke with another adviser:

Me: Seems like everything went well this weekend.
Adviser: Yep.  A bit heavy on the last minute registration but that’s a happy problem.
Me: What about the ceremonies?
Adviser: Still below where we should be, but better than usual.
Me: The food seemed ok too.  Nothing ran out even with the attendance overage.
Adviser: Yeah, don’t tell Mike.
Me: Why?
Adviser: He might get the idea in his head that he can spend time with his family.
Me: Someone’s gotta keep his bald spot growing.

Maybe we’ll get lucky and there will be a freak lightning strike during the lodge meeting.