he part of the world not the United States was shaken by the gruesome events in Beslan, Russia, where a two-day hostage situation ended Friday after claiming the lives of more than 350 non-Americans.

The confusing terrorist incident, not in any way involving U.S.-protected interests, centered on a group of separatists rebels taking a school in the Russian province of North Ossetia hostage. During the two-day standoff between the terrorists and government forces, hundreds were wounded or killed—the majority of them children. American officials are calling the event a "horrific, far-away tragedy."

The foreign nightmare began when armed terrorists took parents, children, and teachers hostage on the first day of school. The rebels consequently demanded Russian forces leave Chechnya, falling on the time-honored method of murdering helpless women and children to gain sympathy for their cause. U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan condemned the attacks, saying, "What the fuck?"

American media covered the non-American catastrophe with a watchful eye, splicing in some video of the horrors between soundbytes from the Republican National Convention and previews of the upcoming Fall TV season. U.S. politicians were quick to provide commentary on the situation, in case something happened to make it a lead news story on any of the national networks or worked its way onto page six of the print news.

"This is yet another grim reminder of the lengths to which terrorists will go to threaten the civilized world," said President Bush, in another grim reminder of the lengths he would go to extort the agony of many to climb a couple of points in the polls.

Across this country, the reactions of average Americans were wide and diverse.

"What a shame," said Jerry Kimler, an office manager from Trenton, New Jersey. "We should all mourn for Russia. We, too, have suffered at the hands of Al-Qaeda. You are not alone, our communist neighbors."

"It's a disgusting crime, especially since it was committed against children," sobbed Agnes Walker-Rush, a cashier at a Winn-Dixie in Napalm, Georgia. "Once the Russians were our enemies, and now, not so much. I'm severely moved by their plight, and sickened by the images I might have seen on TV if I had known anything about this before you told me just now."

Ginger Oliver, a caterer from Concorde, New Hampshire: "I can't believe it. How could this sort of thing happen. Bill Clinton needs heart surgery? Why? How? He's not even that old. Things like this don't happen to presidents."

A different response came from professional wine-taster Gerald "Skeeter" McCloy: "Nope. Can't work up any real concern. You sure there weren't any Americans killed?"

New York University Sociology Professor Jean Winstead took a break from typing up her resume to frame the numb reaction some Americans express to the nightmarish human calamity.

"Geographically, we've always been an isolationist nation, and have retained much of that sensibility in the years since, even though we've become a world superpower with interests across every continent," said Winstead. "Our media reflects this nationalism, and keeps us focused on America as the center of the universe, so to speak. Plus, with all the useless information floating in our heads, from knowledge about the workings of the electoral college to nostalgia about 1980s new wave groups, it's amazing we have enough brain space left over to even remember other countries exist out there. By the way, do you know anyone who's hiring?"

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Kind friends, I'm more than aware of America's fondest for the individual. Actually, strike that, I'm simply aware of it, I doubt it's possible to be more than aware of something, it's the knowledge-based equivalent of being more than dead, you either are or aren't. Suffice to say I know of our need to be individuals, I myself am an individual along with my wife and friends, so I do not suggest we all needlessly conform. And even if I do suggest that, I'm willing to understand when people don't obey. But one thing is damn sure, and there is no quarter given for this fact: There is no "I" in "camp songs."

As Den Boss (I am neither mother nor father to any of them, it's shameful to lead them on like some adult den leaders do) of Troop 54, I am the short, thin green line between fascism and full-out hippie love fest. I will have neither, particularly the latter. I will even take a significant helping of the former in order to avoid any smidgen of the latter, to be blunt and honest. And until last week, order was held and maintained by Den Boss Rokwell T. Finger. Until a freckled kid, I'll refer to him as "The Turd" in order to protect small children from the shame of their actions. Okay, I can give you a hint, his real first name is Todd and his last name begins with a C., he's roughly 9, but that's all I can give you without incriminating him. If you write to me here at the commune I'll send a discreet e-mail sharing his name, just between you and me, but otherwise, "The Turd" thing is still in effect.

During an especially well-tempoed version of "Row, Row, Row Your Boat," I heard a clattering off-key voice chime in, a second late I might add, and bring the whole thing tumbling down like a fat man on glass platform shoes. This voice was high-pitched, so I knew it wasn't my own, again starting up without my control under the boisterous sway of the song's appeal; it was one of the boys.

The freckle-faced Turd was the culprit. It was more than poorly-executed singing; I could tell by his flustered face, the squeaks of giggles from others, and the half-smile his wide-open pie hole was curtained by that the Turd was a revolutionary, a Che Guevara amidst my stolid camper robots. Well, naturally I warned him it was fruitless to defy our singing rules, and I thought that would work. Needless to say it did not.

"The Wheels on the Bus" did not go 'round and 'round, my friends. Old McDonald's Farm was full of blithering, retarded animals, including cats that mooed and chickens that made farting noises. And instead of coming around the mountain when she came, the bitch downright derailed. I was furious, more than furious, which I think may be possible to a reasonable extent.

I had a choice, right then and there: Allow my authority to vaporize to a pudgy anarchist or make an example of him to the others.

It wasn't a pleasant choice, obviously, but I took the only realistic course of action: I abandoned Turd to the wilderness as Troop 54 packed quickly and left. He believed his punishment was gathering nuts and berries, and in a way it was since he must have done that to survive his long stay in the woods and find his way back to civilization. I received stern criticism, true, and lost the command of my scout regiment, but at least I have left an indelible lesson of the importance of conformity impressed upon them, especially one arrogant young boy.

Turd has since managed to find his way back, judging by the signatures on the legal summons, and nobody is happier than me. Hopefully he'll grow up one day and, when a gaggle of young boys are put in his custody, he'll realize a stern rod can shape any young Jimmy Dean Rebel-Without-A-Cause into an impressive soprano.

º Last Column: There's A Bustle in My Hedgerow
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The history of the light bulb is a story of intrigue, espionage and a steamy love triangle gone bad. Unfortunately, that story has been optioned by ABC for a miniseries this fall, so we're going to have to stick to the afterschool special version.

Thomas "Cotton Gin" Edison was a rootin', tootin' six-gun-shootin' eccentric from the crusty butt-crack enclave of Battle Mountain, Nevada. Some may remember the town as the site of Evel Knievel's ill-fated final stunt, when he attempted to jump over the moon in 1983. The crater remains a popular tourist attraction and the center of Battle Mountain social life to this day.

The Battle Mountain of Edison's day was a quieter berg, nestled into Nevada's scenic dirt basin and known to cartographers nationwide as the flattest place in all of the United States. Early settlers exercised a healthy sense of irony in naming a town so flat that twelve people are killed every year by tumbleweeds hauling ass through town.

Little did they know that Battle Mountain would eventually live up to the "battle" part of it's name, when the construction of two dueling gas stations across the street from each other on Mountain Pass Road would mark the beginning of the constant bottle rocket wars across the road that have continued to this day. These skirmishes gave birth to the popular Battle Mountain Eye Patch fashion statement, worn by most adult residents of the town, all of whom had been blinded by bottle rockets. Few visitors to the town last more than a day unless they infer from the shrapnel-strewn storefronts that it might be best to gas up after dark.

But contrary to popular belief, the gas stations weren't the only two buildings in Battle Mountain in Edison's day. The town also featured three houses, a tool shed and a doghouse. The houses belonged to the Edisons, the Turnbuckles, and the Edisons' other neighbors who nobody ever bothered to talk to. The doghouse belonged to the town dog, Ruffles McGinty. Thomas Alvin Edison was born into this bustling metropolis in 1851, and soon made a name for himself as the only kid in town.

Throughout his childhood, Edison was mercilessly teased by the townfolk for his childlike size and pathetic vertical leap. The townsfolk consisted of Mr. Turnbuckle, who ran the Western Gas Station, and the father of the other neighbor family, who ran the Eastern Gas Station. Most of their attention was devoted to the bottle rocket war, but the one thing they could see bandaged eye to eye-patched-eye on was teasing Thomas Edison about his vertical leap.

The alienation and bitter obsessions fostered in Edison's childhood were to serve him well later in life, as he grew into a fine inventor. That's what his mom told him anyway, most of the rest of the town just made fun of him for inventing things that had already been invented, like the derby hat and the shovel.

At the age of eighteen, Edison swallowed his fears and made the move to the big city: nearby Battle Lake, Nevada, a dusty, arid stretch of scraggly, sun-baked land with the population of a little-league baseball team. There he would finally be able to pursue his scientific interests free of the closed-minded milieu and stifling mental environment of small-town Battle Mountain.

Edison blossomed in Battle Lake, spending his days yelling at clouds, digging holes in random parts of town and inventing in his spare time, taking credit for the invention of the marshmallow, the frying pan and nighttime.

As a sister invention to go along with nighttime, Edison decided to invent the light bulb, so he could practice his vertical leap when it was dark. Early attempts at catching lightning bugs in a jar proved effective, but short-lived. After two years of effort, Edison refined his light bulb to consist of an electrical current running through a fishbowl, but found it difficult to develop a filament that could sustain the current for more than a few seconds.

Edison tried anything and everything in his search for a perfect filament, including copper, gold, goldfish, grass, paper, mud, sand, string, underwear, hot dogs, a horned toad, Popsicle sticks, his finger and a neighborhood kid's big toe. After months of experiments, Edison discovered that bamboo coated in carbon worked the best, and he had one last laugh at the neighborhood kids who had told him you couldn't smoke bamboo. His new filament was groundbreaking, and the Edison light bulb burned for a remarkable four minutes before catching the wall socket on fire.

What few people today know, however, is that some English guys had already invented the light bulb fifty years earlier; the innovation just hadn't made it to Battle Mountain yet. After a brief stint as a local hero, Edison tried to take his invention to the patent office in Reno. He was promptly laughed the hell out of town, pantsed and ridiculed for his modest vertical leap.

We might never have known the name Edison today if it weren't for the fact that he snapped, went back to Reno and went hillbilly on the whole town with a rubber hose until it was declared that Edison really was the inventor of the light bulb, never mind all of those bullshit light bulbs everybody over in Europe had been using for years.

Thereafter the name Edison became synonymous with light bulbs and insane backwoods crackers everywhere, a true story of American ingenuity and intimidation that would stand as an example for years to come.

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