In the 8th grade we took metalshop,woodshop and drafting. I still have the bronze cannon I made after the boy's dean admonished us againsn't trying to make knives and zipguns. I told the shop teacher it was a urn. I finally figured out what a zipgun was watching Westside Story in music Appreciation <img src="/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" /> Woodshop was better, I made the naval carriage for my urn. Drafting was horrid. I was prone to drawing sea battles on my class notes and barely passed, the bore of my cannon off center, full of smudges and dire predictions from the instructor I would NEED this later in life, along with my sliderule. In 9th grade I had a choice of drafting again or the new boys home economics course. In spite of peer pressure I took home ec with the rest of the girlymen and learned to sew. It came in handy in bootcamp. Our CPO decided the cross stitched buttons were each a demerit in dress and cut every button off our uniforms. Thats 15 for the bells, 2 on the middy, 8 PCoat , 7 on the chambray work shirts and 118 for the raincoat for the sum of 108 buttons to be resewn with these pathetic dittybag kits. I had to teach my entire company basic sewing overnight while our posted guard watched for his approach. Seeing as I didn't smoke, the rationed cigarettes were not demanded in the usual bootcamp exchange medium. Instead I built up goodwill that carried me and the surviving 38 out of 100 recruits from that night through to graduation and beyond <img src="/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />