Yeah, I think you might want to work that out with your boy's school beforehand. If they have a lockdown policy, you should know about it. In fact, all the parents of that school should know that if a man walks in with a gun and starts shooting people, the teachers will trap all their children inside, behind locked doors. Who knows? you might even get a stupid policy changed. If they absolutely won't listen to you, Let them know they will be releasing at least one boy out of the school, or they will have one more dangerous threat to deal with in a lockdown emergency!

Right around columbine time, about a year later, there was a rash of lesser (if they can be called that) school shootings, I remember in particular one boy who took a .22 rifle, tripped off the fire alarm, and shot at the lines of students and teachers who lined up like ducks in the playground area, fire safety protocol.

I remember that one because I kept thinking about it when a bomb threat was announced at my highschool, and they made the WHOLE SCHOOL get out, line up, and file into the TENNIS COURTS.... I dunno, they maybe thought the twenty foot high chain-link fences would protect us from flak....

When I saw what they were doing, all I saw was a death box loaded with panicking people, trapped behind twenty foot high chainlink walls with only one or two small exits.... Just waiting for some kid with a gun on the roof of the school, or wherever.

I let my friends know that I wasn't going in, and they weren't either. They didn't question me. We took off. We got noticed, were told to stop, I told the principal he could screw himself, I'm not getting into that death box. We took off, the tennis courts weren't far from landscaping (cover/concealment), and then houses. We went home for the day.

Of course, we were the first people implicated as suspects for the bomb threat! OF COURSE.... because we didn't comply with their ill-thought-out concentrative death plan. Fortunately for us, the prank caller, as it turned out to be, turned herself in after seeing all the drama that was erupting in our little town.

That's how I got my eight-person/two-room tent. A friend bought it, used it once, was going to throw it in the garbage! It's more tent than I generally need but it is fun for trips to the beach and such.

My daughter loves to camp but since she's only five we've been avoiding places with long hikes in as of yet. Mostly beach campgrounds and parks that are easy for her little legs to navigate. Thankfully she's not a picky eater.

Make 'em pack and plan their own meals if they're finicky, maybe they'll appreciate the effort it takes to prepare food on the trail. Or, worst case scenario, you end up living off of crackers and canned cheese for a weekend.