Say cheese.

The Office.

Classic.

The Daily News

 

1    I think I'll start this DN with a monologue from You're a Good Man,Charlie Brown in Comic Sans 36 pt:

<Music Under>

YOU’RE A GOOD MAN CHARLIE BROWN 

 Charlie Brown:  I think lunchtime is about the worst time of the day for me.  Always having to sit here alone.  Of course, sometimes mornings aren’t so pleasant, either – waking up and wondering if anyone would really miss me if I never got out of bed.  Then there’s the night, too – lying there and thinking about all the stupid things I’ve done during the day.  And all those hours in between – when I do all those stupid things.  Well, lunchtime is among the worst times of the day for me.

     Well, I guess I’d better see what I’ve got.  [He opens the bag, unwraps a sandwich, and looks inside]  Peanut butter.  [He bites and chews]  Some psychiatrists say that people who eat peanut butter sandwiches are lonely.  I guess they’re right.  And if you’re really lonely, the peanut butter sticks to the roof of your mouth.  [He munches quietly, idly fingering the bench]  Boy, the PTA sure did a good job of painting these benches.  [He looks off to one side]  There’s that cute little redheaded girl eating her lunch over there.  I wonder what she’d do if I went over and asked her if I could sit and have lunch with her.  She’d probably laugh right in my face.  It’s hard on a face when it gets laughed in.  There’s an empty place next to her on the bench.  There’s no reason why I couldn’t just go over and sit there.  I could do that right now.  All I have to do is stand up.  [He stands]  I’m standing up.  [He sits]  I’m sitting down.  I’m a coward.  I’m so much of a coward she wouldn’t even think of looking at me.  She hardly ever does look at me.  In fact, I can’t remember her ever looking at me.  Is there any reason in the world why she shouldn’t look at me?  Is she so great and am I so small that she couldn’t spare one little moment just to…[He freezes]  She’s looking at me. [In terror he looks one way, then another]  She’s looking at me.

[His head looks all around, frantically trying to find something else to notice.  His teeth clench.  Tension builds.  Then, with one motion, he pops the paper bag over his head]

1   It's Frideeeeeeeeee!!! Great week!

2   Got a LOT done and looking WAY forward to the rest of the school year.

3    I don't know about others, but I thought our opening went pretty smoothly.

4    Yesterday I went with my colleague Sean to get pho during our prep period, which is the last period of the day.

5    I haven't had a last-period-of-the day prep period since 2005.

6    At YB I tended to love that period of time, because I could have an hour breather before going into rehearsals for shows. I also loved it when there WEREN'T shows because I could get away and cruise, or enjoy a little free time, or simply hang in the Theatre with my guitar, amp and mic. Haven't had that sort of freedom in quite some time. Miss it! 

7   It was fun having a common prep with a colleague. Sean is younger than I, and we are working together to develop some creative lessons that could incorporate the common core curriculum (now known as "standards," as though Sinatra used to croon them.) that is currently all the rage.

8   We took off at a little after 2 p.m. which seemed ungodly early to be leaving work for the day. 

9   We left work to go to work, only in a much more pleasant surrounding. It was also out of the line of fire. Nobody could reach us. Quite worthy of hot pho and high fives. 

10  Sean joined us last year. In fact, on the first day of school last year I walked in early and our Principal introduced me and asked if I could show him around. 

11  He is a younger teacher, but clearly has all the love and passion it takes to be really good. He isn't afraid of anything, and is willing not only to take my lead on some pointers, but to give me input on modern trends. 

12   We ran across each other last year, and always had laughs. It's a great combo; we had piping hot pho and exchanged "pedagogical methodology." #snootyconfusinglyconvolutedtermsforteachingmethods #trendthatmakesnonclaritythefashion #wrongwaytoteachclearwriting #andotherfancystuff

13   Here. This is from Dictionary.com. It is literally a cut and paste:

 

 

Say cheese.

The Daily News

1   WHEW!

2   Thursday already, and we are rockin' it!

3   I LOVE teaching!

4   I don't ALWAYS love teaching, but right now, I LOVE it.

5   There's always something about the beginning of a new school year that is eternally refreshing.

6   Yes, we have to sit through all the rules, regulations, trends and things but once the dust settles, we get into the classroom, roll up our sleeves, and get down to it. 

7   Moving on, Part One: Speaking of school, I'd like to talk to the guy who pitched Staples' Back-to-School commercial that begins with a horrid version of Alice Cooper's monster hit School's Out. I didn't really catch the entire commercial, because most of teevee these days is like a lava lamp with droning sounds that fall to the floor like obnoxious raindrops.

8   Last night I busied myself with writing this when that commercial came on. The Staples' version of the classic end-of-the-school year song sounded as though it was being sung by the Angel's Camp Girls' Choir. This with a song about the end of the school year done originally by a band whose lead singer purportedly tore a live chicken to pieces on stage, bit off its head, and quaffed its blood during a September 1969 concert at a festival in Toronto. The press jumped all over the story the following day, prompting Cooper to deny all accusations. The immortal Frank Zappa heard this and swiftly got this message to Cooper: "Well, whatever you do, don't tell anyone you didn't do it!"

The inimitable Frank Zappa

9   Staples. My head spun. Aren't they supposed to target students during their Back-to-School campaign? Isn't Back-to-School one of their biggest seasons of the year?

10  The place has to be teeming with executives who majored in Back-to-School. They had to use some good bait to get the Back-to-Schoolers to come in and spend money on their products. Somebody somewhere came in with the idea of using School's Out, not by Cooper, but by a rather dull cherubic choir in order to ignite huge spending sprees. 

11  I REALLY had to ponder: "Who PITCHED that?"

12   I glanced over the top of my granny glasses and hitched a smile.

13    I then gave my head a non-physical shake and got back to work on this. I again looked up and pondered. Sidebar: English majors actually major in pondering. They look up and ponder more than the average citizen.

14   I remembered as a seven or eight-year old I would watch on teevee obnoxiously stupid commercials, most of which would make me go berserk. At one time I couldn't stand it any longer. I looked up at my Dad, who was reading his morning Chronicle when I abruptly blurted out, "I could write stuff better than that!" I had reached the boiling point. 

15   His response? "If you think you could do it, then do it." And he turned the page and got right back to reading.

16   That incident shut me up for about a hundred years.

17   I never did get around to pursuing advertising as a career. I remember toying with the idea in college, but thought about how truly scary it must be to pitch an idea to executives and investors.

18   I spun it around and decided it probably isn't as easy as it looks.

19   What is?

20   #sigh

21   Those who can.

22   Moving on, Part Two: Yesterday morning's Merc News had this as a headline: THRIVING GIANTS. For about a billionth of a second I thought I had somehow wandered into a parallel universe. Fireworks and explosions burst all through my frabjous mind.

23   But only for about a billionth of a second. The Giants. Our Giants. My Giants #allapologiesrusshodges

24   It's all darned impossible for mortal man to comprehend.

25   Hold on to that feelin'.

26   Yeesh.

27   I can't wait to channel surf back and forth between the Giants and Property Virgins tonight. I just shake my head when I think of the legacy of this team. History won't be kind. This team will be remembered as the all-time choke team that gave up when things got tough. Not true maybe, but that's the legacy they have carved for themselves. I still love them because they're my team. But it is a mild sort of sad. Just mild.There are worse things.There are worse things.But I shall say no more. 

28   Moving on, Part Three: Later that night: Oh, what it has all come to! Woe is me! Woe are we! Woe, woe, woe!

29   I'm pretty sure that was from Oedipus Rex.That guy did a lot of woeing.

30   He was sort of a woeing machine.

31   Anybody lookin'?

32   I'll never do that again.

33   No. Seriously this time.  I PROMISE. 

34   Is there a back door outta here?

35   Moving on, Part Four: My historical battle with inanimate objects continued into the day before yesterday.

36   It was darned well Chaplinesque.

37   I washed a few dishes by hand the other night, a secret obsession I have with being clean. I wanted to wash them and THEN put them into the dishwasher.

38   I was scrubbing a coffee cup when the handle broke off, right in my hand.

39   Probably brittle from so much washing.

40   I've also been trying to stay all over the laundry, since we actively work out, garden, and LIVE, which includes lots and lots of organic grime.

41   I've gotten Zen about the grime.

42   I learned it from Lennon.

43   I put my head inside a bag and do a grimal scream.

44  

45   Oh stop. Somehow I had to get a camel in here for longtime DN fan Cindy Barrett. 

46   For the rest of you, I'll never do that again. I already promised once. And you know me. 

47   Moving on, Part Five: Where was I? Oh yeah #inanimateobjects #thinkoldman #Chaplinesque #laundry

48   While trying to keep up with the laundry, I went to take it out of the dryer that same night only to find I had more shirts than I had hangers.

49   I put aside two Hawaiian shirts that had small rips, and took great care to go green with the hangers.

50   I can go green when called upon. I'm cool like that.

51   I put one of my crisp, clean school shirts on a hanger. The weight of the shirt broke the hanger hook off the hanger, right in my hand, EXACTLY like the coffee cup handle earlier in the evening. The shirt's neck area  mysteriously showed evidence of ring-around-the collar.

52   I thought of hiring a detective.

53   I saw this as a copycat inanimate-object occurrence.

54   In laundry terms that's a high grime.

55    

56   OKAY, okay.

57   I'll never do that again.

58    The same night I was editing the DN when something knocked the teevee tray holding my laptop completely to the floor.Total collapse. The tray flattened at on odd angle. My laptop landed safely on my lap.

59   The teevee tray landed flatly on the floor. I wanted to put chalk lines around it, and again call a detective.

60   Moving on, Part the Last: NOOOOOOOOOO!

61   Sorry. Just having a sudden flashback. I found myself in some odd bubble that was yesterday morning, with some Lifetime movie flickering on tthe teevee. I looked up. What I saw was all these wretched people huddled together singing Amazing Grace.They seemed to be dodging meteor showers. It very much could have been the Angel's Camp Girls' Choir doing the singing. Meteor showers. Yeesh.

62   Like I don't have enough to worry about.

63   About which to worry.

64   That's about plenty for today. I'm in the present and headed for cover. Can umbrellas stop meteors?

65   I'll see you tomorrow.

66   Peace and puns.

~H~

 

www.xanga.com/bharrington

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

BYAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!! 

 

 

The Daily News: Special Pre-School Year Edition!!!

1   Anybody lookin'?

2   I am excited to bring you this very special edition of the DN, because it is my proud pleasure to announce the engagement of my daughter Nicole to her longtime friend and confidant Matt Seymour! This summer Matt proposed to Nicoley in a surprise sunrise proposal on Kiva Beach in glorious Lake Tahoe.

3   Everyone was in on it except Nicole, who was somewhat annoyed that we were dragging her out of bed first thing in the morning to watch the sunrise. Normally she is an early riser, and the first to go to a sunrise. This morning just wasn't hers; she was tired, and a tad cranky about being shaken awake.

4   This made all of it better, as we knew something that she didn't: it was a morning designed to change her life forever!

5   Getting these pictures up here was a bit of a trick, what with a new laptop, Windows 8, and a broken-down Xanga.

6   It all somehow worked, even though it was all shot from an older iPhone 4. The pictures are undoctored, for the record. I love that this all got caught somehow in spite of the obstacles. The entire morning was nothing short of magical.

7   We arrived at the parking lot in the woods in virtual darkness, with dark orange and indigo hints of morning hovering above the eastern horizon.

8   Nicole wore a Disneyland hoody, red sweatpants and Tevas, an elegant and quite understated wardrobe for a life-altering event.

9   We walked up and down the beach, a slight morning breeze keeping it all real.

10  Matt traveled light. He had a wedding ring, black hoody, and a six-thousand-pound backpack on his person.

11  If Nicole HAD suspected anything, that backpack cleared all suspicions.

12  Waiting for a sunrise usually involves walking around, taking artistic pictures of sand, and twitching one's head every minute or so.

13  Tahoe is a particularly fun arena for sunrise pictures,  as a mountaintop could be graced in bright gold while the horizon might still be dark as a morning mist.

14   So Matt walked around with his backpack companion. The sun kept teasing, getting slightly brighter in the east, but still almost agonizingly slow.

15   Helene walked down the beach, turned around, and came back.

16   As the sun pushed further and further up, instincts took over.

17   Almost on cue, Caitlin suddenly dashed in front of Nicole with her phone out, coaxing Nicole to take some sunrise silhouette pictures of her, forcing Nicole's back to Matt.

18   My eyes, meanwhile, darted to and fro, wondering if anything big was happening.

19   Within seconds, I saw Matt poised with the ring, and saw him give a visual cue by kneeling down. Nicole turned around and was instantly stunned.

20   I made a mad scramble for my glasses, gave up and started snapping pictures.

21   What we wound up with was a series of shots that caught the moment perfectly, along with a video that is somewhere, but that refused to upload on Facebook.

22   After "The Moment" we all gathered together in a sort of group hug. I saw the shadow and took a picture of it. It seems almost better than had I attempted to snap our faces.

24   What a fine morning. The birds, who seemed to have joined in on the conspiracy earlier, chirped happily as we all stood amazed.

25   Back at the Lodge, my sisters Linda and Gayle had set up a mimosa bar. Caitlin had made a paper medallion that said, "I Do," along with and a banner that said "Congrats" in tiffany-blue and coral, THE colors Nicole and Matt will use as theme colors for their wedding.

26   When we got there, the party took off instantly. Gayle played Sinatra songs beginning with "The Way You Look Tonight." Good thing it wasn't "The Way You Look This Morning," because we all looked like hell.

27   After lots of clinking glasses, the party moved to my cabin, where I made a breakfast that would have won me a championship on Chopped. Eggs, Potatoes, bacon, icy orange juice and hot coffee were the orders of the day, featuring the most amazing potatoes I've ever whipped up #tonsofbutter

28   Afterwards we all took it easy. Celebrity golf dominated the clubs, although the younger set managed to hit the town later in the evening, but most of the day remained mellow and relaxed, an absolutely perfect day during a true midsummer, complete with love, magic, and even a forest.

29   The wedding will be held July 12, 2014, a week before we again hit what has charmingly been referred to as "Mars."

30   We call it Mars because we can't be reached while up there.

31   So I thought I would kick off the school year a day early by sending out these joyous tidings!

32   We'll see you all tomorrow, with a brand new string of DN's coming at you each school day.

33   Fun sharing all of this, and a huge congratulations to Matt and Nicoley, and to their baby Rocket J. Dog, aka Rocky!

34   Hope you enjoyed this. See ya soon!

35   Peace.

~H~ 

 

www.xanga.com/bharrington

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

        

 DAY 2: ANYBODY LOOKIN'?

The Daily News

1    ♪ ♫ ♪ ♫Well the first days are the hardest days, don't you worry anymore♪ ♫ ♪ ♫  = ) 

2   Okay so whoever decided to start school on a Tuesday needs his or her head examined. Like that? "His or her." Captain Correctness.

3   Today is Wednesday already.

4   I have to come in with some sort of magical lesson, even though I just floated in from summer.

5   What lesson?

6   How about Tuggle 2, which is a spelling rule. It goes like this: given a word with two syllables (table, empty, revert, etc.) and the accent is on the second syllable (e.g. in the list I just gave, "revert" is the only one where the accent is on the second syllable. You say "re-VERT"  but you don't say "ta-BULL" or "em-TEE." Simple, right?

7   So let's start again: given a word with two syllables and the accent is on the second syllable, AND the word ends in a consonant/vowel/consonant...(examples: occur, commit, admit, etc. you double the final consonant before adding a suffix, or more to the word. "occurrence, committable, admittance. Just memorize this rule. Look it over for a few minutes until it sinks in, and it will be with you forever!!!

8  

9   Okay I have officially assuaged my guilt at not being as actively "on it" as I will be within days.

10  I promise that I'll evermore be on it like a sonnet.  

  

11  Oh, come on!

12

13  English rocks.

14  I'll never do that again.

15   I swear.

16   Moving on, Part 1: fajfkds;fkdsjfkl;sdjfdsjfkdsjfdsfjs

17   That's a sort of doodlefast version of my first day teaching, 2013.

18   I had lots of visitors early, and LOTS of fun!

19   Short day. It was remarkably, well, short.

20   I had just finished my second class of the day and shouted at my class, "Your next class is...lunch!"

21   Lunch after third period. That is the YB equivalent of lunch after second period.

22   I skipped lunch, hopped across the hall to visit my friend Gwen, and we laughed and waited out the seemingly endless lunch period.

23   Sooooooo weird.

24   If you are a person with a normal job, you don't have lunch at your morning coffee break, right? It was like that.

25   I got back, finished the next three periods, and my day was done.

26   Ba-BAM!

27   I then checked my emails.

28   I must have had 726 emails, and yes I'm exaggerating.

29   Most wanted some sort of immediate action, which I had little time to do. I was spending my prep period planning some things with another teacher. By the time I was done with all that, and with stopping at the store to get printers' ink for my school printer, I was on my way home. I was starved; the dog was starved, and I was fogged. Surrealistically speaking.

30   Don't get old. You get foggy.

31   Let me qualify: Don't get THAT old.

32   Moving on, Part 2: fjfdsklfjdfjsdlkfjsdfjsdfsdkl

33   What was I just talking about?

34   About what was I just talking?

35   Oh yeah.

36   It's official.

37   Property Virgins is more entertaining than the 2012 World Champion San Francisco Giants.

38

 >

39  Honest.

40  Don't get old.

40  Last night I watched the Giants' game right up to the drizzle.

41  Took me exactly a millisecond to begin channel surfing.

42  After a ridiculously quick skim, I settled on Property Virgins.

43   It's about people who have no idea about buying houses buying houses.

 

  

 

44   One episode kept my interest for around five minutes because they had the best possible affordable house practically in their mitts, and kept grumping about trivial things.

45   I root for young people trying to get into houses, don't get me wrong. I totally get it. But when these morons let a great deal slip through their hands, I almost think, "Good!"

46   That's my social media ogre coming out.

47   Shouldn't I cheer for anyone, especially young people, who are simply trying to build on some dreams?

48   The goodly person in me says, "Yes, I DO cheer for everybody to be happy and to get nice things and to live dreams."

49   But we are so geared to good guys v. bad buys that we assume that snooty people are always bad guys.

50   Maybe they're just snoots.

 

51   Moving on, Part the Thoid: Anybody lookin'?

52   Same day.

53   Ever do that?

51   You wake up screaming at like four a.m. You go back to sleep at six. It's an excuse to close your eyes. You get up. You take a shower. You mumble to no one in particular, "Same day."

52   You get through the morning, go into the break room, get coffee and a banana, and you drop the banana on the floor, causing your coffee to spill all over your shirt. You go into the rest room and soak your shirt with water and try to clean it with toilet tissue. Little balls of wet toilet tissue cling to your shirt. You again grumble to no one in particular, "Same day."

53   @DN readers: You get the idea.

54   Yesterday morning, early, I had to go have my blood tested for one thing or another. I decided to go in early, before school. I got in and out pretty swiftly. I did a few chores, and before I knew it I arrived at school.

55   Somewhere in there the first day of school flew by. The dog had three dinners. The Giants drizzled. I cooked dinner. I watched Property Virgins. I wrote this. It's now time for bed.

56   Same day.

57   The sprinklers just shot on out front. I am now in the present. At least the present last night.

58   I keep meaning to change the timer. I keep forgetting.

59   The teevee just channel-surfed to Godfather II. It is my fave Godfather. It has scenes from Tahoe. Last summer I floated past the Corleone mansion. In real life, it is called Fleur du Loc.  Flower of the Lake. I floated around it in an inflatable raft. Awesome. I said a Hail Mary.

60   It's too late for me to watch it right now.  I own it anyway.

61    Still.

62    Same day. At least last night it was. Now it is Wednesday. You are now in the present. I hope you enjoyed your ride.

63    You guys have an awesome day.

64    Forget all of this the second you're done reading. It's all a lot of uppity pish-posh anyway.

65    Stay safe.

66    See you again.

~H~

www.xanga.com/bharrington

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

                                          

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 The Daily News

 

Say cheese.

   LADIEEEZ AND GENTLEMEN!!! ANNOUNCING THE DN'S SEVENTEENTH YEAR IN EXISTENCE!!!

PLEASE JOIN ME IN USHERING THE IMMORTAL DN IN TO THE 2013-14 SCHOOL YEAR!!!!

1   We're baaaaaaaaaack!!!

2   Anybody lookin'?

3   First day of school. Always scary. Always fun.

4   The best part of today is my schedule.

5   I go in at 10:30 and leave at 2:20. In between I pretend I'm doing something important.

6   I'm excited as always to see my students from last year, who will come in all scrubbed and excited, and I also look forward to seeing my friends and colleagues.

7   Fast Summer: Summertime hit and got out just as fast as it could. It ended so abruptly that I blindly crashed into a metaphorical brick building, causing a cartoon safe to fall on me. The building was there: it was there, it was THERE, and then SPLAT!!! It was literally in my face. I hit the brick and mortar like a Toon. And THEN I got smashed by a perfectly cartooned black safe.

8   It's okay.

9   It's all copacetic.

10  Anyhow, I got here safely, and that's no understatement.

11  Now if I could just stretch out of this accordion body, I could get up and enjoy the brilliance and the surrealism of the first day of school.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

12   It just occurred to me that I'm too old for this.

13   At least I THINK I am.

14   Every time I say that, some doe-eyed student will say in all her earnest: "You aren't THAT old!"

15   Such an innocent thing for a kid to say.

16   Little will she realize that we Old Brown Shoes interpret that statement to mean this: "You're old, but you aren't THAT old!"

17   Maybe she would see it more clearly if she looks in the mirror, sees some acne, and declares, "OMG! I look HORRIBLE!"

18   ...only to have a reassuring friend respond, "You don't look THAT horrible!"

19  

20   Say cheese.

21   Moving on, Part One: I almost didn't get this DN off, believe it or not. Xanga, the service I use to write this stuff, had already been hitting the skids toward the end of the last school year. Xanga has been around forever; many "bloggers" began on this old horse. I actually jumped horses earlier this summer, setting myself up on gmail's Blogger (even though I despise the DN being referred to as a "blog." It pre-dates blogging by years!).

22   I was all ready to kick Xanga to the curb, but realized too soon that they hold all my archives.

23   Xanga has been financially shaky for a while now, and they wouldn't allow me access to my own archives unless I upgraded. To their credit, I don't remember ever having to pay for being able to do this, so I didn't mind throwing a little cash their way.

24    In the process, I was able to keep and access my archives. This seemed important to me, since I have nine years of my seventeen on Xanga archives. Xanga still seems to have issues among Mozilla, Chrome and Explorer, all three of which seem to be needed in order for me to have access to all editing tools. This SEEMS pretty stupid, but that's the way it is.

25   They also won't let me do border colors anymore, or any borders at all. It was just a feature I enjoyed, because it would sometimes make things look a little more clean. It's sort of like when you blacken the lines in a coloring book, or trim your lawn.

26    On top of all this, I got a new laptop last year. It featured the really kooky Windows 8, which changes the way you do nearly everything. I was a reasonably quick study, but it seemed as though someone had come into my office and rearranged everything. It all still works, but if I try to throw a piece of paper into the waste paper basket it bounces on a bare spot and rolls to a jaunty stop. Things just aren't where they usually are.

27   So there I was two days ago still trying to figure out how to make Blogger happen, when I decided to give Xanga one last chance.

28   For the sake of brevity, as well as of tradition, I finally chose to go with Xanga, even though it is at best a rickety old jalopy.

29   But I know how to slip and slide through the cracks with Xanga, so I'm pretty sure the choice will work.

30   Too many changes happening too fast. That's what old people always say.

31   I'm old, yo.

32   But I'm not THAT old.

33   Moving on, Part Two: Whilst rambling and experimenting with ol' Blogger, I thought I'd try to sneak a new feature into the DN, a fun little idea I called Today's Unsolicited Glamorous Grammar Lesson, or "Tuggle" for short. The idea is that on certain random days, I will throw grammar tips out to the laymen out there. Or the laypersons. Or whomever.

34   Just ride with it.

35   Here is the last part of the DN I had actually posted on my "Blogger." It may seem random, but it was designed to BE random. So this is how it went down; this is almost a cut/paste verbatim of that post:

37   "Ah, shoebox.

38   I LOVES me right after vacay. The back of my head, which contains all my logic and memory suddenly expands to the size of a shoebox, and the most logical things cling to that new back wall of my mind. Given any stimuli at summer's end, logic and common sense take the length of a shoebox extra to return to the frontal part of my cranium. It's what I may someday deem the "Duh..." factor. Nothing happening too fast in the cranium at the end of summer. We won't name that phenomenon just yet. We may never.

39   Cranium #ohyeah

40   Something in the back of  that shoebox makes me remember that we played a game called Cranium whilst on Mars. Originally Jupiter. Mars #synomymsforvacay #crickets #pereidmeteorshowerpassesover #cranium #mars #jupiter #vacay #synomyms #ohyeah. Bottom line: I cannot be reached whilst there.

41   Whilst. #jupiter...

42   That one kills me.

43    There's no rule about that one, but if I could invent one, then here it is: pretend that there is no word "whilst," at least not in the USA. I once read a book on choreography by some choreographer who kept using "whilst." I almost thought all choreographers were morons because of that one choreographer. The word is archaic, and on the brink of obsolescence. So it isn't technically wrong, but it IS just silly and unnecessary. YOU think you sound intelligent. You don't. You sound like a moron #trustme

44   I hope to give a bunch of grammar tips in this year's DN. I had planned on that one all the way back in June.

45   That was pre-shoebox, and right on the front lines.

46   So I guess there's no time like the present. Here is my rule/non-rule on the word "whilst.":

47   There practically ain't no "whilst" anymore. Lose it. Now. There technically ain't no "ain't" either, but that's for another day.

48    Today's Unsolicited Glamorous Grammar lesson is "No whilst." Let's lay this word to rest, America. England, it's all yours. I personally think it's janky.

49   Hmmm. I think "Tuggle" might work, especially if I go lower case after the initial letter "T." I like it because it is loosely structured enough that I am not committed to it every single day.

50   Tuggle 1: "No whilst." Not on my watch.

51   Me likes.

52   Anybody lookin'?

53   We'll see you tomorrow.

54   Feel free to feed back whilst this "blog" or whatever is still in working order.

55   It's Tuesday. Welcome back.

56   Fly low.

57   See you again.

58   Peace.

 

~H~

www.xanga.com/bharrington

 

 

 

 

 

The Daily News

1   Last day of school.

2   Always filled with other-worldliness, coincidences, stress, and surrealism.

3   The other-worldliness begins with the disappearance of the seniors.

4   The rest of the school holds on to normalcy for dear life, but there is still this sense of sadness.

5  

6   Anybody looking?

7   No matter how much I try to avoid massive coincidences, they happen on the last day of school.

8   First off, I had to say good-bye to my Disney class. I simply adore my Disney class. The good-bye had to be graceful and perfect.

9   I did it in grand style.

10  Right before my final I had my entire Disney class sing Happy Birthday to my daughter Caitlin.

11  It was awesome. I put her on speaker. She was amazingly awake, even though she usually is a late riser.

12  It was triumphant, because one of my very first lessons of the school year is a story about her learning the difference between good and well.

13  I'll tell it in its entirety some other time, but it had to do with her chewing gum, swallowing it, and me carping at her about that.

14  She said at a very young age that she had chewed it good.

15  I corrected her. We were on a walk, stopping every once in a while and sitting on the curb to crunch autumn leaves and stuff. She was Hello-Kitty little.

16  She kept asking me for more gum, but she kept swallowing it. I would ask, "What happened to the last piece of gum? Did you swallow it?"

17  "No," she would insist. She would then pause and look back up at me. "It went down my throat."

18  This happened several times. I was a softie and would explain that "swallowing" and "going down your throat" meant the same thing.

19  She just wanted another piece of gum.

20  At one point I tried very patiently explaining that she needed to stop swallowing her gum. I heard somewhere that horrible things happen to gum-swallowers. I told her that.

21  She looked up and said, "I chewed it good."

22  The English major in me corrected her. "You chewed it well. You do things well sweetie. You do good things, but you do things well."

23   She paused. Then she said, "May I have another piece of gum?" I was impressed with her usage of the word "may." 

24   I figured she understood, and gave her another piece.

25   After a fashion, we crunched a few more leaves, listened to some birds, and watched the sun start to set.

26   She eventually asked for yet another piece of gum.

27   I asked once again if she had swallowed her gum.

28   She once again told me "No." She again paused and said, "It went down my throat."

29   I finally lost my patience and told her emphatically that NO, she could NOT have another piece of gum, and that she continued NOT to understand the difference, and that NO, no more gum. Absolutely NOT. Done.

30  She stopped, reflected, and then looked up with the sweetest look ever. "Daddy?" she said.

31  "Yes?" I asked, still a bit annoyed. She looked at me with absolute sincerity.

32   "I chewed it well."

33   Moving on, Part the Second: Looks like I got the story out in spite of myself.

34   Where were we?

35   Ah yes. Coincidences.

36   No shortage. Here are a few: Yesterday I jokingly mentioned that the greatest movie of all time was a low-rent film called Mitchell.

37   Caitlin's hubby Josh told us about it and how the movie was ridiculously low-budget, but that its treatment on Mystery Science Theater made the combo arguably the greatest film ever.

38  Last night I had the teevee flickering as a lava lamp, and suddenly looked up. There was this obscure movie on. It was called The Outfit, for the record. Helene noticed that one of the actors in The Outfit was Joe Don Baker.

39  Who is Joe Don Baker?

40  

41  The guy who played Mitchell.

42  Another coincidence. Yesterday I told my Disney class that I loved them because nobody in that class annoys me.

43  They laughed. I told them about a nice kid who had come into another class the other day, and he was tardy. He came in late, and started playing with a hacky sack. It was a bit annoying because I want to say good-bye to each class in its own way, and I had just settled into a little bit of sentimentality right before the final when the door opened and this guy came in and was in a totally different mood.

44   Nice kid, just bad timing. And it was annoying.

45   So yesterday I had a sweet, graceful moment with my Disney class. First I told them I loved them because nobody in their class ever annoys me. I told them about the guy who had come in late the day before. They had a laugh, and then they fell into doing their final. After about ten minutes, my door opened, and I saw a woman I had never seen before, and then the door closed.

46   The door opened and I saw her again, so I walked over to the door and moved outside.

47   It turns out that the lady was the mother of the kid who had come in late the day before. She asked if I could write a recommendation for her son. I was happy to do it. She left with a smile.

48   I mentioned that coincidence quietly to a couple of my Disney kids. The ones who sit in front of my desk are particularly aware of the coincidences. One girl, for example, is the girl who blurted out, "I LOVE Peter Pan!" right after I had written "Nice hook" on a paper I had been grading. What are the odds of that student's mother walking in right after I had mentioned him?

49  Last night I went to write this stuff, and I clicked on the teevee. For some reason it was on NBC. I have no idea what the show was called, but I looked at the screen. It said at the bottom of the screen "Coincidence, or Divine Intervention?"

50  It was the end of that segment.

51  When I was writing about Caitlin earlier in this piece, I heard a commercial on TCM that had Judy Garland say, "Toto, I have a feeling we're not in Kansas anymore."

52  Caitlin and Nicole played Toto in my version of The Wizard of Oz years ago. That show had tons of Heidi trips.

53   There is a special going on right now about Marie Dressler. I don't even know what it is, but it is on TCM, my lava lamp into the past.

54   It just mentioned Anna Christie, a film directed by a director named George Francis.

55  My real name is George Francis.

56   I'm not making any of this up.

57   All this happened within the last two days, and most of it last night as I wrote this.

59   Moving on, Part the Thoid: They're still talking about George Francis and Mary Pickford. I'm recording it.

60   The last day of school.

61   The stress.

62   We have to get all our grades into the system by four. We also have to get signed out, which means making sure that everybody we have annoyed throughout the year needs to sign a sheet of paper. It's stressful because everybody is now annoying everybody else. I have to lock stuff up in my room because some outside group will be using my room this summer.

63  I feel like I won't get out for another week, but I want to be gone by this afternoon.

64   Am I creating my own stress?

65   Moving on, Part Four: To say this is all surrealistic is an understatement. I had planned on talking about the surrealism when I started writing all of this. I never expected all of this when I awakened and started to write it.

66   The special is coming to an end.

67   It is the last day of school, and all is right with the world.

68   This is the final Daily News for this school year. It's fitting that a bunch of coincidences rained down on me last night.

69   Thank you all for enjoying this go round. It is a year in the life, I imagine. That was sort of the theme for this year's DN's. I hope you enjoyed the entire thing and that you got some insights into this amazing profession. 

70   Have a wonderful summer.

71   See you in August.

72   Take care. I'll miss this. 

73   I gottago.

74   Peace.

~H~

 

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Happy Birthday K.T.!!!!!

The Daily News

1   Happy Birthday to my beautiful daughter Caitlin! 

2   For your birthday I bought you both a Sharks win, and a Giants' win, with a walk-off by Pablo.

3   I have connections.

4   I also got myself a present.

5   Summertime!!!

6   Hope you have a GREAT birthday week.

7   Are you having fun?

8   If not, then it's time you started!

9   I love you K.T.!

10  Moving on, Part One: I wrote this stuff yesterday afternoon. I was off work at 12:50, sat down and wrote the following stuff.

11  I just got home.

12   Same as the day before yesterday.

13   I gave finals yesterday.

14   A lot of it was sort of eerie.

15   I got through my first class famously.

16   Great classes, lot of good students, and wonderful beyond words.

17   One girl brought me a chocolate cake.

18   We're really not supposed to accept gifts, but come on.

19   A chocolate cake. 

20  I thought it was sweet.

21  The thought dude.

22   I haven't eaten the cake. 

23   This kid had nothing to gain by giving that to me.

24   She is just one of those awesome students that we get, and quite often.

25   She knew that she had already scored an A+ in my class. She has done nothing but quality work in my class all year.

26   So it clearly wasn't a bribe.

27   So fun.

28   That group left, and their finals were all awesome. GREAT class. I graded them immediately. Some awesome pieces of writing. 

29   After a brief lunch, my second class of the day came in. It was my fifth-period class, filled with a lot of sweet, yet emotional students.

30   The day before yesterday they were pretty loud and obnoxious.

31   I let it roll. End of the year excitement and all.

32   Yesterday they came in like they were coming before a firing squad.

33   A lot of them looked pretty worried because they didn't listen to a thing I said about the final.

34   I calmed them down pretty quickly and they got down to business.

35   Midway into the test, I had finished grading my other class's papers and decided to begin the business of closing things down.

36   I organized my room and kept made myriad trips to the recycling containers.

37   After a while the students noticed that the room was shutting down.

38   There came a certain sadness. This was a fun group with lots of entertaining kids.

39   You could sense the sadness though.

40  They have been together since August of last year. That's a long time. Friendships were made. The class had a pretty nice bond. 

41  At one point, the room started to look empty. 

42   You could feel the sadness. It was almost palpable. 

43   Even though they were predominantly freshmen, all the fun times and memories seemed to be rushing out the door.

44   I thought to myself, "Too soon?"

45   At the end of the period, a few students asked if they could take a picture with me.

46   At first I refused, stating that "Every time someone takes a picture of me, I'm in transition from human being to horse!"

47   They loosened up.

48   I said, "Just a sec."

49   And then I blasted Jack Johnson's Upside Down from Curious George, the anthem of my classroom. I played it all year when they would be doing desk work, or group work.

50   After the last kid left the room, I looked out. It was empty, and Johnson's final lyrics were, "Please don't go away..."

51   Moments.

52   That's why I love the job. 

53   AnywayZ...

54   I gottago. 

55   Today is my Disney class, and then I'm out at 10:15. Beach?

56   It has its perks. 

57   Reflection.

58   Have a GREAT day. And Happy Birthday K.T.!!!

59   See you again.

60   Peace.

~H~

www.xanga.com/bharrington

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Daily News

1   I just got home.

2   I mean I just got home yesterday.

3   That's how I have to move these days. 

4    I ain't complaining, it's just that closing out the school year requires twice the multi-tasking that we usually do during the course of the year.

5    I ain't trippin'.

6    I actually said that to a class, and through a microphone no less. 

7    Someone said something to me about finals' week and my response was this: "I ain't trippin'."

8     I was sort of trippin' but really,  I was not trippin'.

9     I wasn't.

10  I knew that all sorts of things this past month prevented a higher quality of lesson plans.

11  With all due respect.

12   I had Shrew playing. That should silence the critics. 

13   I also knew instinctively that due to the thirteen bazillion boushit things that happened in the past month, my students were going to be totally gone yesterday.

14    Couple that with the awesome yearbook that just came out. I'm talkin' jewels. The last thing they cared about was Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton in Shrew. A part of me thought that it was a situation of pearls before swine, but I would never say it.

15    How is a fella supposed to compete?

16   I could have fought and battled. I could have guilt-tripped my students into joining me in my cause to culturize society, if there even is such a word.

17   But as a guy who has been there, I knew that the events of the past month, and especially of last week would have sent one of the greatest movies on Earth down in flames. To me, The Taming of the Shrew is up there with the greatest. It is arguably the most underrated film of all time. It is also the classic ending to every school year. You can't argue with that.

18   And even that begs the question: What is the greatest movie ever? Okay, let's sidebar, if I may courageously turn a noun into a verb.

19   What is the greatest movie ever?  Simple answer.

20   This movie called Mitchell. 

21   The movie is horrendous.

22   But its treatment on Mystery Science Theater is epic.

23   Okay, so the first time I saw it was under the guided hand of my daughter Caitlin's genius husband Josh.

24   The film is called Mitchell. It's called Mitchell, man. It is mad and awesome. But only if viewed through the lenses of Mystery Science Theater.

25   

26   Moving on, Part One:   Anybody looking?

27   At least I somehow got this stuff on fire. It isn't easy to come home from the last teaching day of the school year and start anything remotely interesting.

28   Slow punk.

29  

30   For the young set, a punk is something one uses to start a campfire.

31   It's a tree branch, or a cigar, or some other starter.

32   So I tried to get this piece going with a low-burning punk.

33    It might have worked. 

34    And it might not have.

35   Moving on, Part Two: Tough to fire something up. Today is the first day of finals.

36   I trained my students on what they need to do yesterday.

37   They have to write intelligently about myriad Shakespearean plays.

38   This includes the venerable Shrew.

38   Because of all the testing and nonsense from outside forces this past month, we almost didn't even have Shrew.

39   I knew instinctively that next year I will have to re-create the entire ending of the school year.

40   Furlough days, common core pressure, benchmark bubble tests, and AP testing completely obliterated my best practices.

41   This group of students will never understand. Sad, sad, sad.

42   Yesterday I got a card from a former student who had me for two years.

43   It was a thank you card that was an assignment from another teacher, but hers was clearly not an assignment at all. It came from the heart.

44   I forgot to bring the card home, but it was a heartfelt thank you that summarized how much she had learned about writing, and about life and all.

45   Nothing I say here could put it in perspective, but she talked of how many of my lessons helped her to become a better writer, and that she loved everything I ever did.

46   I read that card, and then looked out at my current students who were happily ignoring Shrew. The only reason it was being ignored was because my entire end-of-the year stuff was so rudely interrupted.

47   I had to tell them that I had planned much more incredible lessons, but that they got interrupted by numerous outside forces.

48   This was clearly ineffective. I had already lost them last week amid all the nonsense. Not my fault. I didn't adjust to the elimination of almost two weeks of lessons.

49   That card put it all in perspective.

50   It's too late to recover from it all this year. I got numerous cards from all sorts of other students, but that one really put it all out there, and how much my students lost due to people from outside my realm trying to force their stuff into my lessons. It obliterated my strongest stuff.

51   Am I angry?

52   Nah. Just pensive. People are suffering tragic losses in Oklahoma City. I can't even begin to imagine.

53   So no; these losses are pretty petty when placed in any sort of global perspective.

54   Still, as a teacher who knows he is at the top of his game, I am a bit annoyed that my students didn't get to enjoy my best lessons, which I usually do the last month of teaching.

55   So I will go in today and give finals to two of my classes who never got the fun of the Cafe Verona, or of the jazz, or of the breakfast, fruits, pastries, and Starbuck's for a nickel. They will never appreciate Shakespeare as anything but a boring lesson. So sad.

56   I doubt that I will get cards from them. Not that I need cards, mind you. I am comfortable with who I am.

57   I just feel that I got rudely interrupted by several outside forces, and that my students lost some amazing lessons, and that they will leave this morning never knowing what should have been.

58   I'll say a sentimental good-bye, but I will also know that the second they all leave today, I will instantly begin planning  how to get around all of the idiots outside the classroom who somehow wish to change something that has always been in place, and that has clearly worked.

59   It drives me crazy.

60   I will make a few adjustments for next year, and I will never allow this nonsense to  happen again.

61   They will graduate in a few years never knowing.

62   So it goes.

63   I'll adjust. They system will continually try to be better by having outside forces telling professionals how to do their jobs, but the best will circumvent, and make things happen.

64   Because we are in the trenches. And there are those of us who know how to operate in the trenches.

65   And there are those of us who will not suffer fools.

66   It is into the three a.m. and I do believe I should now gather some rest.

67   I have one more shot at reaching these guys.

68   This will be quite a task. I'll still give it all I have.

69    They deserve no less.

70    They were robbed.

71    I gottago.

72    More to come.

73    See you again.

74    Peace.

~H~

 

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                                  Please Help. Follow the Link Below.

http://www.cnn.com/2013/05/20/us/iyw-how-to-help-moore/index.html?iid=article_sidebar

 

 

The Daily News

You wanna make God laugh, tell him about your plans.

                                                                                   --Some movie that was glaring at me yesterday morning.

 

1   I had to laugh.

2   It was on yesterday morning. It was on Dad's teevee. He doesn't often watch an entire move. He channel surfs whenever you aren't looking.

3   I may never know the author of that quote, but it certainly sums up the end of my school year.

4   Sometimes someone says something on teevee or radio that makes perfect sense, and you never catch who said it.

5   I remember one time years ago when I was a bartender in a cheap bowling alley in Chico.

6   The bar was called The Alibi Room. Gotta love it. One thing I found out about being a bartender: you get more respect than you do as a teacher.

7   Just sayin'. Anyway, one slow evening I found myself washing glasses and listening to music on the juke box. I looked over just as this old guy with twinkling eyes came in, and we engaged in a delightful conversation about life and love and aging and all.

8   At one point he looked me right in the eye and said, "Meaningful people come into your life and leave you with words of wisdom. They come into your life for a reason, and then you never see them again." He smiled. We talked on for a while, and then he bade me well and left. Being a young man, I found myself enchanted by the entire encounter.

9   Now that I am older, I think a part of me thinks he was an angel, like Clarence.

10  I also think that the writer of the above-mentioned quote was also an angel, and that it is a movie that I probably will never see again.

11   Moving on, Part One: You know how I always talk about Heidi the ghost, and all the coincidences she brings every time I hear her name mentioned?

12   It is no exaggeration. In the past couple of years the coincidences have increased beyond anything that could be construed as coincidences.

13   It is a bit similar to Bill Murray's experiences as Phil Conners in Groundhog Day.

14   He tries to tell people that a really strange thing happens to him all the time, but nobody gets it.

15   He lives the same day over and over.

16   On the surface, that film is a pretty pedestrian concept. It isn't that deep, but sometimes our worlds do seem to repeat on a daily basis, sometimes to the point of pure lunacy.

17   What occurred to me when I first saw that film was that a person could have something absolutely astonishing happening to them, talk about it to others, and have the world either ignore it, or look at the person as though he were a lunatic.

 18  And I GET that. For the record, I haven't had too many coincidences recently. They usually occur when I am either under extreme stress, or when extreme emotional things happen in my life.

19   They often happen publicly. For example, earlier this year in my Disney class I was grading a student's paper and wrote of his introduction, "Nice hook." At that exact second a girl who sits right in front of me blurted out, "I LOVE Peter Pan!"  That coincidence coincided with other coincidences involving Robin Williams, all of which I reported here when it went down. Recently I have had a series of occurrences that have completely destroyed my lesson plans for the past three weeks. That's why I smiled when I heard that quote yesterday. These weren't so much coincidences as simply life interrupting all my plans. 

20  Brilliant quote.

21  I think Woody Allen said it.

22   Don't quote me on that.

23   I didn't have the internet this weekend, so I Googled the quote in the two a.m. last night. Some low-rent website credited the quote to Woody Allen. Should I have gone Bing?

24   Keep in mind that I wrote most of this yesterday at my Dad's house, and there was no internet.

25  So I couldn't Google it.

26  Nor could I Bing it.

27   No internet.

28   Heavens.

29   All this technology.

30   Useless.

31   Moving on, Part Two: I am loyal to Google. It never forced itself on me as did Bing.

32   Bing was like some rude bully coming in and telling me that it was doing my searching from now on.

33   So I am personally boycotting Bing.

34    Anybody looking?

35    In the middle of writing all this useless garbage last night, I got off on my numbering. I jumped from item 28 or something to item 33.

36    Something.

37    Happens.

38    aafjdfkdaljffd;sfjsd;sjj;kj;

39   Moving on, Part Three: Is it REALLY Monday?

40   Yesterday I awakened late.

41   I was having this dream that I was in a bar and some piano player was playing really idiotic oldies.

42    I was lying on my stomach with a couple of other people. I was younger, so I could get away with lying on my stomach.

43   The guy was making references to things so old that I didn't even get them.

44   I remember that my sister Gayle was on my left.

45   This guy was singing obscure songs from the fifties and sixties.

46   He really thought he was good.

47   I looked at Gayle, smiled, and said, "If this guy sings In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida I'm outta here."

48   Google it.

49   Or Bing it, if you are a traitor.

50   At its time, that was the longest song in rock history.

51   I even have a coincidence surrounding that song.

52   I was driving home from YB one fine afternoon, and turning the corner at King and Story, the legendary storybook streets during San Jose's gangsta heyday.

53   I turned left on King and headed for 280. That's a freeway, for those of you not into the Nor Cal jingo.

54   I thought to myself, "I want to hear the long version of In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida, right now!" Iron Butterfly. Almost a joke song.

55   For the record, the odds of hearing a seventeen-minute song even in its heyday were off the charts. The shortened version used to be under three or four minutes so it would receive airplay. The long version was rarely played on the radio.

56   I pushed the on button and right on cue, the long version of that epic tune blasted me in the eyeballs.

57   Maybe that's what started all this nonsense with coincidences. 

58   Just may be.

59   I'm now well into the two a.m.

60   Star light, star bright...

61   I think I'm going to say a few prayers for people and get some sleep.

62   I'm going to tell God my new plans.

63   Right about now I'm guessing He could use a few laughs.

64   It's outta control.

65   Have a GREAT Monday. Fly low.

66   See you again.

67   Peace.

~H~

 

www.xanga.com/bharrington