The Daily News

1   Warrior Idol turned into a massive success last night, and it was just an awesome night, with Coryna Nagra running off with the top singing prize, and Mark Balanza dazzling everybody with a stand-up routine that looked darned close to professional! Everybody else just sang, danced, and played their hearts out, and it was just a wonderful night in the good ol' Theatre. Congrats goes out to everybody who helped put it all together; it was quite worth the wait.

2  Yesterday I was visited by the WPC (just ask around), who seemed to grill  me as though I were a raw bottom-feeder because I didn't have a text book issued to each and every student. This particular version of theWPC seems to think that the reason we aren't achieving as a school is because we aren't issuing enough fat, heavy books to each student. That MUST be it...

3  I understand they went off to Jerusalem and berated Jesus for not having textbooks. He was right in the midst of his "blesseds" when they descended on his rock and asked if he had desks, books, and if he gave homework. I felt pretty sorry for the guy; he had on sandals, and he truly was in need of a shave.

4  They pulled me aside and asked me all about Him, but I just gave my curt reply: "Jesus shaves!" The WPC didn't find that very funny, but those sorts ALWAYS walk through here shaking their heads and reporting miseries, and the NEVER find things very funny, and REALLY never finding the REAL reasons we don't always achieve.

5  Anywho, I'm glad that someone is paying for them to come through and point out that not all teachers believe that textbooks are the absolute answer to our challenges. I mean, that money COULD have been spent ON textbooks, but then, what would become of these people and their condescending approach?

6  Jesus shaves, you see, it's a takeoff on...

7  Nevermind.

8  How do the students learn without textbooks, for heaven sakes?

9  How did Plato's students learn?

10  The solution is so simple.

11  Fat textbooks, one for each class, for each student, and tons of homework. So THAT'S all we need in Comp/Lit...

12  How simple!

13  How did over 130 teachers not see this?

14  Godspeed, WPC. You'd know.

15  Hurry up and leave; you are insulting. You don't know squat about who we are, or how much we DO care about our school, and about our students. You are mere beancounters, so go count beans somewhere else.

16  Jesus shaves...you see...

17  Peace.

The Daily News

1  This year's talent show, entitled Warrior Idol, goes up tonight at 6:30. Since I was absent yesterday, I have nothing to report in terms of when people are supposed to get here. Last week, there was to be a meeting in the Theatre before the show, so you might ask Beaver, Loan, or Mr. Rocha for further instructions. It's always good to have communication before a show, so I'm guessing they have already arranged for you guys, but if you ARE in the show, by all means get over to Mr. Rocha's office and ask.

2  Oh, and good luck to all! Talent shows are a lot of fun, so go out there and be the best you can be.

3  I'm not always one to begin a huge humanitarian effort at YB, but Thuy Ann brought the genocide taking place in Darfur, Sudan to my attention. Very briefly, the Sudanese government is systematically killing, raping, and starving the black Sudanes of Darfur in what Colin Powell has described as a genocide, or massive murder of a people. At present, we are searching for information on how we can help. Stay tuned. Here are a couple of websites you may want to visit:

http://www.darfurgenocide.org

http://www.studentsagainstgenocide.org/index.php

This is clearly a crime against humanity, so I am open to any suggestions as to how we could get information out to our own local community. I'll report back as the days go by.

4  Yesterday I attended a program entitled Sober Graduation. I spent a lot of time with Police Officers, Corrections Officers, Highway Patrol Officers, D.A.'s, a doctor from the Coroner's Office, as well as a visit to the jail, (including the very scary 4th floor, where the "worst of the worst" are kept), and ending with a visit to the Coroner's Office, where we all visited the morgue, which contained over 40 bodies. To call it Sober Graduation was an understatement. It's easy just to SAY to students, "Stay sober at prom and graduation; don't drink and drive", but when you have the arrests, the loss of all your rights, and the direct contact with people who face these tragedies every single day, I came out a different person. I'm hoping I can get word out to all the kids going to either prom, and especially to my Seniors for their graduation: don't drink or do drugs, and drive. Just don't. Period.

5  I'll have more on that one later on as well. I hope to bring a couple of professionals into our school to help get that message out there. This was one of the most chilling "field trips" I've ever been on. And trust me: you DON'T want to go to that jail, ever! It smells like piss and barf, and you lose almost all your rights. It's old, rusty, and you might get an hour or two outside per week, IF you behave. So yeah.

6  So yeah.

7  So let us re-cap, because I ALREADY have e-mails about the Talent Show tonight, and I am just doing a rewrite this morning. The Talent Show IS scheduled for TONIGHT (THURSDAY!) and NOT tomorrow night (FRIDAY) as originally re-scheduled. The reason for the change is that the Junior Prom goes up on Saturday, and the Juniors need the time on Friday to get set up. When I originally re-scheduled, I had forgotten that the Prom was so close! M'bad!! Either way, it IS tonight!

7  Well, nothing like a boatload of happy news here on a humble Thursday. But I just thought I'd share some of the more serious aspects of being the self-proclaimed Worst Role Model in the History of Education.

8  The beauty part about that one is, when I DO get serious, I think people listen.

9  I hope you listened today.

10  Have a good one, yo.

11  Peace.

The Daily News

1  The Warrior Idol Talent Show will be tomorrow night at 6:30. Whew. Last Thursday, we had the power outage, and we had a lot of scrambling to do to get the thing back up and going, but it seems things have righted themselves, and are back on track.

2  This means that if you are performing, it's time to practice, practice, practice!

3  I'm not here today; I'm at a conference. It's a good thing; grades are due, and I've already posted. Trust me, it wasn't pretty. What happens to kids this time of year? Hopefully things will improve.

4  If there's anything I enjoy, it's slow news days. We've had a few in the past few days, and it's always a pleasure.

5  It's Later-Than-You-Think, Dept: I just found out that the new 49ers million-dollar quarterback, Alex Smith, is the same age as my younger daughter. Caitlin, my elder daughter, would almost be cradle-robbing if she dated the guy. Oy.

6  Amazing.

7  Okay, so Xanga is going wonky this morning. I had written most of the DN last night and just jumped on board this morning to finish up, and the fonts began changing size again, and THEN I got bombarded by a gazillion pop-ups, which seem to be happening like swarming locusts of late. This just doesn't amuse me one bit. I thougth of hurling my computer out the window, but then it would cost me a window.

8  This morning's Merc had a story that ALL ESUHSD teachers have now been rescinded. Is this TRUE???? I SURE hope so, because I think YB has some of the best young teachers in the entire WORLD, and I was sicke that we might be losing them. That entire episode was ugly, and I'm sorry Madame Super, but you played ALL of that wrong, and you know damned well that you did. You should be ashamed of yourself, but clearly, you HAVE no shame. You know head a district that has utterly no use nor respect for anything positive you might like to do. How does it taste?

9  M'bad.

10 Okay, now that I got THAT outta me, I need to get going.

11  Talent Show people, get rehearsing; rest not on your laurels. Practice, practice, practice, and make us all proud!

12  Peace.

The Daily News

1  Whoa.

2  Yesterday I got through the day pretty easily; I just got up, went in, and had a fairly normal day.

3  I even had a pretty easy go of it after school, just sat at a prom meeting taking a billion pictures, because I really didn't know what else to do with myself after such a power-packed weekend.

4  So I got home, opened my front door, and promptly collapsed on my sofa, physically and emotionally exhausted from what seemed like the whole year. I literally went to sleep from 8 to 11, the earliest ever.

5  The only thing that woke me up was, of course, the news. More stuff going down on the Wendy's finger story. I've said it before, and I'll say it again: no news is good news. I like that things are somewhat stable, and quiet.

6  My, oh my.

7  I actually don't even feel like being a DN wise guy today. I can't even believe I am walking around.

8  I'm grateful for the weather. Personally, I love the weather lately. I seem to recall that last year, it got unbearably hot around this time of the year, which caused a feeling of non-reality that became totally weird. Last year's Seniors had to go through that torment. So far, the weather has remained pretty comfortable, and things haven't gone into a torture mode yet. I have to thank the heavens for that one.

9  This past weekend probably did me in for the year. I still have a ton of stuff to do, but my body is clearly telling me that it's time to slow down. I almost feel robbed about last night, but then I look up, see my stupid dog, and thank the heavens for a whole bunch of stuff.

10  If exhaustion is my only problem, I have no problems.

11  Okay, I have absolutely nothing to say today, so I think I'll go.

12  My dog needs me.

13  I actually love my dog.

14  S-h-h-h.

15  She's sleeping.

16  'Til the next time...

17   Peace.

The Daily News

1   I'm pretty amazed at all the things we did in the Theatre last week, beginning with UCSC's The Winter's Tale last Wednesday morning. I inadvertantly inherited Rocha's job for a day or two, and lemme tellya, it ain't easy! That, coupled with managing the Theatre when it had multi-shows going all weekend made me conk out last night at around 5 p.m.!

2  Thursday night's Warrrior Idol had to cancel due to a blackout. So instead of something normal happening, my first chore was to handle all of that stuff: waiting, deciding, re-scheduling, notifying people, arranging for refunds, etc. All those decisions had to be made almost instantaneously, and wisely. To this minute, I question the wisdom, but at least we were decisive. A big thanks goes out to all the kids who helped organize that event, and also to all the kids who practiced so hard, only to have it postpone. That's a HUGE disappointment, but hopefully, we've re-grouped.

3  Friday we ushered in Music-in-the-Parks, a huge turnaround in the Theatre from Warrior Idol to an interstate music festival. All Friday night we set up and brought in some Choirs, followed by arriving at the crack of dawn on Saturday to do both Music-in-the-Parks AND Campus Clean-up, our own salute, I imagine, to Earth Day. Following that, we had one more group in the Theatre, a group that brought in over 300 people, all the way from turning it all around AGAIN, to sound-checking, and then the actual event going until almost 9 p.m.

4  A HUGE, HUGE thanks goes out to all the music kids who got up early, starved, and helped make Music-in-the-Parks a success. You guys worked super-hard, and it was all voluntary. You should be really proud, as that event brought in some much-needed revenue to YB music!

5  And to the ASB kids for getting up early and planting, digging, sweeping, and picking up after our school, we also send out huge props!  You guys ALL made the school look awesome, in more ways than one!

6  It was one of the busiest weeks we've ever had in the Theatre, but the new "design" handled most all of it. I was sure glad we had spent all those hours organizing it all.

7  My goodness.

8  For those who don't know, the Warrior Idol Talent Show was re-scheduled to next Friday night at 6:30. I shall be quite happy to hand that one back to Rocha, piping hot. We have a full plate going on this week as well, so it'll be interesting to see where things go.

9  At some point, they are re-painting the stage, meaning we shall once again have to move the masking flats and get out of the way. It's all pretty insane, really.

10  Okay, so it's Monday.

11  Two baseball games in Detroit got canceled over the weekend. Snow. You can't blame global warming for THAT one.

12  On Saturday, we went to Wendy's to eat, and to give a thumbs-up to the workers, as well as to the corporation for having to put up with a bunch of false allegations. They had news media all over, prompting Sparky and Peter to stage their OWN version of the finger fiasco. Later, we stopped for gas, and this big, pink-white guy got out and bent over, revealing something that made two cars crack a smile, if you get my drift. The guy finished pumping his gas when he realized that the WHOLE gas station had noticed his little faux pas. Poor guy. You just don't do that in front of certain groups. It was pretty funny, and he went from pink to, as Vivien so succinctly put it, BEET red, in around one second.

13  Well, I think I'll relax and goof off online for awhile, before all the rest of everything decides to conk me on the noggin. It was nice to laugh after all that stress. I feel things are getting back to normal. Whew.

14  And Paz, you can have your job back. No regrets over this way.

15  See you again.

16  Peace.

The Daily News

1   Who-wee.

2   So yesterday I became acting Activities Director for a Day. LOVED it. I hopped onto Rocha's desk chair, spun around a few times, put my feet up, and thought, "Man, what a cushy gig!" That office has a fridge, a freezer, TV, couch, air conditioning, and the top 100 most motivated students in school in and out the door at all times.

3  Rocha handed me the keys, and I was on my way. Within no time, I was tested almost beyond all limits.

4  We were to get the Warrior Idol talent show to the stage. Normally, I could put a talent show together in my sleep, but yesterday a blackout knocked us for a huge loop.

5  First, I had about sixty kids asking me constantly for the keys, which I wisely decided NOT to lend out. Good thing. I lent his keys out twice, and they came back once. That was it. THEN I lent my OWN keys out, and they disappeared for around two hours!!

6  Out of nowhere, people needed to get into the gym, the wrestling room, the electrical room, the room behind the Theatre, and on and on. There was no end to people running up to me and demanding things.

7  I'm pretty much used to that, just dealing with managing the Theatre, so most of it I just dealt with on a needs-be basis.

8  The blackout was another thing entirely, because it was never a COMPLETE blackout. Around 5, I began anticipating worst-case scenarios, and we started figuring out how to work with the little electricity we had, routing extension cords to distant electrical receptacles, checking boomboxes for loudness, and for batteries, and planning on almost a survival camp sort of show, but getting it figured out, when a SECOND blackout hit, killing the entire south side of Lucretia.

9  I looked up at the flag on top of the Theatre, and it looked like a kid at camp peeing in the bushes. Not really the image we wanted to project.

10  To keep it short, we called PG & E (Maggie and Sparky suggested that one!), and then called around looking for another venue (Maggie's suggestion. Way to go, Magz!). Well, nothing panned out. We had to postpone the talent show, and my first attempt at being the acting Activities Director met with a tough end. Oh, well. Some things are meant to be.

11  Moving on: did you see that chimpanzee who smokes? It was hilarious, on the news last night. Now if the ATFNL could only get him as a guest speaker...

12  And we seem to have an arrest in the Wendy's finger scandal. Police arrested the lady who found the finger last night. It would appear you are now free to go into Wendy's on Alma and grab some hot chili, without fear of a digital surprise.

13  Somebody's in a boatload of trouble, but I won't point any fingers...

14  M'bad.

15  We have Music-in-the-Parks tonight and tomorrow in the Theatre. Although it is hectic, it's always a really fun day, filled with lots of talented schools, good humor, and a GREAT fundraiser for the Band, Choir, and all music in this buildin. So offer help; be here and expect to sacrifice a lot of time. It's all for a good cause.

16  We could all have a HUGE chili party at Wendy's after the event! Haha! Hey, why not?

17  Okay then, gottago.

18  Have a great weekend everybody.

19  Out.

The Daily News

1  I've been enjoying the "new look" of the DN, because it is actually the OLD look!

2  UCSC's The Winter Tale rocked, in my eyes. It was just awesome seeing our new stage christened with Shakespeare! Tonight, the FIRST show from our own school will go up, complete with masking flats, lighting, sound, and all the rest.

3  That's the Talent Show, Warrior Idol. We have some good things this year, so get out there and enjoy the evening! You'll be surprised at which students have unique talents. Yesterday's dress rehearsal was a lot of fun!

4  On Friday night, Music-in-the-Parks rolls into town. This a HUGE fundrasier for everyone enjoying the hard work and dedication Mrs. Hooper is putting into your lives. She has brought music back, completely, almost on her own. I walk into the building these days, and I see LOTS of kids enjoying singing, playing their instruments, planning, and enjoying the wonderful world that this building has always been.

5  So this goes out to all of you: get in and offer your help this weekend. It is something that shows how much pride ALL of us have in the Performing Arts, and it will help everyone down the road.

6  Help keep it all real. Don't take any of this for granted; I've seen it ALL almost disappear several times through the years. You have to FIGHT to keep things as wonderful as Performing Arts solvent, so pitch in and offer your help.

7  Or if not, at least come in and enjoy all the wonderful music that will be ringing through these hallowed halls.

8  To all Talent Show participants, good luck tonight, and I mean that from the bottom of my heart. Give it your all, every time you perform. Relax, don't tense up, just enjoy the moments. They're memories, as you will soon learn as soon as you leave this place.

9  And let's just get a whole buncha people down here tonight and make the Theatre come alive once more. She's all dressed up and ready to rock!

10 I loved hearing Governor Groper use his same, lame apology for saying we should "close our bawduhz" to Mexico. Hey, Genius, had we done that YEARS ago, your happy ass wouldn't be coming over here, groping wimmin, saying essentially, "M'bad", then saying something THAT stupid and your answer being, essentially, "M'bad". So yeah.

11  What a knucklehead, in a year of knuckleheads.

12  I see the 49ers front office knows exactly how to make a bad decision. Amazing.

13  Yesterday a kid I don't even know walked up to me and said, "Hey teacher. Can a teacher give you a referral for farting?" I thought the guy was joking. My answer was, "Well, sure, if it was deliberate and disrupted a class."

14  In complete, sober sincerity, he announced, "But it was for REALS. I held it the whole day, and it was an accident, but he gave me a referral anyway."

15  I just wanted to tell the guy that $#!t happens, but thought better of it; the very image. He then walked off, possibly detecting that I was screaming in laughter inside, but holding a serious mug, you know, how you do? When he was about ten feet away, the teacher came out, and I advised, "Call the ACLU!"

16  Like many kids on testing day, he wasn't interested in listening. He just walked away, hurt and injured. So sorry man. I tried like heck to help. Get a lawyer, for REALS.

17  Godspeed.

18  That's about it for today.

19  Go to Warrior Idol! Should be fun!

20  And let the lesson be learned: take care of business BEFORE your three-hour STAR tests next time. I wonder if that is going to affect our scores?

21  Time to go.

22  Late.

The Daily News

1  I don't know about anybody else, but I find it hard to relate to a Pope whose name sounds like a menu item at Denny's.

2  See the paper today? This big picture of the guy, and he looks like Alfred E. Neuman of Mad Magazine fame, had he aged naturally. 

3   Oy.

4   Well, congratulations, guy. Hope the hat fits. Seriously, dude.

5   Pope news.

6   Nothing like it.

7   I loved giving those tests yesterday. By the day's end, my head turned to glue, hardened, cracked, and fell to the floor in pieces.

8  Had a terrific visit with Sheryll Marmito and later on, Cindy Barrett yesterday. Just a really nice time; we talked for hours. It's always good to see the people who made a difference in your life. They represented a beautiful era in this building. It's almost hard to describe, but those were the days, my friend.

9  And YES, that WAS the Y.B. stage yesterday. After having been stripped and sanded only once before since I got here, it looked utterly amazing, almost brand new! On the sad end, every paint drop that represented a past show was sanded out.

10  Well, it was nice that Sheryll was here. For just a second, she looked on a little sad about that. I was too. Only I've also seen that stage abused time and again by different groups, and it was truly on its last legs, so really needs to be viewed as a step forward.

11  Next week they are going to be bringing in some sort of finish, as well as some new curtains, which is all fine and good, but nobody seems to be considering my requests for what would  work the best. For one thing, a shiny finish is bad, bad, bad in a Theatre. This is universally understood by most professional Theatre companies. It reflects the light, giving a ghastly glow to everything that goes up. Dull works on stages. The stage actually looks good as is, but maybe a nice finish, without all the sheen, might really make it look smart.

12  And I keep hearing that they want a front curtain and a rear curtain. The veteran over here KNOWS that what we NEED are side curtains, called "legs", and short curtains, called "teasers",  to hide the lights.  A front and rear curtain are nice, and look nice, but really not as necessary nor as useful as legs and teasers.

13  Sadly, nobody seems to be listening. I'll TRY to get word out again, but it seems that nobody wants to consider the guy who knows more about the stage than anyone else in the school.

14  So yeah.

15  This morning, if you're REALLY lucky, you'll pop into the Theatre to watch UCSC's version of The Winter's Tale, during 2nd period.  I got up this morning really early to let those guys in to set up. I can't wait!

16   So yeah.

17   Gonna go now. I gathered all the pieces together yesterday, and the glue set all last night. My head is now ready for day 2 of The Star Test.

18  Peace.

The Daily News

1  I gotta love that commercial where that guy is applying for a job, and his friends call him and get rowdy. Pretty funny. It's the one where he gets on his cell, and they all yell, "SMITTY!!!", concluding with a guy whose mouth looks like he's doing a tribal ritual, garbling into the phone, "Guess how many cookies...I hab in my mout..."

2  We sure have a full plate this week. Wednesday morning, UCSC brings The Winter's Tale into the Theatre Wednesday, just before the STAR tests. Shakespeare, man. Gotta love it. If you can get down to the Theatre during 2nd period on 4/20, it's playing then. That's at 7:55, you know, when it's usually 1st period. Some trick. They should change the schdule all around every 4/20. Be a great joke. Hitler's birthday. Oy.

3  Wednesday is the dress rehearsal for the Warrior Idol Talent Show, and Thursday night is the show itself. Friday night and Saturday in the day, the Band sponsors Music-in-the-Parks, a wonderful fundraiser in which Bands and Choirs from all over the place come to our school and compete; well, actually, most just want to do their very best, get out of here, and then go to Great America. But it's a fun time, but a little hectic.

4  So good luck with that, everybody. Make our school shine, willya?

5  Oh, happy 99th birthday of the 1906 San Francisco earthquake. Every now and again I consider where I live, and that prospect always gives pause. Last night I actually had a nightmare about it.

6  That was AFTER I almost burned down my house. It seemed like I almost burned down San Jose. I was trying to do too much at home, you know, guilt trip for having spent all of Saturday down here. So I tried to mow both lawns, barbecue, cook rice on the stove, take up my carpet, and entertain the dog. Well, while I was barbecuing AND mowing the lawn, I forgot about the rice, until major plumes of smoke cascaded out my door and rolled to my lawn. At first I thought I was smoking, when it dawned on me that I don't smoke. Stupid, huh?

7  I ran into the kitchen. Fortunately, it was just smoke. But it was LOTS of smoke. Everything in my place smelled like burnt rice and buttcheese.

8  But we were all safe. Except that right after heroically putting the house back in order, I proudly walked right into a plate glass window.

9  I felt as though I were in a video game, with all sorts of Mario Brothers graphic dangers trying to kill me: the dog startling me from behind a bush, the smoke, the lawnmower making a thunking sound, the plate glass window, AND a super-rickety ladder. I didn't tell you about the tricky dog, nor the thunking lawnmower, but yeah. You can do that nowadays. You can leave stuff out, and just add, "But yeah."

10  I really couldn't wait to get back to school, where all I need to worry about are pink slips and getting electrocuted, or having a platform hammer me to the ground. Those things happened on Saturday, when we purged and cleaned the entire Theatre.

11  All day Saturday. I swear. And it was predominantly Jose and I. We tore the entire Theatre down, began from virtually zero, and worked from 10:30 a.m. to 1:30 in the morning. We WAY needed help, but got none. Vivien came in for a brief stint, as did Sparky, and Peter was there for a second, but overall, Jose and I totally organized the entire stage. It was an INSANE amount of work. But we got the job done.

12  Okay, so here we go again. But at least we could now find things backstage; it's truly amazing.

13  Well, I'm going down fast here; the eyelids are closing heavily; think I'll see you all really soon. I need to plan how to get past all those dangers and move "to the next level". And to get through this zany week.

14  The Marios rock.

15  Have a great day.

The Daily News

1  "It was so beautiful in New York City today that Camilla caught a Frisbee in her mouth."
                --David Letterman

2  Ouch.

3  How about those Washington Nationals? They had their home maiden voyage yesterday and are presently in first place! Nobody cares, but I just thought it ought to be recorded for posterity right here, right now.

3  Yesterday I stunned the fashion world by appearing in a pink shirt for only the second time in my life. The first came when I received my pink slip from our Fearless Leader.

4  We all wore pink out of respect for our fellow colleagues.

5   So yesterday, when asked by my students why I decided to wear pink, I answered, "I wore pink today as a symbolic gesture protesting the ridiculously insulting tactics the District used to deal with their financial crisis, and to support those whose status remains uncertain."

6   I  looked out on the sea of silently stony faces. Not a peep.

7   Suddenly, one student chimed, "Laundry day, huh?"

8   Signed, sealed, and delivered.

9   Gotta love it.

10  I walked in the Theatre yesterday and noticed that the 25 or so flats and props that had remained on stage following Saturday's purge of over 200 pieces had been tossed against the up-right wall seemingly by Satan. The floors needed to be waxed, so everything got hurled in that one corner, where they now sit at disjointed angles.

11  I thought it was either a science project, or a New Age art exhibit.

12  I'm thinking of leaving it as a backdrop for Honors' Night.

13  Beautiful.

14  It's looking less and less as though Wendy's was responsible for the famous finger in the chili. Recent revelations seem to point to the finger having been snapped off by a pet spotted leopard owned by some knucklehead in Nevada. I assume she is a knucklehead, because I know a knucklehead when I see one, and anyone who owns not only a pet spotted leopard, but somewhere in the neighborhood of 17 dogs is more likely than not a classic knucklehead.

15  I don't know. That story has more twists and turns than a cheap hose.

16  I think everyone ought really to head to Wendy's this weekend and throw in a little support. I think I might wear my pink shirt. A little Wendy's chili stain would make it a museum piece. It would be a sort of salute to everything this week: the pink slips, the mysterious chili finger, and the spotted leopard, all rolled into one.

17  Think I'll leave now.

18  Go Nationals.

19  Peace.