The Daily News

1  Mom got through her latest "procedure" pretty well, all things considered. She is resting comfortably in ICU at Kaiser up in South San Francisco.

2  The procedure dropped her blood pressure pretty low, so she was placed in Intensive Care, where they are keeping careful watch. It's been a pretty trying weekend, but thanks to those who have given so many kind thoughts and prayers.

3  Last night she was up, talking, and even managed to eat a full dinner consisting of chicken and rice, so if anyone is a tough cookie, it's my Mom. She's also a joy.

4  Anyway, thanks.

5  Moving on:  I honestly don't know how people are even moving around these days. Seems like someone has decided that absolutely nobody should have time to do anything.

6  I don't think it's just me, because everybody I know seems pretty stressed out and overworked beyond any sort of normal reason.

7  When did it turn to this?

8  Ah, well.

9  Look at the good. The Sharks seem to be back on track, Lincecum pitches today for the Giants, and the A's may even get down this way.

10  Even if ya don't like sports, it isn't a bad hobby. Try it some time; it's pretty nice, especially baseball.

11  Baseball to me is always like a lazy lawnmower on a Saturday afternoon. It is in the background on lovely days, and reminds all of us of simpler times.

12  This isn't my annual ode to baseball, but simply a warm-up.

13  Moving on, Part II:  Somehow in the midst of not living, I have managed to maintain straight A's. I got my second report card for this six-weeks and have an ongoing A, and a score of 100%. Why it isn't an A+ is beyond me, but then, I don't run these things.

14  By the way, I'm still seriously pondering taking a class in the CIA.

15  Hell, I could be the professor!

16  El Professore.

17  Has a sorta sweet sound.

18  Yeesh.

19  I got yanked out of normalcy this weekend.

20  I still don't know if I've been pink-slipped. I received nothing in the mail, but who knows?

21  Some guy in my online class was so stressed out by all the work we have to do that he actually said, "Man, I sorta hope I got pink-slipped so I could quit this class..."

22  Can you even begin to imagine?

23  Poor guy. He's the guy who has poker games every Friday night and love partying, former Deadhead who has been to 40 shows. A few weeks ago he was contributing from a beach in Cancun! A few weeks ago he sent some piece to our Learning Group and apologized for being a bit out of it, but he was hungover and just dropped off some beotch.

24  TMI, lemme tellya.

25  Anyway, this has all been quite an experience. I'm slowly morphing into a professore, whether I like it or not.

26  I'm thinking of taking up smoking a pipe.

27  Not THAT kinda pipe Sparky.

28  Get yo mind out the guttuh.

29  A good ol' tobacco pipe, which just leaves you with a lip that's quite liable to fall off.

30  I actually smoked one of those years ago when that's what Joe College used to do.

31  Now pipes seem to be somehow associated with hookah, which when I was a kid was the loose lady down the street. She smelled like cheap perfume and old cats.

32  Yeesh.

33   I better go.

34    Peace, it's Mondeee, doncha know. Fly low.

~H~

www.xanga.com/bharrington

The Daily News

1  Ha!

2  It's FRIDEEEEEEE!!!!

3  Last night I got tired of spending the whole night working on my schoolwork so I was able to goof on Family Guy with Caitlin.

4  I have NO idea why I was laughing my ass off all night, but we had a ball.

5  I made old-school popcorn, using a frying pan and oil and all the rest.

6  It was fun!

7  The popcorn started hopping out of the frying pan and going every which way, and we just laughed and laughed.

8  And she had this DVD of Family Guy that was insulting to anyone and anything that would even come close to watching it.

9  Frankly I found myself thoroughly disgusted and wishing to report these guys to whoever it is that's in charge of morality in this country.

10  Used to be Bush, of course, the most moral guy this side of Mike Tyson.

11  Anyway, I'm kidding about the morality thing.

12  That show had so much to offend, and I didn't care for one minute WHO it insulted; I still laughed my ass off all night.

13  I swear, Caitlin saw me glued to the internet rushing to do my classwork and to keep up with school.

14  I've turned into an old fuddie duddie.

15  All I do is try to perfect my lessons with pinpoint accuracy.

16  It's paying off, because I'm honing my lessons and enjoying every single day I teach these days.

17  But I'm almost overdoing it, shooting for perfection.

18  And last night, I took the time to go out and buy a pink shirt.

19  Teachers and school employees wear pink today, to remind everyone of the deadline for pink slips, which is today.

20  We should be wearing black.

21  People have NO idea what is going on in education, but this is by far the worst I've ever seen it.

22  Anyway, wear pink today if you think of it. It would be a salute to all the people who work so hard to keep schools going.

23  So sad.

24  I have no idea if I'm going to be pink-slipped. I'm on pretty thin ice because I was late applying for my CLAD, which is a certificate I need even though I hold a life credential which clearly ISN'T a life credential even though the State of California clearly tells me I have a credential for life.

25  It's just that suddenly I need this other thing, so we'll see.

26  So many good people are going to be pink-slipped today, and this time around it's pretty serious.

27  I thought of wearing a pink slip to school.

28  Anyway, if  you see a bunch of people wearing pink today, give a honk.

29  I'm glad that I spent last night with Caitlin laughing and laughing.

30  You have a great weekend.

31  Laugh.

32  Peace.

~H~

www.xanga.com/bharrington

The Daily News

1  I took last night off.

2  Ever do that?

3  You just tell the rest of the world, "Hey, need time for meself. Sorry!"

4  That was me yesterdee.

5  Once in a while the stress gets to you and you have to tell the rest of the world, "Sorry."

6  Amazingly, the world has lots of goodly sorts who will understand instantly when those times approach.

7  There's something fundamentally wrong with the world nowadays, almost as though someone had decided that they own you.

8  They don't.

9  But in the past five years I've noticed a trend that has everybody I know jumping through multitudinous hoops and feeling that somehow they must give their lives over to something other than their friends and families.

10  That's a buncha boushit.

11  For the past three years I've had outside forces trying to dominate my personal life, and I've allowed it.

12  Last night I decided that enough was enough.

13  I sorta broke down.

14  Not in a psycotic fashion or anything, just in a "I've had enough!" fashion.

15  We've all been there.

16  it didn't matter where I turned, somehow everyone else's agenda somehow bullied its way into being my own top priority.

17  Meanwhile, my Mom and Dad had to take a back seat to the rest of the world. I found myself telling them that I would get to them as soon as I could, even though my Mom is paralyzed, going through her third straight year of health concerns, and my Dad has cancer and other health concerns, besides taking care of her whenever he can.

18  But somehow, my daily life has been to do everything I can for the next guy who comes down the pike.

19  I'm not talking about good friends, family, or alumni. I'm talking specifically about people related to my job, which is really just the means of providing for everyone I love.

20  At what point in life did our jobs become more important than our personal lives?

21  Several years ago I formed a club called The Goof-Off Club. It consisted predominantly of my nearest and dearest family and friends.

22  We all  decided to protest our work lives and goof off during the day. I would throw out a topic and ten to twelve people would come back with ten responses. For example, one of the first topics was this: 

"Who got issues?"

23  For almost three years the GOC spent every single day coming up with ten funny replies, and most of our work days centered around NOT letting the bastards in charge of our lives run things all the time.

24  The basic premise was that we would get work done, and do our jobs, but that we would also devote most of our daily lives to one another instead of to some company, or to some school or outfit that the second times would get rough, would just as soon dismiss us without blinking.

25  I'm quite tempted to do that again. It was a hoot! I'm guessing everybody who reads the DN could spend their entire day coming up with ten people who got issues.

26  With twelve people, we would do our jobs, and every half hour check in to our e-mails and someone would have a new list, which would be hilarious and unique. There would be feedback, which would pretty much get us through the day, every day, for almost three years.

27  The Bush got elected.

28   I love to blame everything on that little bastard.

29   Somehow, the company store took over, and the GOC slowly faded. We still maintain contact, of course, but for a few years we decided that WE were more important than that customer, or parent, or boss who wanted to come in and dominate our lives.

30  We all STILL feel the same way.

31  So I'm revving up to start that all over again.

32  I'm encouraging you to start it as well.

33  Tough times require goof-offs and humor. It's a brave move towards giving sanity back to the world.

34  Start goofing off.

35  The Revolution is here.

36  I don't know about you, but I've had it with these bastids.

37  Start goofin', you'll live a whole helluva lot longer.

38  Peace.

~H~

www.xanga.com/bharrington

 The Daily News

1  Man Oh Man.

2  Last night was the first night in about a hundrit years when I actually had time to...

3  Know what's ridiculous?

4  Once you HAVE a minute to yourself, you have NO idea what to do with yourself.

5  Seriously.

6  I got all my stuff done finally and went home last night to...

7  Uh...

8  Can't remember.

9  So I went online and hit up my school e-mails.

10  First e-mail:  Mr. Harrington!

11  Uh-oh.

12  Some girl whose mom wanted to know how she was doing. I said that she was doing great, but that she was missing a huge writing assignment.

13  Her mom thanked me, and I headed home.

14  Did all I said I did and in her e-mail she said I had LOST her assignment?

15  Prolly true.

16  So much for a night off.

17  Ah, vell...

18  There are worse things.

19  Yeesh.

20  Moving On:  My Mom's sick again and going in for another of six-thousand "procedures".

21  Naturally she wouldn't take any phone calls tonight.

22  Tough gal.

23  Yeesh.

24   The new "procedure" is on Fridee.

25   Yeesh.

26   The deal is, she's okay, and that always keeps me going, but I like visiting her when she ISN'T going through this stuff.

27  Ah, she's my Mom.

28  She taught me all about strength and humor.

29  Mostly humor.

30  And strength.

31  Apple.

32  Tree.

33   Thanks for listenin'.

34   Pray for Mom.

35   She's tougher than nails and twice as sharp.

36   So yeah.

37   Peace.

~H~

www.xanga.com/bharrington

The Daily News

s-h-h-h-h-h-h.....

it's tooooozdee.

fly low.

Peace.

~H~

www.xanga.com/bharrington

The Daily News

1  I wrote this DN the other night at either 12:06 a.m. or 1:06 a.m. depending upon if you still subscribe to daylight saving time.

2  All I know is that it was a loss of an hour of sleep, which in my hurried and ridiculous world is akin to stealing my gold.

3  Looovvvvvve sleep.

4  I'm like that little bear you see on Sleepytime tea.

5  Ah, whatevuh.

6  Once you're up, you're up.

7  Unless...

8  Saturday night I was quite tempted not to go in on Monday.

9  Exhaustion.

10  Like that's something unique.

11  Are you guys all as exhausted as I am?

12  I swear to you someone wants to completely drain all of us.

13  And it AIN'T GONNA WORK!

14  Know why?

15  BECAUSE THEY HAVE INVENTED CHOCOLATE!!!!!

16  Yeee-uh!

17   So there, CIA guys who are trying to make all of us go mad.

18  We challenge you to try to fight us when we have chocolate in our corner.

19  Whatwhat.

20  With chocolate, we could <dare I say it>

21  Rule the Wullled.

22  Every time I'm about to go mad, I pop a piece of chocolate into my mouth.

23  It speeds up the madness.

24  I bend, twist, swirl at an unimaginable pace, and reach heaven, where I kiss the sky and all that is for inventing luscious, mahvelous chocolate.

25  I may need to get some.

26  But, alas!

27  Which is best?

28  Stay tuned...

29  Muhahahahaha.

30  Peace.

~H~

www.xanga.com/bharrington

The Daily News

1  It's probably to late to correct the fact that in yesterday's DN I wrote, "It's probably to late..."

2  It's "too late", not "to late".

3  Yeesh.

4   I've been keeping the DN going pretty well, but I have noticed some gross errors lately.

5  I thank it's due to my complete lack of chocolate.

6  It's been at LEAST a day or so.

7  Yeesh.

8  Moving on: It's March Madness in this swirly profession. Times are definitely tough. Teachers and staff are losing jobs right along with the rest of society. Morale is low. Swimming and aquatics have been cut, which is akin to the Death Star obliterations in Star Wars. Worlds are being destroyed, and it's tough to look into people's eyes not knowing when the shoe might drop, or to whom.

9  Ironically, I'm having one of the greatest, most sensational years of my career. I waited years to finally get some higher level classes, and it's finally here. I've been working harder than I ever have, designing lively classes (not all of 'em, but most of 'em!) and keeping on top of everything 24/7.

10  The rewards of working at the Chill have been multitudinous. The staff respects and listens to the experienced teachers. The younger staff shares sensational ideas with the O.G.'s. There is a tremendous coming together of the staff due in part to the fact that everyone is in danger.

11  Anyway, I sense the school finally starting to gain an identity. Our girls' basketball team is in the division playoff game this weekend, an absolutely amazing group of scrappy gamers, most of whom are under 5'4".

12  Our bands and orchestra played last night and lit up the night, as always. Interestingly, Steve Barnhill, our own version of a musical Babe Ruth, asked me if I could direct the band at the playoff game! I thought it would be fun, but grades are comin' up and all. We'll see...

13  It's been an absolutely phenomenal year, with many good days and few bad ones, and with the exception of feeling totally over-worked, it's like all the pent-up frustration of never having been given English 1A classes has now exploded into a complete teaching marathon. I've been given the chance, and it has officially paid off already.

14  Almost every single day I can't wait to go in and work with these students, who are absolute jewels. The past two years I have been the guy with the keys, and only now am I enjoying the wonders and goofiness of what we refer to as "the classroom".

15  Administrators are already balking at having to go "back to the classroom".

16  Yeesh.

17  I do understand the cut in pay, but I took a cut in pay this year, and you know what?  It was well worth it to get back into doing what I always loved.

18  Just some joy comin' at you after a sensational week.

19  It's a little bit funny, but if someone asked me if I had to do it all over again would I do it, I'd say yes, most definitely.

20  Know why?

21  As Nolte said in the old movie Teachers:  "I'm a TEACHER".

22  Always have been.

23  Nice finally to see it.

24  Have a great weekend everybody, and thanks for listenin'.

25  Peace.

~H~

www.xanga.com/bharrington

The Daily News

1  Guess what I just found out about the University of Phoenix?

2

3   Ya give?

4   Here's a hint:

Have you figured it out yet?

Sure?

5  Here:

How to Become an Agent for the CIA

November 25, 2008 by

Matthew Kee  

Matthew Kee

 

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Since the startup days of AOL (American Online), my friends and I have always like to crack accounts just for the fun of it.

We felt it was cool be Jim Bond (USA version of James Bond) and get into places we had no business being.

We didn't cause any mayhem or profit as we knew there were humans at the other end. Besides, if we ever got caught (which one of of did) we did not want the penalites to be too

 hard.

We'd risk going to jail or prison for a very long time which would hurt or familes and the chance to get jobs later on.

So how does one get compensated for hacking without getting in trouble? Well for starters, you'd do it for the government.

Actually, you can get in trouble if you are a field agent caught who is caught in the field instead of remote hacking from some G-14 Classified installation.

Is it easy to become an Agent? It actually is very easy. One will need take class from and institution such as the University of Phoenix. The benefit of the University of Phoenix is that they have convenient class locations as well as online learning.

To date, the University of Phoenix has helped thousands of students achieve the higher education they need to become Agents for the CIA and they can help you too.

  The Daily News

1  I just got a check for $.84.

2  It was dated February 24, and it was for eighty-four cents.

3  Capital One.

4  I thought of going into the bank and cashing it, walking out, and smoking a cigar.

5  Looking at the check, it looks as though it probably costs a darned bit more than eighty-four cents to make. It has a bunch of numbers at the top, an authorized signature, and you might think that somehwere, somehow, someone probably has an exact replica, but with thousands of dollars.

6  And I'll ALSO bet that the guy with the thousands of dollars probably sent a little over my way to cover the costs of that check.

7  I have NO idea why I got it. But eighty-four cents saved is eighty-four cents earned, if you ask me.

8  I'm thinking of putting it in a time capsule, so that no matter what, I'll never die broke.

9  = )     <-------- sideways smiley dude.

10  Moving on:  Yesterday I lost a little button that said something like, "I'm a big leprechaun". I was UP-set.

11  But you know, I decided long ago that it would be cool to learn how to spell the word "leprechaun". I'm guessing most people can't, so whenever someone says, "How do you spell 'leprechaun'?" I'll ALWAYS know.

12  It's actually happened twice in my life, both times right around St. Patrick's Day.

13  Luck o' the Irish.

14  There are words I have just memorized over the years. "Restaurant" is another.

15  I think it's because the only thing I've ever won in my entire life was my sixth grade spelling bee.

16  Like, not my class spelling bee. The entire SCHOOL spelling bee. I beat Janice Schnetzler on the word "legume".

17  I was a frickin' HERO!

18  Everybody wanted to play four-square with me, and guys bought me ice cream and everything. I felt like climbing the tether ball pole and pounding my chest.

19  Ah, the day ended, I went home, and the very next day I was just another guy taking up the fourth square.

20  But for one brief shining moment...

21  Welp, I think I'll keep it short tonight. I pushed a lot the past two weeks, so I'm on cruise control, at least for tonight.

22  You guys have a grand Wednesday, willya?

23  See ya agin.

24   Peace.

~H~

www.xanga.com/bharrington

  The Daily News

1  Yep. That was our school on the news last night.

2   Huge meeting, lots of emotions, a whole bunch of poker faces.

3   I stayed, then finally had to hit the road.

4   Once home, I had to stay up until all hours finishing an assignment. Pretty exciting, huh?

5   Fortunately, Nicole looked up and asked me if I had seen the creepy M & M's commercials, in which a green M & M seems to be a bit too sexy.

6   I haven't seen that commercial, but I do remember years ago the rumor that green M & M's made people horny.

7   Hey, it's PROBABLY an urban myth!

8   And Nicole challenged me to put that in the DN, so Nick, here ya go!

9   And check out THIS guy:

10  Or girl, not sure which.

11  One thing is certain: if I wanted to find more out about all of this, I found around five or six different sources, which is about five or six more sources than I could find about recent research in testing accommodations for English Language Learners, which tells me more about the state of our stupidity than anything I could have invented.

12  The M & M articles were easy to access, easy to cite, and easy to stick into a bibliography.

13  The more important research is nearly impossible to garner. My head turned into a bowling ball last night trying to find all that out.

14   As a joke, I decided to write a 1700-word research paper on green M & M's just to see what my professor would do.

15  The guy wrote back and wanted me to come in as the new Dean.

16   Nah.

17   I THOUGHT of doing that, lemme tellya.

18   I keep getting F's from those rogues for using terms like "lemme" and "tellya".

19   I just shot a ha-UGE ring finger right up into the sky.

20   Hey, nuthin' wrong wid dat.

21   Moving On:  Did I hear that Kurt Warner is SERIOUSLY considering coming over to the 49ers?

22  Singletary will scare him off. My prediction.

23  Have you seen the Letterman Singletary spots?

24  Hilarious.

25  Moving on, Part 2:  How com you always run out of toilet paper at inopportune times?  Last night at midnight I was informed by Caitlin that we were down to our last roll.

26   Fortunately, she is the most prepared person on this good Earth, and pulled out a nice spare, just in case.

27  Still, it looked like I had to do another of many midnight runs.

28  Let me rephrase that.

29  M'bad.

30  Enough of this madness.

31  Immina go.

32      "It was so cold last night that the hookers in Time's Square had a night of 
                                                      'Fat Guys Free.' "
                                                                                    ---David Letterman

33  Now I'd REALLY better go.

34   I can't even remember why, even though it was only 10 numbers ago.

35  So I'm out.

36   Peace.

~H~

www.xanga.com/bharrington