September 29, 2011
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The Daily News
1 About a hundred-gajillion years ago the State of California sent helicopters above our houses and doused us with poison in order to restrain a fruit fly.
2 I remember being a young feller and my outrage that “The Man” decided that this was okay.
3 We would be walking around minding our own business when fleets of choppers would rise up over the hills and move in. It was right out of the movies.
4 I vaguely remember pumping Vagner’s Ride of the Valkyries back into the sky as a sort of Nordic revenge.
5 Wagner.
6 Sorry.
7 M’bad.
8 Seriously though, at one time in the history of this great state, “The Man” had decided to wage all out war on fruit flies and showered us with poison every other day.
9 I remember vaguely (two vaguely’s in one DN, new record) looking up at the sky and clenching my fists in fits of rage.
10 Well, I wish they had dumped tons more, because last night all these random descendents of that annihilation began alighting on my computer screen.
11 It was almost a Stephen King moment, were it not so domestically normal.
12 Great concept though. The descendants of the Great Fruit Fly Massakree From Days of Yore taking over all of our computer screens, causing massive squishes by people who normally would never even hurt a fly.
13 Madness, utter madness I tell you.
14 Anyway, I wouldn’t squish a fly on my computer screen.
15 They’re helpful little critters, like all thing great and small.
16 Moving on, Part the First: Well, that was random.
17 Moving on, Part the Second: I apogize to DN aficionados for yesterday’s little faux pas, the absolute impropriety of not getting the DN posted. It was actually written at the usual time, which was in the middle of the night, but my morning flew by, and I figured, “I’ll just launch it from school.”
18 Well…I had a short film ready for the second half of each period, but noticed the students trying to use it as free time. The film I showed was the classic short, “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge”, a bit of a corny send-up of the Ambrose Bierce short story.
19 It’s a gimmick short, but has an awesome surprise ending. The trouble is, the director got a bit indulgent midway through, so part of it looked like a director who might have been dosed on model glue. Still, a superb little piece, and perfect for a minimum day.
20 But I had to stay on top of the students so that they would remain interested. It has a guy who is about to get hanged fall into a river when the rope breaks, and the rest of the story is his running from a relentless group of Civil War troops bent on killing him. You might have seen it. If you haven’t, then get it and watch it.
21 No spoilers here.
22 The ending is pretty intense, and pretty abrupt. But I saw my student starting to do homework for other classes, lie their heads down, or talk with friends, all pretty annoying stuff when a teacher plays a video.
23 They always see it as free time, no matter how many different ways we as teachers try to bring mass media into the classroom.
24 But that’s a story for another time.
25 Bottom line is this: because I had to stand over them, I didn’t get to the computer, and when I did, I had to keep vigilant on my grading deadline of 4 p.m. In my head, I had already launched the DN.
26 It’s funny once you get something into your head. “Hey, I did that already!”
27 And the circle, it goes round and round.
28 I sweh. Anyway, that’s my story of the Case of the Missing DN, and I’m sticking to it.
29 Moving on, Part the Thoid: I found it interesting that today’s DN and yesterday’s DN both headline Bugs Bunny. It wasn’t really deliberate: yesterday I just thought of how horridly oppressive the weather has been, and remembered Bugs saying at one time or another, Eh…unusual weather we’re having, ay doc?”
30 Today when I pondered the Ride of the Valkyries (Act III of Die WalkÜr) fruit fly wars I googled it, and quite naturally What’s Opera, Doc? popped up.
31 So I left it in. I thought that two days of Bugs Bunny isn’t gonna kill anyone, plus the guy is loony. So there ya go.
32 Moving on, Part Four: Finally, because I remained so focused on hitting my grading deadline, I missed the Giants’ final game of the season. That’s usually a time of brief reflection, because despite all my criticism, I usually like to salute my team, especially when they emerged with a pretty respectable record, ten games over .500 with absolutely no run support. I liked the young guns, and the young enthusiasm on the team. I became impatient with all the grumpy old men who would come to bat and ground into double plays, but still.
33 The spirit of the team shattered when Buster Posey broke his leg. And they still were just two small series from being in the playoffs. And it really struck me when Pat Burrell approached Coach Bruce Bochy and asked if he would start the last game.
34 It was probably the last game of his career, so a bit of sentiment should be thrown his way. There is no crying in baseball, but there are the occasional lumps in the throat. Watching a guy walking back to the dugout on what might be the last game of his career is a little bittersweet. You just respect the guy. Goodly man.
35 I’ll let The Merc News’ Giants’ beat guy Andy Baggerly tell you the rest of the story:
Burrell also presented Bochy a gift–a huge, hairy, brown musk ox pelt that is currently adorning the floor of the manager’s office. It looks like someone scalped Chewbacca, and truth be told, Bochy isn’t sure it ties the room together.
“Don’t tell him but it’s going on eBay as soon as the season’s over,” Bochy said.
36 I can’t think of a better way to say good-bye to the Giants’ 2011 season than that.
37 In fact, I can’t think of a better way to put the DN to bed than that.
38 Have a great Thursday everybody.
39 Peace.
~H~
