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Socrates "Wait'll my dad hears about what this Pilate guy pulled. He's gonna *crucify* him." From NumberOneSon at 7: 41 p.m. April 3 CE 40. JChrist "Totally lost. Better name this place Hispaniola and rape all the women or school children five hundred years from now won't get a day off." From CC_Globetrotter_3 at 3:01 p.m. Oct 12 1492. ChrisColumbus "Suck It @King George: Don't Fucking Tread On Me!" Colonizzy#17 at 5:00 a.m. July 4 1776. JohnHancock "Hey @Johnny, thanks for taking care of those urder-may arges-chay. Barbeque tonight?" From BigDog at 8:15 p.m. Oct 3 1995. OrenthoJamesSimpson "Are you shitting me? U'd better be shitting me." From JohnMcCainforPrez at 11:14 p.m. Nov. 4 2008 JohnMcCain "Just take a short trip, they said. The judge'll have forgotten *all* about it, they said. Pricks." From romanpolan at 10:01 p.m. September 29. RPolanksi Labels: Great Moments in History --posted by Digger Blue at 4:15 PM 0 comments thus far Tuesday, November 17, 2009 My Most Inspirational Teacher Nomination from Last Year He didn't get it. But he should have. For posterity: My most inspirational teacher was …Gustaf Van Cromphout. I had him for Early American and Romantic Literature. He spoke five languages. Threw gobbets around the way I would Simpsons quotes. Could trace a word’s etymology two millennia back without breaking a sweat. But all of this was secondary to his real tool: passion. He made you care. And he cared about his students. He remembered me almost a decade after I had him as an undergraduate. Van Cromphout died three years ago, but before he did, he’d made it clear that death was the only thing that would keep him from teaching. Labels: Nostalgia File --posted by Digger Blue at 6:16 PM 0 comments thus far I really cannot stand hearing what I hear when doing supervision for midday "study group." They talk a lot about what they've seen on tv (mostly crap). They talk about the teachers they don't like. They use adjectives like "queer," "gay" and "retarded" to the point of near-meaninglessness. They throw food at each other. They're not bad kids. It's not that. It's just a snapshot of our Youth Culture, and I want to stand and scream at the top of my lungs, "You can NOT hold me accountable for this. I DIDN'T do this--I have to DEAL with this. I'll do what I can to clean the mess up, but don't you DARE blame it on me." Of course, such things cannot be screamed to a room full of adolescents (or parents, or colleagues, or administrators, for that matter), so instead I rub my stomach to assuage the stress pains and wonder how to relax and not take it all so seriously. I have a hunch I'll have it figured out soon enough. When I'm planted six feet under. Labels: Teacher Man --posted by Digger Blue at 11:30 AM 0 comments thus far Sunday, November 15, 2009 From today's paper The History of the Death Panels. Ought to be required reading for town hall and tea party idiot protesters. Teachers Sell Lesson Plans. Personally, I don't see it for myself (I can't even give mine away sometimes), but if we're going to be held accountable like people who work "real jobs," then we ought to be able to sink our thumbs into the free market like, say, investment bankers, mortgage brokers and the like. Megan Fox talks about being an actress. For some reason, the people offscreen aren't laughing hysterically. P.S. Take your top off, Ms. Fox. Labels: Guilty Pleasures, Right Noise, Teacher Man --posted by Digger Blue at 10:45 AM 0 comments thus far Wednesday, November 11, 2009 TV Pilot Script: The D.C. Guys A co-worker and I whipped this up last spring in a desperate attempt to cash in on the addled tastes of whoever picks shows for television and escape our humdrum jobs, not to mention avoid work. So...yeah. We avoided work, all right. For about ten minutes. VOICEOVER: In 2009, a couple of disgruntled, possibly-loaded-on-the-job high school teachers packed up and went to Washington, D.C. Their mission: to expose any elements remaining of the evils of the Bush administration, and to get a cushy job in Legislative Affairs. Whatever the hell that is. Today, they're living on the fringe in the nation's capital, watching, investigating, and racking up debt. They're currently wanted by a government that refuses to acknowledge their existence, and their savings are almost gone. If you have a problem, and no one else can help, and if you can find them...maybe you should hire...the D.C. Guys. OPENING MONTAGE: Magnum PI ripoff music. Scenic shots of D.C. The Capitol Building. The White House. The Lincoln Memorial. A homeless guy pissing in a dumpster. CHARACTERS:GREGG STUDLYBUFF, tall, ripped, wearing a Hawaiian shirt and two days' worth of beard. And sunglasses! Mirrored, aviator sunglasses. He leaps out the door of his Potomac-bank trailer wearing his mirrored, aviator sunglasses and spends an exciting minute and a half parallel parking his Dodge. ADAM ACHIN', medium build, conservatively dressed, smoking a cigarette and staring arrogantly out the window of his swank, three-bedroom apartment. Behind him, a trio of Senegalese men implore him to come back to bed. Adam resolutely ignores them. Gregg finally gets his car parallel parked. He steps out. Through the reflection of his bitchin' aviator mirrored sunglasses, we see the Capitol Building. Gregg smirks confidently, pulls out a cell phone and calls Achin'. CUT TO: ACHIN'S SWANK APARTMENT. Achin answers the phone. ACHIN: "Yeah." SENEGALESE MAN/BOY #2 (from the bed): "Revenu au lit, le grand homme. Les heures sont peu." ACHIN: "Quiet, lover. Daddy's working." GREGG: "Achin'. I'm at the Capitol." ACHIN: "And?" GREGG: "Uh, they still won't let me in. The restraining order paperwork went through." ACHIN': "Damn." GREGG: "Yeah. So, what do you want for lunch?" PREVIEW NEXT WEEK'S EPISODE: Club sandwich special! And a quick trip to the doctor's office for penicillin. ROLL CREDITS Labels: Paperback writer man --posted by Digger Blue at 5:10 PM 0 comments thus far Friday, October 16, 2009 Fox News Isn't Even Pretending Any More [to be objective], from Salon.com. Labels: Media, Right Noise --posted by Digger Blue at 4:27 PM 0 comments thus far Thursday, October 15, 2009 How I Dealt With a Crazy Pregnazoid This Morning. Truth be told, I work with a lot of women. There are men in my department, I don't deny it, but I see little of them. Whether that's because they're too busy doing their jobs or shaking down hallway toughs for soda machine change is a speculation I will absent myself from for the moment. At any rate, their illegal shenanigans leave me plenty of time to listen to complaints from my female coworkers instead. Not all of them. Not even half of them. Most of the women I work with are just that: women I work with. They do their jobs and then some. And then they disappear into the vastness of whatever lives they've managed to carve out for themselves: with husbands, volleyball teams, Peace Corps volunteering or taking care of elderly family members. They smile and say hi in the hallways; they occasionally vent, while I provide a shoulder to cry on or a convenient hand with which to spank their pilate-toned asses. I'm nothing if not sympathetic. No, my spleen is reserved today for the more vocal women in my department. There's about two or three of these harpies, and they have their Greatest Hits of complaints, which all boil down to one of a few possibilities: 1) They're pregnant. 2) They have kids to take care of. 3) They're pregnant and have kids to take care of. And that's pretty much it. These are trump cards, the likes of which an unattached, freewheeling suburban playboy like myself cannot possibly hope to contend with. If I so much as hint that I'm tired from an evening of misbehavior, I'm immediately reminded that, well, it must be fun to be able to leave the house without carrying diapers and toys for the infant. Or it must be nice to not worry about little Jimmy's soccer practice. Or whatever. Confronted with such assaults on my lack of responsibilities, I usually slink off to some remote corner to work, ruminating on the unfairness of a world where they have to drive kids to the mall and I get to watch reruns of Baywatch instead. I know, right? I've got it made. Consider Emily's ambush this morning, after a curriculum meeting (Emily, by the way, is bursting-at-the-scenes, shit-crazy pregnant, and her husband, who works in the building next door, seems to find lots of places to be besides at her side) EMILY: How are you this morning? ME: Oh, you know. I'm hanging in there. EMILY: Yeah. Try being pregnant some time. ME: ... And for the record, no, I am not exaggerating that conversation. Word. For fucking. Word. Well, I don't need Miss Manners to tell me, Relax, she's hormonal, she's going through chemical spikes that would put twelve monkeys on anyone's backs for life. Besides, what possible responses do I have, anyway? #1 EMILY: Try being pregnant some time. ME: I'm really sorry to hear it's been tough. It'll be better soon. Trust me. That would work. But this conversation happened at 6:45 a.m., when I'm legally stupid. Besides, come on, if I'm going to be that diplomatic, I'd better be getting a piece of tail afterwards. And since these particular gardens have already been seeded, and are about to yield their harvest, there's not much incentive for me to plant a shovel in there...yeah, you get the idea. So: #2 EMILY: Try being pregnant some time. ME: That's a biological impossibility for me, Emily. But maybe in my next life, I'll be able to experience the miracle of birth like you. Eh. It would work, provided I could say it in a tone completely free of sarcasm. So we'd better stick to likely possibilities. #3 EMILY: Try being pregnant some time. ME: Fuck off. That one's probably the most realistic. As long as it's muttered under the breath. Which I would forget to do. Let it rest, I tell myself. Emily will come around. We're old friends. Okay, we're friends. Okay, we're vague acquaintances, but we'll be capable of neutral discourse again some time. Your ire will subside. You'll forget about it in a year or two, and when she's got her kids actually on her hands, you can laugh at her and text pictures of the bottles of beer you'll have consumed instead of chasing after diapered maniacs and watching reruns of Elmo. These remonstrations work for a while. Until I round the hall...and meet Crazy Pregnant Lady #2! Immediately, my mind goes preemptive and my Sensitivity Valve is turned to Full Blast! MARTHA: How's it going for you? ME: Oh, you know. I'm hanging in there. But at least I'm not pregnant, right? Ha ha! MARTHA: Ha ha ha! Good one, Gregg! ME and MARTHA: Ha ha ha! And suddenly I'm in the sun again. I am a Man Who Understands. I Put On No Airs. I'm a Good Catch for Aspiring Mothers (or would be, if these nice young pregnant ladies weren't already married--except for Cassandra in Accounting, that filthy whore). And all I had to do was totally debase myself. Which is still sticking in my craw, even these many hours later. Look, for the record, I don't want to be a woman. Ever. I can't believe the shit they put up with, not excepting assholes like me. And childbirth...blech. I can't even survive an episode of NOVA if there's a hint they're going to show the baby enter the world. So I've got nothing to complain about. But Emily, really. You're pregnant. You're not exactly carrying a cross to Golgotha. And besides, admit it: it was fun getting that thing in there, right? Anyway, you'll have to excuse me. I have to go and not be pregnant andy busy with kids. Labels: Angry Man, White Noise --posted by Digger Blue at 6:22 PM 0 comments thus far Wednesday, October 07, 2009 Pages Ripped from my Old Notebooks: Spring Break 1996 Setting: Cumberland Island, Georgia, on a weeklong camping trip Todd had been missing for two days, and when we finally found him, he was huddled next to a tree, covering himself with mulch to stay warm. “You could have just slept in the tent last night, you know,” Tso told him. “Yeah, you’d like that,” Todd hissed through shivering teeth. “I don’t trust you. You’re too handsey when it’s dark. Now get me back to camp before I freeze to death.” “Fine,” said Tso, pouting over the prospect of a sleeping bag alone. “But now you’re on kitchen duty for the rest of the trip.” Todd cursed and tried to crawl away so he could freeze to death peacefully instead, but Tso hoisted him up on his back and carried him back. Todd fought valiantly, but when he realized he was stuck doing pots and pans, he gave up and wept bitterly. I myself had managed to put together a rather impressive still in the woods, and after we imbibed a few pints of my home brew (made from rubbing alcohol, toadstools and flavored lemonade stolen from the trip leaders), I proposed a hiking trip through the wetlands. For much of the journey, I amused myself pummeling Tso in the back of the head with rocks I'd picked up along the way. Tso rolled cigarettes, and Todd smoked and rolled more cigarettes. I threw rocks. Tso threatened me, which hurt my feelings, so I cried and threw more rocks at him. Ah, sweet bird of youth. Nothing like your early friendships. Ten minutes down the path, we spotted an alligator lying ahead of us. Todd immediately squealed like a six-year-old told she just got free tickets to a Hanson concert and jumped into Tso’s arms. Tso tried not to look pleased at this. “Maybe we should go around it,” Tso said. “You don't mess with those things.” I laughed at him since he was an idiot and continued pelting him with rocks. “Nah, if we throw something sharp at it and yell in its ear, the dumb thing will run away and leave us alone. Just watch where you step around him.” “No kidding, genius,” snarled Todd, stomping off, tripping over the alligator’s tail and breaking three of his teeth. Tso, upon seeing the great beast lift its head, shrieked like a six-year-old girl finding out that the Hanson concert had actually been cancelled because they’d all married a seven-year-old rival, sprawled to the ground and began covering himself with leaves. (Meanwhile, 1,114 miles away, Dale Carlson sat up on his couch, watching illegally downloaded pornography. “I’m getting a feeling my friends are in danger,” he said to himself. “Like they’re going to get eaten ... Eating. That reminds me. I'm hungry.”) Labels: Nostalgia File, Tso is an idiot --posted by Digger Blue at 6:17 PM 0 comments thus far Copyright © 2001-2009 Endoxa Productions "My wretched dragon is perplexed." --William Butler Yeats Home	Quotes "'Tis time this heart should be unmoved, Since others hath it ceased to move: Yet, though I cannot be beloved, Still let me love!" -Lord Byron" Reading Cakes and Ale The Dumbest Generation, Mark Bauerlein Listening To new Cult playlist Projects lesson plans for two new goddam preps this year Labels: A Friend's New Kid Actin' Action Jackson Angry Man Brand New Day Bust a Move Culture Man Damn Poetry Dewification Drinkin' Dropping some NYC Festivus for the restofus Full of myself Get a Job Great Moments in History Guilty Pleasures High Quality Flannel Homeowner The Hounds of Digger Blue Insomniac Iraq War Learnin' Man Lefty-loosey Media Mini Vacation Moving My dumb campaign My dumb cat My old man New Car Nostalgia File Och, my aching back Out Sick Oy-il Paperback Writer Man Pedagogy Politics Right Noise Rockin' Man Romancin' Roughing It Slumlord Snow Day Stuff I'm Listening to Stuff I'm Reading Stuff I'm Watching Teacher Man Travelin' Man Tso is an idiot Uncle Blue White Noise Working Late Watch The Bride Wore Black Don't Watch The Exterminating Angels