The Blog I'm Not Writing

Department Of Marital Bliss, Lowered Expectations Division

Earlier in the week I read a New York Times article about a crime that has scandalized Iran: an elderly couple was arrested for drugging, suffocating, stabbing, then dismembering three people.  The couple expressed no remorse, even though the murder victims were their son and their daughter and her husband.

“I have no guilty conscience for any of the murders,” (the husband) said in a TV interview from detention. “I killed people who were very morally corrupt.”

“We decided together, the two of us,” (the wife said)….My husband suggested it and I agreed. I have a great relationship with my husband. He doesn’t beat me or curse at me.”

( “They Were the Nice, Older Couple Next Door. Then the First Body Turned Up,”
NY Times 7-5-21 )

As bizarre/disturbing as the murders are,  [1]  that is not what lingered in my mind after reading this story.  Rather, I was drawn to the WTF?!?!? criteria of the wife’s “great relationship” with her husband.

Moiself  may be slogging into the “cultural differences” swamp, so grap your hip waders.  The thing is, this is not the first time I’ve come across such an anemic description of the qualities of a good husband.  Many is the time I have read a quote, from a woman living in a highly conservative/patriarchal and (often, but not exclusively) Islamic society, as to what a good husband is.  And most of the time, it is a list of “non-negatives.”    [2]

My husband and I have a good relationship because he DOESN’T
* beat me
* curse at me
* force me to have sex
* pull out chunks of my hair if he sees it peeking from behind my head scarf
*forbid me from leaving the house without a male escort
* burn my books and prevent me from obtaining an education
* steal my food
* lock me outside in the cold because he said I made lumpy hummus
* siphon from our children’s sons’ college fund to pay his sports gambling debts

 

 

*   *   *

Department of Back To School Daze

“Ultimately life is disease, death and oblivion.
It’s still better than high school.”
( Dan Savage )

Dateline: last Sunday. MH was out of town; son K came to dinner.  Moiself cannot remember the exact prompt or context for the story K shared with me (and neither can he; I checked), but it was about a play on words he’d recently heard, which he thought was clever and funny, but which someone else said was insulting. K and I talked about the “that’s funny – no, that’s insulting” controversy which sometimes arises when a person takes words or sounds from different languages (or even your “own” language) and uses the sounds to form puns and/or humorous words.  “Remember the Car Talk credits list – their Russian chauffer?” K asked.  How could I forget? That show was one of our family faves.  K and I began sharing “the best” titles and names that we could remember, from the show’s infamous credits list.

Engineersscientist/car repair enthusiasts Tommy and Ray Magliozzi (aka “Click and Clack – the Tappett brothers”) hosted the NPR show Car Talk from 1977 – 2012. They ended each broadcast by reading select entries from their ever-expanding list of recently acquired staff,   [3]  a mere sample of which follows:

– Accounts Payable Administrator                                          Imelda Czechs
– Accounts Receivable Supervisor, Mumbai Office               Vishnu Payup
– Bad Joke Interpreter                                                             Nadia Geddit
– Book Critic                                                                           Odessa Paige Turner
– Child Transportation Specialist                                            Minnie Van Driver
– Coordinator, 12-Step Recovery Program                             Cody Pendant
– Director of Gender Studies                                                  Amanda B. Reckondwyth
– Director of Japanese Cooling Systems                                 Emperor Overhito
– Director of Pavlovian Research                                            Isabelle Ringing
– Elvis Impersonator                                                               Amal Shookup
– French Dogwalker                                                                Poupon Degrasse
– Gastroenterologist                                                                Cameron Diaz
– Gum Surgeon                                                                        Perry O’ Dontal
– Head of Working Mother Support Group                            Erasmus B. Dragon
– Latin American Bullfighting Specialist                                Gordon Diaz
– Liaison to the British Isles                                                    Isaiah Oldchap
– Marine Biologist                                                                   Frieda Wales
– Plumber’s Crack Apologist                                                   Lucy Lastik
– President, Disgruntled Hatchback Owners Club                  Ivana Trunk
– Restroom Attendants                                                           Trudy Door & Donna Hall
– Russian chauffer                                                                   Pikov Andropoff
– Staff Meteorologist from the Seattle Office                        Wayne Goaway
– Swedish Attorney                                                                 Bjorn Liar
– Teenage Valet                                                                      Lao Tse Parker
– Tom’s Personal Matchmaker                                                Robin D’Craydell
– Undergarment Inspector                                                       I.C. London
– Visually Impaired Parking Lot Attendant                           Dale Neverknow
– Wine Taster from the Abu Dhabi Office                             Hassen Ben Sober
– Women’s Hockey Team Manager                                        Miss Inga Tooth

 

 

K brought up his favorite incident involving phonetic names mashup/entendres: the notorious “pilot name scandal” which arose after the crash of a Korean Jetliner.  In July 2013 Asiana flight 214 crashed on its final approach to San Francisco International Airport. Later that day, while reporting on the incident, a San Francisco TV news anchor was pranked by her staff, which led to her reading, with a straight face, straight from the teleprompter…    [4]  I’ll let the Wikipedia entry of the incident take it from here:

San Francisco television station KTVU fell victim to a prank which led news anchor Tori Campbell to report the names of the (flight 214) pilots as “Captain Sum Ting Wong,” “Wi Tu Lo,” “Ho Lee Fuk,” and “Bang Ding Ow” in the immediate aftermath of the crash. Viewers quickly realized that these “names” were in fact phonetic double entendres for “something’s wrong,” “we’re too low,” “holy fuck,” and the sounds of a crash. The prank was described as racist and unprofessional, and led to the firing of three veteran KTVU producers.  While the source of these joke names remains unclear, the NTSB admitted in a statement that one of its summer interns had confirmed the erroneous names when they were stated by the news station.

 

 

Moiself , after I recovered from a severe case of ROTFLMAO when I watched the video of the prank newscast, was offended by those who were offended.  Now, *of course* a plane crash is no laughing matter, but that wasn’t the point of the prank.  See the above Car Talk credits list. The pilots’ names stunt was unprofessional…and, c’mon, admit it, fucking hilarious…but racist?  As in, per the adjective form of the overused pejorative,

“based on racial intolerance” or
“discriminatory especially on the basis of race or religion”

 

 

The pilot-name-joke used the phenomenon of phonetic double entendres to imagine the conversation among the pilots as they realized their landing was going wrong; the joke was not disparaging of nor discriminatory against Korean airplanes, Korean pilots, or Korean people.  I’ve little doubt that, had it been an American or French plane which had crashed at a Korean airport, some Korean smartass could’ve fashion a similar joke, using phonetic double entendres, from the English or French languages – names or phrases which would mean nothing to French or English speakers (and which we wouldn’t even recognize) but which would be hilarious to people fluent in Korean.

The pilot joke names were no more “racist” against Koreans than the Car Talk guy’s faux staff credit names were racist against Russians (“Russian chauffer, Pikov Andropoff”) or the French (“French Dogwalker, Poupon Degrasse”) or Indians (“Accounts Receivable Supervisor Mumbai Office, Vishnu Payup”) or Japanese (“Director of Japanese Cooling Systems, Emperor Overhito”) or Latinos (“Latin American Bullfighting Specialist, Gordon Diaz “) or Scandinavians (“Swedish Attorney, Bjorn Liar”) or Arabs (“Wine Taster from the Abu Dhabi Office, Hassen Ben Sober”), or members of the UK (“Liaison to the British Isles, Isaiah Oldchap”)….

If you don’t get understand why, or if you think you need to convince people who aren’t offended by this prank that they *should* be, please stop reading this blog, right now.

It was a classic, brazen, guerilla humor stunt; I hoped that the fired KTVU staff took their dismissal with equanimity – surely, they understood the risk they were taking.  (I also hoped that they later found jobs as comedy writers for late night TV.)

K and I had fun re-living (and re-laughing at) our favorite Car Talk credits names…

 

 

…and I was struck by a memory of an incident which, although primal, was one I hadn’t thought of in years.  I prefaced the sharing of this incident by telling K about a time, when I was in high school, when the phonetic double entendre thing was all the rage amongst a certain group of friends. We’d trade off fictious book titles and their authors’ names, ala,

“Under the Grandstand”
By Seymour Butz

“One Hundred Yards To The Finish Line”
By Willie Makeit
Illustrated by Betty Wont

Yuk yuk. Yes, that passed for rapier-like wit in the tenth grade (and apparently also to K, who periodically shook his head and snickered, “Seymour Butz,” for the remainder of the evening).  Then I asked him, “Did I ever tell you about what happened to me in high school, when the use of phonetic double entendres proved…troublesome?”  K said no.  Thus, what follows, my longest blog post to date, is kinda/sorta his fault.   [5]

Dateline: Moiself’s senior year, SAHS (Santa Ana High School); ~five-six weeks before graduation.

 

 

It was election time for next year’s SAHS student government officers.  Moiself, my sophomore buddy, SG, and fellow senior DB, while eating our lunch in the Student Activities Office, lamented the election posters we’d seen posted – we were aghast at how BOOORRRRIIIINNG the signs were.  No creativity or originality; most didn’t even give a reason why you should vote for this person for this particular office.

We decide to remedy the situation. Within minutes we’d designed election signs of our own, with fictitious candidate names for actual student body offices.  SG and I were the main text composers; SG and DB, due to their superior artistic skills, did most of the graphics.  The signs can be found at the end of this blog, before the footnotes. 

We printed out several copies of each sign.  And by printed out I mean mimeographed, boys and girls, because there were no photocopiers in public schools at that time.

 

 

All three of us were involved in a variety of student activities, including being teacher’s assistants.  That, plus SG’s being a photographer for the school yearbook, DB’s being a cheerleader and former student body officer, and moiself  holding various student government offices for three years straight, had given us familiarity with and access to the mimeograph machine located in the teacher’s lounge.  Not one teacher batted an eye when SG and I entered the lounge, removed a stencil from the mimeograph machine (teachers were always leaving/forgetting to remove their stencils – a detail crucial to this story, later on), and ran our sign copies.

We taped the signs on our and our friends’ lockers and on a few of the halls around campus, next to or underneath the other (“real”) election signs.  Constrained by the 8 ½ ” x 11″ paper capacity of the mimeograph machine, our signs were smaller and in black and white, unlike the larger, colorful (if boring) signs and banners put up by legit candidates. Thus, we weren’t expecting many people to even notice them (other than our friends and fellow student body officers, whom we planned on alerting to the prank).  The lunch period ended, and we returned to our respective classrooms.

Our school had six classroom periods per day.  Fifth period for me was Journalism (I wrote for the school newspaper). I left the class early on to run an errand for Mr. Clucas, the class teacher and school newspaper advisor.   [6]   The errand took a mere 5 minutes;  when I returned to class Mr. Clucas told me that I’d just missed a school security guard (!!!), who had come to class, looking for me.  The guard told Clucas that one of the school’s Vice Principals, “LM,” wanted to see me in the Student Activities’ office.  It seems a teacher had alerted LM to “…something about ‘illegal election signs,’ ” Clucas said, his eyebrows raised in an And what are you up to now? manner.  I grabbed a textbook I’d brought to class and, with Mr. Clucas’ blessing, left to go find and warn my fellow “illegal sign” cohorts.

 

 

I found SG in his advanced Spanish class – where español only was spoken.  In my very unadvanced español I managed to convey to La Señora (the class teacher) that I needed to speak with Señor SG in private. As SG and I stood in the hallway outside SG’s class, exchanging what is going on?!?! speculations, a security guard approached us, and asked for our names.  I can’t remember the exact name I gave – Al Capone, or some other gangster.  SG immediately, brilliantly, gave another fugitive-from-justice moniker: Patty Hearst.  After waiting an appropriate comic beat, I flashed the guard my best, oh-aren’t-we-silly smile. I told him my real name, said that I understood he’d been looking for me, and that SG and I were going to get our other friend who was involved “in this” and then we’d all go to the activities office.

SG and I turned toward the doorway which led outside, to where DB’s cheerleading class met.  The guard said he was going to take us to the Activities Office, “right now.” He grabbed my arm and pulled me toward him; “You’re not going anywhere,” he said.

I yanked my arm from his grasp, flung my textbook to the ground, turned to face the wall, and assumed the classic perp spread: palms on the wall, legs apart, prepared for a pat-down.  SG tried his best not to giggle at the guard’s obvious embarrassment/confusion at my reaction, as I called out, “You gonna search me for weapons?”

 

 

The guard made no further attempt to touch either moiself or SG as he escorted us to the Activities Office, where we were joined by DB. The kangaroo court “meeting” consisted of five people: The Gang Of Three (“TGOT”: SG, moiself , DB), Vice Principal LM, and the Student Activities Director, “MTT.”

What followed was…confusing…infuriating… and saddening.  We, TGOT, were in big trouble, the adults told us (LM did most of the talking).  LM held up a handful of our election signs.  How dare we put up fake, obscene, off-color, and racist election signs/? How dare we mock students running for office….

Wait a minute, TGOT protested, in indignation and legitimate confusion.  Our signs (we were not told how TM figured out they were “ours”) mocked no actual person.  And, “obscene,” “off-color,” “racist”? We made no obscene or racist signs – what signs are you talking about?

LM flipped through the signs he held, and pulled out the allegedly “racist” sign:  “Vote for a true worker: Manuel Labor, Commissioner of Publicity.”  TGOT’s reaction:

 

 

The pun on the name Manuel makes it racist? SG, who was Jewish, pointed to the Ben Dover for ASB President sign, noting that Ben, short for Benjamin, is a Jewish name.  Using the name Manuel as a phonetic pun was no more racist than using Ben was anti-Semitic, SG declared.

Seeing as he was going to get no admission of malintent from us, LM moved on to the “obscene/off-color” sign.  “Told ya,” I cracked at SG, when LM held up the sign for the Student Relations  (“Want to relate? Well then vote for E.Z.!  E.Z. Lay for Comissioner of Student Relations!“)  (That was the one sign that I’d thought, if any adult paid any attention, might be considered a little iffy…but it was so silly; who would take it seriously? It was SG’s idea and he had drawn it).

I looked straight into LM’s beady, petty eyes and haughtily informed him, in (what I hoped was) my best journalistic, I-have-a-larger-vocabulary-than-you, you-power-mad-ignorant-bureaucrat tone of voice, that the text of the sign employed juvenile sexual innuendo, not obscenity, and I proceeded to wonder aloud how any supposed adult did not understand the difference.

The meeting went even further downhill from there (surprise!). It became obvious that LM was determined to find malice where there was none, and that TGOT were getting no support from MTT…and why was MTT even there?  What hurt us most was the lack of support from MTT, the Activities Director.  MTT said he was being blamed “for this”…. As it turned out, there were other things going on, things between MTT and the administration, which we were not privy to.

MTT was in some kind of trouble with someone higher up; there were also other “issues” involving both the Vice Principal and the Activities Office.  SAHS was facing external, staff, and parental pressures, including changing demographics  [7]  and the growing presence of gangs in Santa Ana schools. The administration faced accusations from Chicano-identified  [8]  students and their adult supporters, accusations of, as LM put it, “Mexicans get picked on and Whites get away with everything.”  LM began to give examples, such as students getting in trouble for writing or painting gang symbols and signals on their lockers, “…but here are the three of you, putting up “illegal’ election signs and thinking you can get away with it….”

LM was comparing violent gang symbols with bad puns? 

 

TGOT exchanged knowing looks.  We were being sacrificed on the altar of a term we couldn’t have used at the time because it didn’t yet exist. LM (who happened to be SAHS’s first Latino Vice Principal) had essentially clued us in as to what was going on:  he felt it politically expedient to make examples of us, as in, we gotta get some white kids, for something.

TTM, alluding to the trouble he was in, told us that “when word got out” the “heat” would fall on him for our antics.  I noticed his usage of the future tense – “when” and “would”…and I wondered what was going on.  Did anyone else in the administration, other than LM and MTT (and the teacher who reported the signs  [9]  ) know about this?  My response to MTT was tersely unsympathetic: “Well, you know what they say – if you can’t stand the heat get out of the kitchen.”

I immediately regretted my response, and to this day, I cringe to think of it.  I’d lashed out in anger, but also, mostly, in pain.  Of all the adults in the school, I’d thought MTT would have stuck up for us.  The Activities Director was the advisor of the Student Government; SG, DB and I had all known and worked with MTT for years and were quite fond of him, and he of us.  Earlier in the year, another student government officer and I used the Activities Office PA system –  which we had permission to use for announcing pep rallies, school dances and fundaisers, etc. –  for a prank.  Over the PA, which was broadcast in every classroom, we announced, “Attention, all students and teachers: There is a change in today’s school schedule.  Please note that the fifth period bell will ring at ten minutes to two, instead of at 1:50.”  We did this at noon, and when MTT heard the announcement, he thought it was so funny that *he* got on the PA an hour later, and reread the announcement.  He received one objection, from a flustered teacher who harumphed about why he hadn’t been informed earlier as to the change in his class’s schedule.    [10]

Back to the meeting, which was going to the proverbial nowhere:  LM informed TGOT that the security guard would escort us as we removed every sign we’d posted, then we were to return to our respective homes immediately. Our parents were being contacted by telephone, and we would find out later this evening the consequences of our actions, which could likely result in multi-day suspensions for each of us, and possible marks on/withholding of our school transcripts (a vague threat to DB and I, who had already been accepted to our respective colleges).

 

 

When I got home my mother was awaiting me, all aflutter in concern and confusion.  She’d been telephoned by a secretary from the school office, who told her I’d gotten in trouble for…I can’t remember her exact description.  My mother told me that when the secretary told her that “Robyn and two other students had been involved in an incident with school staff members,” and that the Vice Principal would be calling later that evening to explain things, her first thought was, “Oh, no – did Robyn punch a teacher?”

That revelation led to her hearing a well-deserved, Moooootttthhhhhher – how could you even think that?!?! from me.  But then, the kicker, which made my mother realize that something funny was going on: Mom said that when she asked the secretary for details re the “incident,” the secretary lowered her voice to a whisper, barely suppressed a giggle, and said, “Well, actually, some people might think is’s kind of funny….”

DB’s and SG’s mothers had also received phone calls.  DB’s mother, after speaking with DB about what had happened, went on the proverbial warpath. She made calls of her own to the school, speaking first with LM and finally reaching the Principal.  After the initial, late afternoon phone calls, each of TGOT’s households received calls later that evening, but not from the Vice Principal, as had been promised. Our parents were contacted by an assistant to the Principal, who told them that SG, DB and I should return to school as usual the next day, and that after school we would all meet in the Principal’s office, with the Principal, LM, TMM, and any of our parents who wanted to attend.

 

 

The Day After: Meet “The Butt Out” Gang

The Summary

What SG, DB and I suspected turned out to be true.  LM had overreacted, had gotten MTT involved, and attempted to turn a molehill prank into a mountain. He’d threatened draconian disciplinary action against three students who had spotless disciplinary records (and each of us members of/involved in the school’s gifted program/Honor Roll, sports/arts/activities/student government) *without* running any of it by the Principal.

The Gory Details ®

At 4 pm SG, DB, moiself, and my friend RR – whom I’d brought along and introduced as “my attorney” –  sat down across a rectangular table from LM and MTT.  Principal “JW” sat at the head of the table.  None of the TGOT parental units were there. After DB’s mother had contacted the principal, gotten the situation “straightened out,” and then phoned SG’s and my parents, our folks didn’t think their presence was necessary.

 

” Hairstyles change, and skirt lengths, and slang, but high school administrations? Never.”
( Stephen King )

Principal JW informed TGOT – to the obvious discomfort of LM and MTT – that there would be no suspensions or other disciplinary actions taken against us.  However, we students did need to understand the seriousness of “the concerns” re our actions:

(1) “Some people” felt our signs had mocked student government and student activities, and thus by extension, students involved in such;

(2) the sensitive nature (“obscene/off-color”; “racist”) of some of our signs;

(3) the administration’s main concern: our unauthorized use of school property (the mimeograph) for personal purposes when that machine was strictly for “school business only.”

RR, like any good advocate, brought a yellow legal notepad with her, and wrote down the concerns as they were listed by the Principal. TGOT referred to her list as we proceeded to dismiss and/or refute address each of the stated excuses for adult hysteria concerns.

(1) You’ve got to be fucking kidding (we did not phrase it thusly).  Hello; look at us?!  We, each of us, have been involved in student government and activities for the entirety of our high school years. Whom would we be mocking – ourselves?  Not only have we not disparaged student government, we’ve encouraged others to run for office.  Holy post-Watergate lack of cynicism  – Robyn (as my “attorney” noted), as voted in by her peers, is the Senior Class Vice President!

And, by the way, who exactly, allegedly, expressed “concerns” about the signs?  Why couldn’t we face our accusers?   (We never received names of anyone who was offended by the signs. Since we’d had to take down all the signs the previous day, after our meeting with LM and MTT, they’d only been posted for a couple of hours, and few people had actually seen them).

(2) The two signs in question (“Manual” and “E.Z.”) were neither “obscene,” “off-color” nor “racist.” Other than admitting to mild/harmless vulgarity on the E Z. sign, we did not concede to those pejoratives.  We were certain that, had students had the opportunity to actually see the signs, they would have found them at least mildly amusing (if they paid any attention to them at all). And if our respective parents – all politically and socially conservative, and all of whom had been informed of the content of the signs –  [11]  had not been shocked or even bothered by them, what was the administration’s problem?

C’mon– “obscene” signs? The “E.Z.” sign is mild compared to the sexual innuendo contained in the cheers which the school-sanctioned pep squad *leads* the audience – students, and parents alike – in reciting during football and basketball games:

Get it  up/put it in/do it, do it !

Grab a piece – Grab a piece…(of yardage; of yardage!)

It’s all sniggering, adolescent, nudge-nudge-wink-wink. Why make a big deal out of it?

 

 

(3) Interesting, that this “main concern” had not been mentioned, by either LM or MTT, when they read us the riot act the previous day.  I thought – but did not say aloud – that it had been added last minute, by either the Principal or LM, so that they’d have at least one accusation that stood a chance of sticking.  The other two charges were subjective, and slowly evaporating, fading away due to their inherent flaccidity (there I go again, with the juvenile innuendo).

TGOT admitted we’d used school equipment to make copies of the signs, and we were prepared to reimburse the school for the cost of paper and mimeo printer fluid. I removed a five-dollar bill from my jeans pocket, at which point Principal JW told me to “Butt out,” even though we (TGOT) were the ones speaking, and hadn’t interrupted any adults in the room.  SG came to my rescue, and posed a question to the principal: if the main issue of concern was the use of the school mimeograph for personal, as in, non-school/academic matters, did that also apply to the teaching staff?  And if not, why?

The three adults/administrators exchanged wary looks, and SG and I began to share our stories,   [12]   of having both first and second-hand knowledge of teachers using the mimeograph not only to run off copies of their math and grammar tests, but to print party invitations, baby announcements, and other personal papers.  One student we knew had been sent by his teacher to use the mimeograph to make a class vocabulary list. Before the student could do so he had to remove the stencil left by a previous user of the machine – a paper which appeared to be a teacher’s annual family Christmas letter.

SG gave two more examples; I related one of the many examples I was prepared to cite.  Earlier in the year I’d been given flyers to mimeo (from TMM) and post around campus, for a student activity.  When I went to the teacher’s lounge to use the mimeograph I had to remove a stencil the previous user had left in the machine – a stencil of an invitation to a housewarming party given by a teacher (I’d recognized the teacher’s name).  “We could give you more examples,” I said, “but we’ve made our point, that…”

LM interrupted me, which gave my “attorney” the moment she’d been waiting for:  she actually said, “Objection! My client is testifying.”   [13]

I rephrased SG’s query/statement: since item (3) is supposedly the administration’s “main concern,” what are the consequences for teachers – these adults and authority figures, who supposedly set the examples for students – who violate the school’s policy against using school equipment for personal use?

 

Hard to believe, but my question was not well-received. Principal JW once again told me to “Butt out.”  (And for the brief remainder of the school year, SG, DB and I referred to ourselves as, The Butt Out Gang.)

Principle JW addressed TGOT, restating the “concerns” she’d hoped we’d taken to heart. She then looked pointedly at me and said, “You’re not going to write about this, are you?”

Although it was a question, JW’s tone and facial expression said, “You’d better *not* write about this in that #!$? smartass column of yours.”  Which of course, made me want to…if only for a moment.

It was the butt (out?) end of the school year. The school newspaper was published every two weeks, with one issue slated in the coming days, which left only two or three issues to go, and I’d already given the outlines for my columns to the editorial page editor.  I knew Mr. Clucas would have granted me the editorial freedom he’d insisted upon all year – not only for my op-ed column (which was titled, “Parnal Knowledge”  [14] ) but for other articles I’d written. It’s likely he would have given me space in the news section or in another part of the editorial page, had I requested it, to write about the election signs incident.  But I was sick of it all: sick of Those People ® in particular and the petty machinations of high school in general.  I’d been accepted to my first-choice university; mentally and emotionally, I had nothing left for SAHS – I was outta there.  The last thing I wanted to do was to waste my time and creative energy dignifying the Obscene Election Sign Non-Scandal by writing about it.

 

 

The meeting was concluded in less than 45 minutes, with no admissions of guilt from TGOT, little input from LM and MTT, and no apologies from anyone.  JW’s closing remarks were that the election sign incident had been “overdramatized by everyone,” and things would return to normal if we’d all let it, forget it, and move on.

We three accused did not gloat, but could barely suppress our righteous indignation. Overdramatized, by everyone?

It was clear to us that JW had called the meeting to do damage control.  She was shrewd enough to realize that her VEEP and Activities Director had overreacted (read: lost their shit) over a minor prank, but she would not undermine their authority by declaring so in front of students.  She tried to help her administrative staff save face; JW was in damage control mode – in large part (I’d bet) due to her having been contacted by two parents (DB’s and SG’s mothers  [15] ) who raised holy hell and threatened to go public (i.e., to the school board and The Register, the local, editorially libertarian rag newspaper which was anti-public schools) if LM’s threats against TGOT were enacted.

 

 

*   *   *

Pun For The Day
Marital Bliss (“We have a great relationship”) Edition

Two antennas got married. The wedding was a bit disappointing,
but the reception was great.

My husband tells me I’m a skeptic,
But I don’t believe a word he says.

Two melons tried to get married in Las Vegas, but they didn’t have the right documents.
It’s a shame they cantaloupe.

My husband is my favorite aquatic mammal.
That’s right – he’s my significant otter.

 

 

*   *   *

May you look back with equanimity upon the petty pains
(and pleasures) of high school;
May you have a truly “great relationship” with your spouse;
May you listen to rebroadcasts of Car Talk, if only to hear the credits;
…and may the hijinks ensue.

Thanks for stopping by.  Au Vendredi!

*   *   *

THE SIGNS

Sit down, fix yourself a stiff drink, and be prepared to clutch your pearls in horror at the foul content to be found within.

(time and mimeograph fluid has taken its toll on the original stencils)

 

*   *   *

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

(“Can she do the
job?….
Shirley U. Jest” )

 

*   *   *

Finally, the footnotes

[1] The couple are undergoing psychiatric evaluations, officials told Iranian media.

[2] From which you can derive her likely point of reference, as in, “Oh, crap, this is the norm she sees, all around her, so comparatively, she things ‘great’ equals not getting beaten.”

[3] Their tag line for the credits list:  “It takes this many people to produce such a lousy show? Who knew!”

[4] KTVU’s Managing Editor said she thought the names sounded suspicious but approved the list, as she was told that an official at the NTSB confirmed their authenticity.  The NTSB “official” turned out to be  a summer intern at the news station.  The station fired several staffers but spared the newscaster.

[5] Or his credit, depending on your POV.

[6] I have written previously in this space about the late great Theodore “Teddy” Clucas,  a much-adored (and tolerant!) teacher, journalism mentor and 1^st amendment advocate – for many students, including moiself.

[7] by the time I graduated the majority of the SAHS student body was Hispanic-surnamed.

[8] That was a term used by some – not all — Latino cultural activists at the time, as a political signifier.

[9] We never did find out who alerted the vice Principal, other that it was “an adult staff member.”

[10] Sadly, this was not an isolated incident, in terms of the great academic minds of SAHS demonstrating that they were…sometimes not paying attention, shall we say (and we just did).

[11] We’d each taken copies home, to show our parents. I held on to the original stencils, and have them to this day.

[12] DB did little talking during this meeting.  Apparently, her mother reading the riot act to the Principal the previous evening was enough for her.

[13] I think that got under LM’s skin more than anything.

[14] Speaking of innuendo…yeah, I know. But, guess who gave me that nickname, and suggested it be the title of my column?  Twas the highly respected, squeaky clean, universally liked and respected, daughter of a school board member and winner of our school’s highest honor (“The Coterian Award”), the Editor-in-chief of the newspaper.

[15] Other than the phone calls they received from the school, I asked my parents to stay out of it.  I did not, however, tell them to “butt out.”