No Sale

 “Robert Mueller just died. Good, I’m glad he’s dead. He can no longer hurt innocent people!”

“Now with the death of Iran, the greatest enemy America has is the Radical Left, Highly Incompetent, Democrat Party! Thank you for your attention to this matter.”

These are the kinds of things that come tumbling out of the social media account of the alleged pedophile and convicted felon current occupant of the ruins of the White House. 

So here's my ongoing wondering: This is what his handlers allow to escape into the world. What sort of vile things must be lurking just below that thin veneer of what might be considered respectful? We have been made to understand that this is the calling card of the Orange Worst, "telling it like it is." Then leave it to Karoline Leavitt and Mike Johnson to sort out via the tried and not so true phrase, "What the president meant was..."

Sorry, but there doesn't seem to be any sort of adequate filter for wishing death on one's political rivals. That's just "how it is." Let the lamestream media and bleeding heart liberals figure it out for themselves. While we're at it, let's back up the family truckster just briefly to examine the "death of Iran" lead-in. What used to give us all pause here in the United States were the protesters in other countries shouting "Death to America." 

The business of this current administration is being carried out late at night via social media in between rushed interactions on the way to or from his golf club in southern Florida. The interest this nominally human has in being seen as a wartime "president" is all but obscured by the pictures of him on the golf course. Gas prices have risen thirty percent in just two weeks, while the pointy heads who are trying to solve the crisis of faith in the Department of Homeland Security have suggested sending ICE officers in to take over the places of TSA officers who are quitting in droves. There is no difference between the frying pan and the fire. Putting a bunch of poorly trained armed goons in charge of passenger screening at airports is an accident waiting to happen. 

Just Karoline Leavitt and Mike Johnson standing up and trying to make sense of it all for us. 

Sorry. No sale. 

This former game show host is as morally bankrupt as any of his casinos. If you're wondering how this guy sleeps at night, take heart: He doesn't. He's up tapping away on his phone. He waits until he's in policy meetings to sleep. 

Letting Go

 I have mentioned in previous episodes what an easy touch I am for a free T-shirt. I have made a habit, over the years, or collecting all manner of "souvenirs" from experiences that will provide me with yet another shirt that I have to stuff into a drawer along with all those other mementos of experiences that are marked not by a photo or a plaque, but a cotton-blend extra large wad of cloth for me to turn inside out each time I wash them and fold neatly when its time to return them to their resting place. 

This describes only part of the problem. I also feel compelled to purchase a "souvenir" from each concert, performance or sporting event I attend. couple these with the previously mentioned "free" shirts and suddenly you find yourself with a storage problem. Last spring I made it a project to sort through my full and overflowing four drawer dresser, of which three were jam packed with all that ephemera. Each one I held up brought a rush of nostalgia. I remember holding on to that as I made my way back to my seat at Oracle Arena. When it was Oracle Arena. Or the ones that are tied to nights that became more memorable as time passed. Like the hemp shirt I purchased on a trip to my hometown, making me a walking advertisement for Magnolia Road Cannabis in Boulder, Colorado. 

I held on to that one. I figured if I ever give up my drug-free lifestyle, I can smoke the shirt. 

Two garbage bags stuffed full were not so lucky. Those are the ones that did not make the cut. There were some jewels in that mix, such as four Bruce Springsteen tour shirts. I kept the ones that had better graphics, and tried to cull out the extremely high volume of black tees in hopes of leaving a wider rainbow for those around me to appreciate. 

When I took them out of the drawer. 

Those bags were carried up the street to our neighborhood clothes and shoes recycling bin. I paused as I closed the lid behind the second one. The hoarder in me winced, but the guy who likes a clean slate sighed in relief. There's only one of me. I can only wear one shirt at a time. I reminded myself of a time a couple years back when I spent an entire month wearing only Springsteen tour shirts. 

No repeats. 

I let them go. 

Not all of them. 

Just enough to be able to open the drawer again. 

Looking Back

 The hardest part was watching the video.

There was a time when our school didn't have security cameras. We lived on our wiles and the hopes that an eyewitness would show up and spill the beans. Now we just roll back the tape. Except there is no tape. Just digital time-stamped video that our principal can access in the case of an incident like last Thursday. 

Two girls decided, in what I am sure they don't appreciate was the most cliche possible choice, to fight one another in the bathroom. A third grader and a fourth grader, whom I am also sure would not be able to fully express the reasons behind their need to come to fisticuffs. Generally speaking, the boys tend to act more impulsively and square off pretty much wherever they might be when their tempers flare. To the tiniest bit of credit for these young ladies, they chose a spot where the security cameras don't see. 

However, what we did witness, with the aid of technological hindsight, was the stream of mostly girls who packed in behind the two adversaries and the gaggle of boys who gathered just outside the door to try and catch a glimpse of what was happening in the little girls room. Not sugar and spice. That is certain. 

Once that was sorted out and cold water was thrown on the conflict by the adults, it was imagined that the fight was over. Nobody won. Everybody lost. 

Until the school day ended.

And the same gaggle of gawkers found another place out of the watchful camera eye: the elevator room downstairs. But, as in the case of the girls room, this didn't keep us from seeing the gaggle streaming down the stairs with wild abandon. They were about to witness what they must have assumed was going to be the fight of the century. 

Except it never happened. Before any of the video evidence was ever examined, the after school program supervisor noticed that a dozen or more of the students in her care had run off. Their trail was not hard to follow, and before any sort of physical violence could take place, grown ups showed up once again to keep the opponents separated. 

Parents were called. A the two potential fighters were sent home with caregivers. The grandmother of the fourth grade girl wondered how she might help. She had some old school ideas, but she was pretty sure her daughter wouldn't want her to mete those out on the youngest generation. 

We were left of the video. And the blood lust on the faces of those kids who were there to egg them on. What do we do about them? 

Do-Over

 If the Orange Worst was chased from the ruins of the White House today, it would take years to scrub off all the nonsense and graffiti he and his brood of underlings have generated over the past ten years. When Joe Biden was in office he spent a great deal of his time with a paint scraper and yes an autopen just to try to mitigate some of the damage done to our great republic. 

If the Second Trumpreich was driven out of Washington via any means necessary, it could take another eight years and a lot of apologies to get ourselves back to anything we might recognize as normal. 

But what if this were the playground, and not in the metaphorical sense? What if the convicted felon was called into the principal's office and told that he needed to make amends for bombing a girls school in Iran. What sort of apology would that require? 

Or how about those rebate checks consumers were supposed to be getting for the ill-advised and illegal tariff scam? Is there any amount of money that might save us all from the gouging we have taken at the grocery store, gas pump and just about everywhere else major credit cards are accepted? 

Who pays back the billion dollars a day that Private Bone Spurs is spending to keep us from paying attention not just to the Trumpstein Files but every other major boondoggle he and his misadministration has dropped on us? Who can bring back Alex Pretti and Renee Good and all the other hostages taken by masked goons in the name of racial purity? 

If anyone out there suggests that Julie Diana Vance might have a hand in reparations, please lower your hand and do some recalculating. 

This whole scheme has worked on the theory that everything that the bloated sack of protoplasm has ever done is brilliant. He is just misunderstood. We will all be told what to think and when, and as far as the principal's office is concerned if that turns out to be the Supreme Court he selected, things could get pretty ugly. 

Fast. 

Simply put, there is no accountability. We, the people, are left to clean up after the worst "president" in our two hundred fifty year experiment in democracy. The truths we had once been told were "self-evident" turn out to be less than that. Rights and assumptions about our freedom can no longer be taken for granted, even though that is precisely what our founding fathers were doing: granting us freedom from despots with a predilection for gilding things. And lining his own pockets. 

On second thought, just skip the apology. It would be like trying to teach a pig to fly. 

I've Got Some Questions

 What's up with my wife's frozen shoulder?

Why does the stereo in our car short out on one side?

Is there a cat food that our cat will eat consistently?

How do I keep the kids at school from tearing up the playhouse we built for them?

Will I have enough saved away to survive retirement?

When will I find the time to fix the basket that holds our toothbrushes off the counter?

Do we really need all those board games?

What am I going to write about today?

These are all questions that should be in the front of my mind as I face each new day. Along with the proper length the grass in my lawn should be just before I mow it, I would much rather be contemplating answers and solutions to these quandaries. 

And many more. 

Instead I find myself preoccupied with these:

What happens if the United States leaves NATO?

What could we possibly gain from trying to take over Cuba?

Why hasn't any American been arrested since Ghislaine Maxwell for the horrors committed by the secret society of pedophiles run by the suspiciously deceased Jeffrey Epstein? 

What will be left of the White House when the Orange Worst is removed from office?

Why worry about school shootings anymore when we seem to have escalated to military strikes on schools?

What will be left of the world when my son and his generation are left with it?

How do I sleep at night?

Actually, I know the answer to that last one. 

Fitfully. 

Refrain

 I'm definitely getting old. I yet to fully embrace my father's weepiness. He used to cry every time he heard Stars and Stripes Forever. Or Amazing Grace. Or a car horn. 

Okay, that last one might be stretching it a bit, but as I grew up in that shadow, I was sometimes embarrassed by those displays of emotion and later I found that I could relate to them quite well. John Philip Sousa doesn't do it for me, but I do get a lump in my throat when I hear The Dropkick Muphys' version of Amazing Grace, and whenever I sing along with Mister Springsteen's Badlands I've got tears in my eyes at the end. 

"It ain't no sin to be glad you're alive."

My wife made a little framed bit of calligraphy that hangs over my desk reminding me of this sentiment. 

Because that's what all of that compressed joy is about. Feeling all the feels and holding on until it bubbles up to the surface. The wife that made me that nice memento will cry at just about any wedding. Reruns of Friends or The Big Bang Theory, it doesn't matter if she's seen them dozens of times before. Have a tissue ready for her. And you'll need a whole box if she goes to the nuptials of a friend or family in person. 

I will also admit that as I fill up with my own memories of fatherhood and domestic bliss, I feel that dam behind my own eyes tested. Looking back and remembering the way we were, or imagining how things might turn our for my son and his posse. They've started to marry off. And have kids of their own. 

In just a few weeks I will be going to see Bruce Springsteen in concert for the (checks notes) kerjillionth time. I will make a point of standing between my wife and my son who will be there with me. In my heart I know that my father will be getting all misty as he watches me sing along with the Boss. 

It ain't no sin to be glad you're alive. 

Awarding

 I understand that while I am calling for us all to rise up that I would pause the struggle for four hours on a Sunday night to stare at a group of folks who can afford to rent a tuxedo to sit in the Dolby Theatre, formerly the Kodak Theatre when movies were shot on "film," and pass out awards for art. 

Yes, I watched all of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences annual Self-Congratulatory Celebration of folks who, for the most part, can afford to buy themselves the Rolex they found in their Swag Bag. My mother raised me this way. She was the first in her little town of Granby, Colorado to read the newest movie magazines when they arrived at her parents' drug store. She sat me down at the foot of her bed late one night to show me something called "King Kong," and my life was aligned with her ever after.  

Throughout the seventies, eighties and nineties, compared notes with my mom as we filled out our Oscar ballots. When I moved to California, there were lengthy phone calls to discuss the way things turned, back when the show originated from the Shrine Auditorium or the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion. Bob Hope and Johnny Carson presided over the festivities and it never occurred to me that with all the horrible things that were happening in the world maybe watching a bunch of stiffs in formalwear take their bows for the performances they had made with the support of hundreds was a waste of time. 

Like the Super Bowl, it became a tent post, an event that marked the passage of another year. When there were "important" movies that had been stamped by the Motion Picture Association such that I would be barred form entry without a parent or guardian, I had a parent who would make sure I didn't miss One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest. Or Blazing Saddles. 

Those were the days of Nixon. And the Energy Crisis. And Inflation. And the Middle East. Those were the days when I was at the movie theatre. Those were the days when I took it as a matter of pride that I had seen all the nominated best pictures. 

And I knew that the world was at a tipping point. Taking those hours away from worrying about Armageddon didn't seem like a bad choice. In fact, it made the whole mess just a little easier to take. When it was time to hand out golden statues for recognition of the stories being told on those silver screens, I was there.

I still am. There was some mild vindication in seeing One Battle After Another win the big prize. The revolution may not be televised, but at least I got to see it on the big screen. 

Not Me

 This is a story about a little orange hen.

The little orange hen lives in the ruins of the Big White House. He works hard all day long: He Plays golf. He looks for worms. He sits in a bush. And sometimes… He lays an egg.

The little orange hen has three friends: a cat, a dog, and a horse. These animals don’t work hard at all.

The cat likes to run his government and maintain alliances. The dog likes to maintain alliances and run his government. And the horse likes to Stay in touch with the country he governs and watch out for global threats. 

One day the little red hen sees what he believes to be a holy war.
“Holy War!” he squeals. “Yum yum yum! We can make a Holy War!”

The little orange hen runs to tell his friends.
“Guys! There's a Holy War over there! I can take the minds of all the voters off all my crimes!”

The dog drools. “No!!”
The cat licks her lips. “Absolutely not!”
The horse flicks his tail.  “What a terrible idea!”

“So… who wants to help me in this Holy War?” asks the little orange hen.

“Not me,” says the dog, “I’m too busy.”
“Not me,” says the cat, “I’m too tired.”
“Not me,” says the horse, “I’m watching TV.”

“Then I will do it myself,” says the little orange hen. So he launches the missiles, one by one, all by himself. 

“Ok, now we need more missiles, and guns, and tanks, and troops,” says the little orange hen. “Who wants to help me get them?”

“Not me,” says the dog, “I’m too busy.”
“Not me,” says the cat, “I’m too tired.”
“Not me,” says the horse, “I’m watching TV.”

“Then I will do it myself,” says the little orange hen. He goes all the way to the cabinet and gets the missiles, and guns. She goes all the way to the Pentagon and gets the tanks, and troops. 

Then he forgets to ask Congress, all by himself. 

“Who wants to help me blow up the girls school?” asks the little orange hen. 

‍“Not me,” says the dog, “I’m too busy.”
“Not me,” says the cat, “I’m too tired.”
“Not me,” says the horse, “I’m watching TV.”

“Then I will do it myself!” says the little orange hen. He pushes the button until hundreds of civilians are dead. Then he gently reminds us all that in war people die. 

He goes golfing.. Then he hosts a big dance party.  All by himself. 

(Tick tock, tick tock)
Soon there are flag-draped coffins coming from the war zone.. The dog can smell it. The cat can smell it. The horse can smell it too. They all rush to what's left of the White House. 

The little orange hen pulls a baseball hat with gold letters on it. He looks serious and sad. 

“So… Who wants to help me with this Holy War?” asks the little Orange hen.

“Not Me!” says the dog. 
“Not Me!”  says the cat. 
“Not Me!” says the horse. 

“I didn't think so,” says the little orange hen. “You would not help me make this war…  so you should have to help me fight it.” 

He runs away with the stolen Nobel Peace Prize and goes golfing. All by himself. 

I Saw It On TV

 When we elected a former game show host to the highest office in the land, it was only a matter of time before he started asking other TV personalities to come along in the clown car we call the Second Trumpreich. 

There was a time when Jeanine Pirro was referred to as a "former prosecutor and judge." These days she is called a "former Fox news personality."

And what a personality she is. 

When District Court Chief Judge James Boasberg tossed out the subpoenas Judge Jeanine had sent to Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell she had what my mother would have referred to as "a hissy fit." 

The current Attorney General for Washington DC, Ms. Pirro, insisted that the judge's ruling, “has neutered the grand jury’s ability to investigate crime. As a result, Jerome Powell today is now bathed in immunity, preventing my office from investigating the Federal Reserve. This is wrong, and it is without legal authority.”

A government official "bathed in immunity." That's an interesting metaphor. Mayhaps a bit of projection on her boss? 

She finished the press conference by screaming at reporters who were there to do their job: asking questions. “Oh cut it out, do you know how many convictions we’ve—cut it out!,” she yelled. “You’re in one lane! We have cleaned up this city.” With the possible exception of the convicted felon and war criminal who is currently tearing down the White House. 

And those in his cabinet. 

Like another "former Fox News personality," Pistol Pete Hegseth. He was once referred to as Major. Now he's playing Secretary of War on televisions across our country and is in charge of blowing up Iran. His insistence on "Peace through strength" can be distilled down to its essence, "Peace through war." And all he asks is that we follow him on a crusade to the Holy Land and kill the infidels. Just don't question him. 

Of course this all began when we let a former slumlord and bankrupt casino owner trick us into believing that he was a great businessman and he could teach us a thing or two about business via a "reality" show on TV. It was a short hop from there to the Oval Office where he now issues edicts such as the following: “We have unmatched firepower, unlimited ammunition, and plenty of time. Watch what happens today to these sick and low-life individuals. They have been killing innocent people around the world for 47 years, and now I, as the 47th President of the United States, am killing them. What a great honor it is for me to do this!”

As governance goes, I suppose it makes great TV. As real life goes, they should be locked up. I am looking forward to seeing that. 

All We Are Saying...

 My wife was relating a story to me about her past: She remembers sitting in her elementary school cafeteria with her classmates when suddenly one of them stood up and announced that it was his birthday. "And I can't imagine a better present: the war is over."

The conflict he was addressing was the Vietnam War. 

This anecdote came to me on the heels of my wife asking me if "things" were affecting the kids at my school. The school where I teach. The "things" were the stateside reaction to a war that is taking place half a world away. 

It happened that she was asking on the morning after a particularly trying day in which several of our young charges had missed the mark of expected behaviors in and around school. What we were expecting was scholarly behavior. Safe, Champion, Helpful, Original, Loving, Awesome, Respectful. The near-fight on the basketball court came to mind. The stomping and cursing from the fourth grade class whose field trip had been rescheduled at the last minute. The third graders who took their chance to go on a field trip and embarrassed their class and teacher with behavior best described as "off the hook." 

Would any or all of that taken place on any given day at our educational oasis in East Oakland? Possibly. But tracking the range and severity of episodes, it occurred to me that I am teaching a generation that has never lived on a peaceful planet. The looming specter of terrorism is one that I am certain that the kids I teach do not consider for a heartbeat. The World Trade Center came down a quarter of a century ago. These kids have never been to the airport without going through a metal detector. They have been on a heightened state of alert since before they were born. 

And now the guy who has made war on his own country is taking his show on the road. This didn't stop the deportations and the protests. It just gave us all something to fear while we should be busy being afraid of fear itself. 

I remember hearing those patriotic tales of my mother's youth, during the Second World War. Scrap drives and sending care packages to soldiers fighting across the sea. This is the same woman who told her oldest son that she would ride with him on his motorcycle to Canada if the draft came looking for him. 

Happily, the kid in the cafeteria where my wife sat more than fifty years ago got what he wanted for his birthday. 

Ignore Alien Orders

 At some point, it is incumbent for all of us to do the things that will save our country from falling into ruin. 

Making memes to encourage all those people who already agree with you to release the Trumpstein Files will probably not be enough. 

Talking loudly about how there is such a thing as the Twenty-fifth Amendment will not be sufficient. 

Pointing and laughing should no longer be the actions that carry the day. 

We have passed too many mile markers on the road to chaos. 

The time has come for us to start looking at those who are in charge and start weeding out the weeds from the not-weeds. Agreeing with me is great, but what are we the people willing to do to ensure that a government by the people and for the people does not perish from this earth. 

I have taken my modest form of the fight to those elected officials whose job it is to change the metrics of our nation. When there are kinks in the hose, or when that hose that used to exist ceases to exist metaphorically, I take it as a personal attack. I have started sending more and more emails to the folks who represent me and my concerns in Congress. 

Being a squeaky wheel is probably not going to be sufficient. Showing up quarterly with cleverly worded signs to insist that we are a nation without kings may not be enough. Acts of protest that let the powers that be know that they aren't really the powers after all become more pressing. 

Vote. 

I sat in a classroom at the end of a long day and listened to a group of my co-workers confess that they did not vote in the last election. Their reasoning was based on a somewhat prevalent  notion that Kamala Harris was "just as bad" as Donald Juliet Trump. These folks insist that we would be in the precise situation that we find ourselves in had there been a different outcome to the 2024 election. I pressed a little to check to see if any of them had voted on California's recent re-districting plan. 

I followed that thread to ask them if there was anything that would get them off the couch to put their ballot in the mail. 

How about someone telling you that it should be more difficult to vote? Or that only certain folks should be allowed to vote? "Is that what they're saying?" came the moderately confused response. 

Use it or lose it. Question authority. We don't need to make America great again. We need to make America ours again. 

Terror At Thirty-Five Thousand Feet

 So here's an interesting situation: With a war going on that costs a ballpark figure of one billion dollars a day and the Department of Homeland Security currently shut down due to (checks notes) the former director having sex with her deputy on the plane she needed to (checks notes again) have sex with her deputy, over three hundred TSA agents have quit. 

This means that lines at the airport have gotten longer to get through security to take flights to places that can still be considered "safe" for Americans to travel. It also means that the potential for someone's underwear or shoes or oversize bottle of shampoo slipping through the safety net we put in place the last time that things blew up here in our country. 

But you can rest easy, America, because the only president to be impeached twice is on the case. When asked if US citizens should worry about attacks from Iran on our soil, he replied, "I guess." 

Meanwhile, the term "sleeper cells" returned to our lexicon. Local police are now wondering just what sort of help they might receive when foreign agents suddenly spring to action like hydra's teeth to commit terrorist plots in and around your neighborhood. 

Sorry. 

Was that scary? 

It was meant to be. One of the ballyhooed reasons for us to go and stir up the hornets' nest that is Iran is because they are the number one sponsor of state terrorism in the world. They're kind of like the Dark Side of the Moon of terrorism. To paraphrase the nuns whose job it was to watch over Julie Andrews in Sound of Music, how do we deal with a problem like Iran? 

I'm not guessing that blowing up their leaders and killing a school full of little girls was in everyone's playbook. All of this must be written down somewhere in Project 2026. In crayon. Right after, "buy a nice plane or ICE Barbie to get her Mile High Club merit badge."

Gang Agley

 Hector was in the tenth grade. He has a one year old baby, living with his girlfriend and her mother. 

A while back, Hector was our challenge. In elementary school, we negotiated and reminded and encouraged and at times spoke harshly to him. We reminded Hector that he was someone's big brother and his younger siblings were watching him for clues about how to manage his deportment. At that time, keeping him in class was the challenge. Hector had a tendency to simply walk out of the classroom when the mood struck him. School work did not captivate him. As is the case for many of our young scholars, Hector's skills had not risen along with his progress through the grades. 

Rather than slowing down and accepting the help that was available to him, Hector pressed on and made his frustration everyone else's. 

At the outset, I mentioned that Hector was in tenth grade. He is no longer enrolled. Not in public education. Another system has him now. 

Hector will be serving three years for crimes he committed. His baby boy won't see him until he is just about ready to start Kindergarten. 

If he is allowed any contact with him at all. 

Part of me pines for the days when tearing up a bulletin board or eloping from class after recess was the biggest challenge in Hector's life. Is there something we all might have done differently to break the cycle before it repeated? 

Part of me sighs and takes stock of all the successes that I have witnessed before and since Hector. 

Hector's little sister is finishing up fifth grade this spring. Many of the challenges Hector has encountered are there for her as well. Add to those she has an older brother who is locked up for the next three years. We will do our best to set her on a course that will bring her more opportunities, more chances to succeed. 

We can provide all the support we can, and then we watch as they head off on the path they choose. 

The future is out there. 

And it can be terrifying. 

Worst

 “I guess the worst case would be we do this, and then somebody takes over who’s as bad as the previous person, right? That could happen. We don’t want that to happen.”

This is how the orange felon responded when the press asked him for what he believed would be the worst-case scenario in Iran would be. 

Over the weekend, Iran selected fifty-six-year-old Mojtaba Khamenei to be its new supreme leader. If that name looks a little familiar, it's probably because he is the son of that "previous person." 

Oops. 

What do you suppose the chances are that the son of the man the United States murdered will come to this conflict with open eyes and a clear head? Heck, if he had a spare Nobel Peace Prize sitting around, he might even offer it up as a token of his newfound respect and admiration for the guy who invaded his country. 

And we might see oil being sold for less than one hundred dollars a barrel in the next week. 

"We will be greeted as liberators," insisted the late "Dick" Cheney while introducing the 2003 invasion of Iraq. This proved to be a slight miscalculation. One that kept us there for nearly nine years, "liberating" a country that seemed less than interested in our "liberation." 

This is the portion of today's entry in which we point out that not a single arrest has been made as a result of the Trumpstein Files being released. Not here in the United States, anyway. Meanwhile, bodies have begun to return to these shores after having paid the ultimate price for the pedo-in-chief's fear of being "found out." 

I'll just go ahead and add that to the worst-case scenario. 

What's That Spell?

 It was a Sunday morning on the campus of the University of Colorado. Across the street from the football stadium, services were beginning at the Lutheran church. Inside the football stadium, a full day of rock and roll was on tap. May 1, 1977 the headliner was Fleetwood Mac, with support acts that included Bob Seger and the Silver Bullet Band and Boulder's own Firefall. John Sebastian, former leader of the Lovin' Spoonful was slated to open the show with his autoharp and his theme from Welcome Back Kotter. Mister Sebastian who was already the object of much angst simply because he stood on a stage that would eventually be full of rock legends Fleetwood Mac antagonized the crowd still further by referring to the crowd as a group as being from Denver, some thirty miles down the turnpike. 

But before all of that excess unfolded, the promoters ran a special guest out on the stage: Country Joe McDonald. Joe was there ostensibly as a link to the days of Woodstock, and he proceeded to unleash a very loud and enthusiastic version of The Fish Cheer into the Sunday morning air. "Give me an F," he shouted, "Give me a U!" And suddenly we knew we weren't spelling out FISH. When we finished with the fourth letter he asked, "What's that spell?" Into that bright Colorado sky sixty thousand of us yelled the answer. Joe asked us again, "What's that spell?" Obligated as we were, the crowd screamed back in response. Once more for good measure, "What's that spell?" I know that every member of that Lutheran Church heard exactly what that spelled as Joe unleashed the rest of the song. 

Yeah, come on all of you, big strong men
Uncle Sam needs your help again
He's got himself in a terrible jam
Way down yonder in Vietnam
So put down your books, pick up a gun
Gonna have a whole lot of fun

Suddenly we were connected up to the thousands who filled Max Yasgur's fields back in August of 1969. Vietnam was over, but the cold war raged on, and the neo-hippies in the crowd felt the vibe. 

Come on fathers don't hesitate
Send them off before it's too late
Be the first one on your block
To have your boy come home in a box

I have been to a lot of rock shows since that Sunday morning, but this was something special. Country Joe went to that big stadium in the sky this past weekend. His musical contributions may have been slim, but they were powerful, and he stomped on the Terra. I will think of him every time I pass a Lutheran Church. 

Amen. 

More Of The Same

 I know: We're supposed to believe that all this mess is a distraction from the Epstein Files.

"All this" being the seemingly endless stream of Wrong that is the governance of the United States. 

The suggestion that the "president" of the United States is attempting to cover up the fact that he is a pedophile is almost certainly becoming a non-starter. Not that the victims of all of the convicted felon's previous crimes don't deserve air, but the list of crimes has done nothing but grow since he took over for his father the slumlord back in 1971. Ten years after that, he bought a fourteen-story building on prime real estate facing New York City’s Central Park. His plan was to tear down the building and replace it with luxury condos. But first he needed to get the small band of rent-stabilized tenants out of there. They reported that he cut off heat and hot water, and even proposed sheltering homeless people in the building. That didn't happen, but the rat infestation was real. 

Eight years later, he took out a full-page ad in Newsday calling for the so-called Central Park Five to be executed for their alleged crimes. Never mind that the teenagers were convicted via coerced confessions but eventually exonerated after spending years in prison. Nor the fact that New York did not at the time have a death penalty, but these black and latino boys needed to die for the crimes they didn't commit. 

Fast forward to this past week when his (checks notes) third wife wanted the world to know that the man who had an affair with a porn star just after the star of the documentary Melania had given birth to their son, "He would like to have a country where all of the people can walk down the street and not be harassed or murdered, or women raped." As for the harassment and rape, let's take a peek at fifty years of harassment and rape brought to you by none other than the husband of (checks notes) the same guy who would like to have a country where all of the people can walk down the street and not be harasses or murdered. Or raped. Like the former game-show host's first wife who testified in divorce proceedings that her soon-to-be ex-husband raped her. 

Now he's graduated to blowing up school children. He's moved right on past the harassment and rape and moved straight on to murder. 

Distracted? 

Nope. 

Just more of the same. 

Too Many Puppies

 The easy chop was "Ding dong, the witch is dead."

Except she's not. Kristi the puppy killer wasn't fired. She was transferred. This was not the fate Renee Good or Alex Pretti experienced. Kristi "With an I" was sentenced to a new post as Special Envoy to The Shield of the Americas. Her focus will be on implementing the Donroe Doctrine, a wholly imaginary policy from the enfeebled mind of the Orange Felon who felt the need to shuffle the once and future ICE Barbie off to a cushy job out of the public eye where her cosplay could be limited to whatever it is that envoys wear. Whatever happened to "you're fired?" 

Cricket was executed for the crime of being "untrainable."

Meanwhile, the dysfunctional Department of Homeland Security will most certainly have their hands full with what will most certainly be an influx of possible terrorist activity exacerbated by the intentional stirring of the hornets' nest we call the middle east. The current response from what's left of the White House when asked if we should worry about an attack on American soil: "I guess." 

Because two words has never been sufficient to fully explore the depth of his stupidity, the former game show host continued: "But I think they're worried about that all the time. We think about it all the time. we think about it all the time. We plan for it. But yeah, you know, we expect some things. Like I said, some people will die. When you go to war, some people will die."

And as nonchalant as that response might have been, Pete "The Pistol" Hegseth got his knickers in a twist when the initial U.S. casualties from Operation Epstein Fury were announced: “When a few drones get through or tragic things happen, it’s front page news. I get it. The press only wants to make the president look bad. But try for once to report the reality. The terms of this war will be set by us at every step.”

Stupid news. 

Stupid protesters. 

Stupid puppies. 

Ding dong. 

How The Mighty Have Fallen

 Britney Spears was arrested for DUI in California. 

At first glance, this story might seem like a real puff piece. A bit of click bait to start the morning, but I am here to tell you that I believe it is part of a larger conspiracy. 

Having found no real way to circumvent the public's fervent and voracious interest in the contents of the Trumpstein Files, this administration has set about kidnapping its own citizens off the streets. They have shot innocent bystanders in the process of their ethnic cleansing agenda. They have abducted the president of another country via a military operation and declared that he stand trial as the oil reserves of that country become ours because of the tried and true Art of War strategy, "Invaders keepers, losers weepers." They have gone to war with a Middle Eastern country for the purpose of destroying their nuclear capabilities that were supposedly destroyed the last time we were blowing things up with very expensive bombs. Oh, and we managed to kill the president of that country too without the flourish of flying him to New York in chains to stand trial for some sort of drug-related charge shortly after another South American president was pardoned by the same bright orange idjit that didn't want us looking at the Trumpstein Files because the adjudicated rapist has so very much left to hide. 

And let's not forget the destruction of one third of The People's House in order to construct Barbie's Dream Ballroom, complete with hot and cold running irony that no one there will notice. 

But let's get back to Britney. Having recently sold her music catalogue, estimated to be worth between two hundred million dollars, Ms. Spears was out doing what any forty-four year old with money to burn does after ending a thirteen year-long conservatorship that had kept her constrained from doing things like (checks notes) selling her music catalog and shaving her head. Then she did something really awful. 

She deleted her Instagram account. 

How can we possibly keep track of all Britney's scandalous life choices? 

Wait for it. 

She's probably in the Trumpstein Files.

Everything

 In my tales of the workplace, I have spent perhaps an inordinate amount of time discussing my experience as a purveyor of sliced "roast beef" sandwiches clad in brown polyester. Not the kind of attention my career as an elementary school has garnered, but you might imagine that I spent a decade there. 

Not even. 

But I do carry a scar from that tour of duty. 

The scars I carry from working on the loading dock of Target are all internal. A few days back I felt that emotional tissue tingle just a bit when I read the headline: "Target shifts away from being an 'everything store.'" Quelle surprise! As a grown up, my wife and I have a habit of making a date out of our trips to what we had believed was "an everything store."

Not anymore. 

Quelle damage.

Where might I have gotten this impression? 

Perhaps from those nights I spent in my youth in the back room of my local Target, unloading forty foot trailers. We took merchandise off the trucks and organized them according to the department that each item belonged. Housewares. Toys. Hardware. Automotive. Electronics. And so forth. Sometimes we would run across a something that defied categorization. This gave us on the crew a moment of consideration before one of us would say, "Notions." We had a pallet for "Notions." And if we filled it up, we would get a pallet jack and drag it off into the cavernous warehouse to be set aside for whenever we run out of "Notions." Then it would be the job of someone else with a red vest, which would distinguish them from the urchins in the back room unloading the trucks, to deliver those items to the shelves in that mystical realm located somewhere in the store. 

Somewhere. 

I knew where Garden was. I knew where Electronics was located. 

Notions? That was the place where Everything was unloaded. Did you need a desk organizer? Look for it in Notions. What about those felt pads that you stick on the bottom of your chair legs to keep them from scuffing the floor? That's a Notion. 

And that's why you go to Target. Because Target is not just an Everything Store. It's a Notion Store. 

And that's Everything to me. 

Back Nine

 "Sir, are you sure?"

"Yes, I want the nine."

"Well, okay. But that's not exactly what I was asking about."

"Ah, thank you. The big nine." 

"I was talking more about playing golf, you know, after the thing."

"What thing?"

"With Iran."

"Oh that thing. Stand back now. I've got quite a back swing."

“If I didn’t terminate Obama’s horrendous Iran Nuclear Deal, Iran would have had a Nuclear Weapon three years ago. That was the most dangerous transaction we have ever entered into, and had it been allowed to stand, the World would be an entirely different place right now. You can blame Barack Hussein Obama, and Sleepy Joe Biden.”

"Well, sir, if I may: Some of our servicemen are dead."

"What do you think that is, about forty yards?"

"I'm wondering if seeing the President out on the golf course the day after he sends our military into harm's way..."

"Whose military?"

"Sorry sir. Sorry. Your military."

“The Radical Left Democrats, a Party that has completely lost its way, are complaining bitterly about the very necessary and important attack, by the United States and Israel, on Iran. What most people understand is that they are only complaining BECAUSE I DID IT and, if I didn’t do it, they would be screaming — Why didn’t ‘TRUMP’ attack Iran, he should do it, IMMEDIATELY? Do you think the breeze is from the north?"

"I think it's coming from the Middle East."

"How's that?"

"Nothing."

"Look son, some people are going to have to give up their lives. That's just the way it is."

"Yes sir."

“Sleepy Joe Biden spent all of his time, and our Country’s money, GIVING everything to P.T. Barnum (Zelenskyy!) of Ukraine - Hundreds of Billions of Dollars worth - And, while he gave so much of the super high end away (FREE!), he didn’t bother to replace it. Fortunately, I rebuilt the military in my first term, and continue to do so. The United States is stocked, and ready to WIN, BIG!!!”

"Of course, sir."

"And did you see the drapes I picked out?"

"Drapes?"

"For the ballroom." 

"No."

"No?"

"No sir."

"Alright then. Forty yards t the cup. I should be able to knock this in and still get back to the club in time to watch Real Housewives."

"Yes."

"What's that?"

"Yes sir." 

Optics Ad Infinitum

 When a convicted felon announces from a perch safely hidden within the cavernous Xanadu of his own golf club that, “Sadly, there will likely be more before it ends. That’s the way it is. Likely to be more. But we’ll do everything possible where that won’t be the case,” we have passed the point of no return. 

He can only say this ice cold drivel if someone out there is listening. And believing. 

When an adjudicated rapist can tell anyone who wants to listen that he has been "completely exonerated" of charges connected to the sex trafficking ring that his good friend Jeffrey Epstein ran for decades, he is speaking to the faithful. 

That's not faith in anything in heaven's creation. It comes from someplace much darker. 

The Orange Worst is counting on there being still another place he can take his rabble where they can't hear the voice of reason. The voice of diplomacy. The voice of peace. There can be no regrets in his army of lemmings. Forward into the abyss. 

What are the alternatives? I spent the weekend contacting my elected representatives. I continue to talk to anyone who will listen, including you dear reader, of the existential threat being poised by this one man. There is no right left in this administration. It contains only rage and fear. That is the fuel that keeps him awake and alive. Let that noxious gas out of the balloon that he inhabits and you would be left with nothing. No apologies. No regrets. 

He will stand in front of a group of people looking for relief from the strain of living their lives here in the country he nominally controls, and he can give them only more fear and rage. Blame for everyone and everything that he has brought on. All by himself. 

A man who dodged serving his country and promoted himself as "the peace president" is sending Americans into war with the assurance that there will be more because, "that's the way it is." 

I implore you not to accept this. It is not the way it is outside of his deranged myopathy. The world is waiting for this to end. 

Sooner. 

Not later. 

What's Going On?

 Coming out of the tunnel that was my union's negotiations with our school district, relieved to not having to walk a picket line in order to receive a raise that will essentially keep up with the cost of living over the next two years, I find the sound of gears out of alignment keeping me awake. 

What is causing that irritating noise? The sound of the Pentagon, the newly minted "Department of War" scurrying about trying to figure out how to spend the additional five hundred billion dollars that the head of the Trump Crime Family has demanded for its upcoming budget. This goes on top of a trillion dollars already earmarked for the purchase of guns and bombs. 

Make no mistake: These guns and bombs are no longer being used in our "defense." These purchases are for weapons of war, which is precisely why some one hundred million dollars was spent on websites and documentation for the name change. 

That and to satisfy the blood lust of a group of people who wouldn't know actual war if it landed on their heads and started to wiggle. This is a cabal of individuals clustered together to support the ego and lies of one person. They are tasked with creating enough noise to drown out all the other distractions from uncovering the convicted felon for exactly what he is: A charlatan sociopath with delusions of grandeur. 

And we get stuck paying the bill. 

I contacted both my senators and my congressperson to let them know that I consider it the highest priority for them to stop this illegal war and to remove this snake-oil salesman from office. I would encourage you all to do the same. I still cling to the belief that there are more than enough sane Americans left to turn this ship around before it becomes an uninhabitable hellscape, regardless of the pittance offered up by the powers that be to keep us on our knees. 

I want free elections. I want peace. I want to let freedom ring. 

The Price Of Peace

 My wife insists that all responsible journalists should stop using the tag "said" when printing quotes from the Orange Worst. Instead, use a universal replace with the word, "lied." 

Like all that talk about peace. The Boared/Bored of Peace requires all permanent members contribute one billion dollars in cash in the first year of their enrollment. Argentina, Armenia, Azerbaijan,Bahrain, Bulgaria, El Salvador, Hungary, Indonesia, Israel, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kosovo, Mongolia, Morocco, Pakistan, Paraguay, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, United Arab Emirates, United States, and Uzbekistan have all poinied up that big wad of cash to be part of what is supposed to be promoting global stability, restore governance, and secure peace in conflict-affected areas. Like Gaza, a place the convicted felon and adjudicated rapist once hoped to turn into "The Riviera of the Middle East." Fellow real estate developer and son-in-law Jared Kushner sits at the top of the organizational chart for this Bored, so the chances are good that there will be a championship golf course installed, aided by the countless numbers of shell craters created by the three years of nearly incessant bombing of the area. 

You may notice that there are a number of countries missing from that list, partly because they can't afford the membership fee because they are currently under attack from other invading nations. Like Ukraine. And Greenland. And Veneauela. And Iran. Those last two are "our bad," since the peace that those countries might be enjoying was disrupted by (checks notes) The Trumpstein Regime. 

The suggestion that the former game show host and owner of four bankrupt casinos will be up to the task of promoting any sort of stability seems like a stretch if not a bald faced lie. The nominal purpose of the most recent attacks directed by the Chairman of the Board of Peace was to re-obliterate the nuclear capabilities of Iran, but also managed to target key member's of that nation's leadership. Not for capture and return to the United States for trial like we did for Nicolas Maduro, but the not-so-subtle attempt of regime change via high explosives. Meanwhile, Board of Peace member Pakistan called for the U.S. attacks to stop and ”an immediate halt to escalation through urgent resumption of diplomacy to achieve a peaceful, negotiated resolution to the crisis.” Russia also took time out of their invasion of sovereign nation Ukraine to complain about the United States' invasion of a sovereign nation. 

There was no immediate response from the guy who pulled the trigger and/or the Chariman of the Bored. 

That's what a billion dollars will get you these days. 

Tent To The Ively

 At three in the morning on what was essentially the last day of negotiations before the Oakland Education Association went on strike, a tentative agreement was reached. The rank and file, myself included, breathed a sigh of relief. Yet another in a series of battles for the right to provide education to the public school students of Oakland was won. 

"Won." 

With all the asterisks that come with a beast we call "tentative." Signing on to be a part of this machine, showing up every day and providing services to the community that stretch far beyond my job description provides me the security that can be best described as "tentative." The Oakland Unified School District is not sending a car for me each and every morning to drive me to the work I do, and my salary is determined primarily as an operation of things for which I have no active impact on with the possible exception of simply showing up. Every single day. 

I will be receiving an eleven percent raise, over the course of two years. I won't probably see the whole thing since I have plans to retire before those two years are up. But it's a nice bit of news as I head off into the sunset. 

It tends to displace a bit of the trauma experienced by the announcement just a couple days before the "tentative" agreement that the district will be laying off four hundred twenty-one people in order to close the one hundred million dollar budget deficit they find themselves with. Noting that none of the positions eliminated were School Board officials. One hundred forty-four additional positions will have their hours cut. 

To save money.

To give me a raise.

This comes somewhere in the midst of an additional flurry to get as many folks in the district to retire early. I don't claim to be an expert at labor relations, but something about all of this leaves me feeling like I'm running to stand still. 

And maybe the best part of this whole transaction is that I will most likely avoid walking a picket line one more time before I actually do stand still. 

Tentatively. 

We're Watching

 Several people were involved in the invention of the microphone. Initially it was developed by Alexander Graham Bell to make his telephone more useful. That was back in 1876. A year or so later, Emile Berliner sold his patent to a more refined version of the device to Bell. Another year passed and David Edward Hughes continued to improve on these initial designs, and coined the term "microphone." Thomas Edison, who didn't allow science to move too far without putting his stamp on a carbon button transmitter that became the standard for telephony. That was back in 1886. One hundred forty-years ago. 

Video cameras began their existence as movie cameras beginning shortly after those microphone inventions. A funny science joke might be made here about how this was a case of sound traveling faster than light, but I won't bother you with that now. Instead I will let you know that those first moving picture cameras were created to capture events as they happened in "real time." The Lumiere brothers produced the first black and white document of this kind in 1895, and clocked in at forty-six seconds. It showed workers leaving the brothers' factory. It was about the length of your standard TikTok video. 

In 1895, a seventeen second film of a man playing a violin was released with sound. The first music video, brought to you by William K.L. Dickson. Practical video tape recorders were still some decades off, with the creation of the Quadruplex, created by Ampex back in 1956. 

Seventy years ago. Sound and vision.

These days, we don't need tape or film anymore. We carry around more computing power in our pockets than was used to land astronauts on the moon. Things are being recorded all the time by everyone. And left on the vast storehouse of Al Gore's Internet. 

I just thought Donald Trump should know this, since he seems to believe that nobody can remember all his lies. That's what all those lights and cameras and microphones are for, you microcephalic jerk.  

How 'Bout Them Eggs?

 Watching an interview with author A. Mechelle Dickerson on The Daily Show a few nights ago, something that was discussed stuck with me: the idea of having us all down here in the middle looking to the left and right with an eye on who is getting what and why aren't we getting the same as them. We don't tend to look up. Up there are the ones who are content to keep us fighting for scraps. They would much rather have us a scattered rabble arguing amongst ourselves about the price of eggs while up there (insert gesture here) they have plenty of eggs. Ironically enough, they who are "up there" are often given eggs in the hopes that they will recommend the eggs to those "down there" so that more eggs can be sold.

It's not about the eggs, as it turns out. 

My wife was intrigued by the number of stars being offered travel shows, with destinations that we who are in the middle will likely never see. I pointed out the frustration I sometimes feel about these excursions, since these celebrities are being paid to take these lavish expeditions while we are left at home hoping that we can afford the subscription fee it costs to watch their exploits. 

Sometimes they are served eggs on these shows. In very special ways at which we can only marvel. 

It's still not about the eggs. 

It's about working a job for decades and hoping that negotiations with the school district allow us a raise that keeps us on pace with the cost of living. In California. 

Right. Good luck with that. 

And yet, here we are once again having testy debates with a school district that struggles to pay its bills while the Second Trumpreich "struggles" to find ways to spend five hundred billion additional dollars on war. 

Five hundred billion dollars would buy a lot of eggs. 

And they all seem to have a way of finding their way up instead of spread out like you might expect eggs to do. 

Once again ladies and gentlemen: It's not about the eggs. 

Great Expectations

 Betty White was very close to one hundred years old when she died. Just another couple weeks longer, and she would have made it to a century. The comedy legend passed away on New Year's Eve 2021. Her birthday was January 17. There was quite a bit of hoopla leading up to what became essentially a non-event. Please understand that I mean this as no slight to Ms. White. I remember watching her on Password with her husband, host Allen Ludden. They were quite the pair. Allen went to that big TV studio in the sky in 1981, and in all those years after Betty never remarried. 

But she didn't last until one hundred. Bob Hope did. So did George Burns. And, as comedian Bobcat Goldthwait once observed, they kept getting funnier every minute. Mister Bobcat meant that sarcastically, but the argument might be made that Betty White experienced a renaissance in her career as she grew older, rather than simply riding on the wave that is, "Really? Almost one hundred?" Her last film role was the voice of the owner of the eponymous animated dog, Trouble, in 2019. 

I could go on and on here, but I am actually creeping toward a potentially larger point. There were those who believed that these United States might not last until its one hundredth birthday. Happily, the skeptics were wrong, admitting the great state of Colorado to that union in 1876, marking it as The Centennial State. A hundred years after that, even as the wounds of Watergate and the war in Vietnam were still healing, America celebrated its two hundredth anniversary with parades and celebrations and collectible quarters which are now worth (checks notes) twenty-five cents. 

And now we find ourselves on the brink of our semiquincentennial, a word that had to be cobbled together to pump up the importance of the pending event. Two hundred fifty years is quite a run: two and a half Betty Whites. Here's the thing: Wouldn't it be awful if we didn't manage to hang on that long? A catastrophic event of some stripe that brought about the end of our great republic? The loss in swag sales alone would be devastating, while the great nations of Europe might cough and say something along the lines of, "What a pity. And so young." 

World War. Economic Collapse. Civil War. These were the kind of scenarios that used to be the stuff of dystopian science fiction novels. Now they're all on the board as we teeter toward our two hundred fiftieth birthday. 

Or maybe we'll just die peacefully in our sleep after a prolonged Trump. 

Reckoning

 I want to reiterate my stance here and now before I begin my tirade: No one deserves to be shot. I am firm in this belief much in the same way that I am a supporter of this thing called Restorative Justice. All of the loopholes like the "Stand Your Ground" laws found in some states, including the one in which I live, No one should have to die. 

Now I hear a voice from my past, the one that shouted in my ear insisting that if someone raped and murdered my mother I would surely be locked and loaded for that individual. A pause, a deep breath, and then the question that I did not ask at that time in response, "Why would you even think of this as some kind of litmus?" Like the sickest possible version of "Never Have I Ever," a co-worker of mine whose politics skewed several degrees to the right of my own seemed to take a certain degree of pleasure mining my resolve. Eventually I replied that I would hope and expect that as difficult as that situation would be that I would rise above my simian urges for revenge and instead seek out a resolution that didn't involve taking one more life. As a matter of fact, I'm pretty sure that my mother would back me up on that. 

So the stage is set. Now I will say that I can understand why the current resident of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue has had as many attempts made on his life as he has. This past weekend a young man carrying a gas can and a shotgun attempted entry into the "Southern White House" and was shot and killed by Secret Service Agents. This brings the alleged attempts on the convicted felon's life to three in the course of less than two years. While my disapproval jives pretty consistently with the poll numbers found  in and around this great land of ours. I will say that the white guy with a gun model hasn't done much to conflate the images put out by the twice impeached "president's" handlers of Antifa assassins coming to assassinate the last best hope of making 'merica great again. 

As a a matter fact, the current occupant of the ruins of the White House has been the target of more assassination attempts than any other previous chief executive of the United States, especially when you include the envelopes of ricin sent along in that first term. It does seem as though there are quite a few people who would like the former game show host dead. 

Again, I cannot stress this enough, no one deserves to die. That is not up to us as mere mortals. The reckoning awaits, not from those with access to guns and ammo, but to a ballot. 

But more on that later...

In Charge

 I've been in charge a few times. 

I was pep band president when I was in high school. Much of my orchestrated tomfoolery became legend, at least for a compact group of individuals. Eventually all that anarchic energy proved to be my undoing. As it turns out, being the authority in an anti-authoritarian group is a pretty tight rope to walk. 

I climbed the ladder at Arby's all the way to closing manager. They gave me the keys to the register and a nice brown polyester vest. I enjoyed it as much as I suppose anyone could enjoy a job in fast food, and my managerial style was modeled on which I saw around me. Roast beef sandwiches with a side of silliness and never ask anyone to do a job, even cleaning the shake machine, if you haven't done it yourself. I came back from a week's vacation just as the old guard was being phased out, and a quick perusal of the back room showed me two things: I was not on the schedule for the next two weeks and all the amusing/gross cartoons I had drawn and tacked up around the bulletin boards had been removed. Aloha, Arby's. 

Eventually I found my way to a video store, a setting which suited my needs for a job during college: Flexible hours and plenty of time to watch movies. Friday and Saturday evening rushes were tolerable when balanced out with the doldrums of a Sunday afternoon. That was when I instituted "theme days," during which each employee was encouraged to pick a film from a particular category. Like "rubber suit monsters" or "sweatiest movie ever." We traded free movie rentals for pizza from the place up the sidewalk in the mall. A change in ownership made all that fun go away. 

I used all that experience to my advantage when a spot on the warehouse management team opened up. Turns out that I was the responsible one: newly sober and a newlywed, I was going to build a family out of the tiny margin that book wholesalers made. Until the employee-owned company expired under its own counterculture weight. 

Now, some thirty years into my teaching career, I still get asked, "Why didn't you ever become a principal?" Well, as you can see, I had my share of time wandering around with a clipboard, checking other people's work. Watching the intensity of the interactions between management and customers in this realm gave me pause. I don't shy away from student or parent connections, but I also know that somebody else has the office, and the metaphorical brown vest and keys to the register. I understand that offering someone a two-for-one coupon at an elementary school won't bring the same result that it used to get in fast food. I have carefully massaged my job description to be as helpful and supportive as I can possibly be just before taking on an actual title. 

And every so often, I get some leftover pizza.