You want to know what I think is a colossal waste of time? No, tough shit; here goes.
New Year's Eve/Day.
Yup, the old end of the year extravaganza with the champagne, noise makers, gunshots, making out with someone you just met; the whole nine yards. Waste of time, for the most part.

Doesn't make sense, no matter how you try to sell it. People spend the better part of the day getting really drunk (that's not the waste of time) so they can count down to one and puke all over some stranger in a $1000 ball gown. That's the waste of time.

I am consistently amazed at the fact that people will spend hundreds of dollars to sit in a ballroom at a second rate hotel, buy really expensive drinks, get their "complimentary champagne toast" at midnight and say they had fun. Now, I suppose if you were to get a fancy hotel room with a Jacuzzi tub in the package, then we're talking. But then, wouldn't it be better to just skip the party, grab some better booze, get buck nekkid, grab your date and count down to midnight in the tub? Thought you'd like that. Just wish I could get the wife to go for that one. Just maybe. . . but I digress.

I used to look forward to someone I knew hosting a New Year's bash so I could get pickled and find an equally drunk young woman to swap spit with at the stroke of 12. Never really worked out that way, but I kept trying. For years. Finally, one year it happened. I was lucky enough to be next to someone as drunk as me and, by golly, I got lucky. Next thing I knew, I was engaged and now have been married 14 wonderful years. Maybe the drinking is a waste of time.

So, nowadays, it's stay at home with the neighbors, drink, set off some illegal fireworks, freeze our asses off outside and go to bed really late. Not so bad, and it only happens once a year. Admittedly, there are a couple of neighbors I wish would get a little drunker, but I always have the wife to give a sloppy one to when the clock strikes 12.

So, maybe New Year's Eve isn't so bad, for me anyway. I'm not stupid enough to leave my house. Last time I did that was for "The millennium." What a fucking waste of time and money that was. Paid a bunch of money to go to someone else's block party, freeze my ass off, get soaking wet (it rained like crazy), have a bunch of punk teenagers drink my beer, and have no apocalyptic end of the world. Waste of fucking time. So, I now stay home. The drunks are going to have to hit someone else on their way home from their disappointing parties.

Now, New Year's Day there is no defense for outside of the selection of college football games. Rose Parade? Hate it. Hope it finally rains on the piece of shit this year. Please. I actually know one of the float designers (Raul Rodriguez). He's made a bunch of money designing the most gaudy flora adorned recreational vehicles known to mankind. He's an unusual, but nice enough guy. He just makes his living in a very strange way. Besides, the Rose Parade is singularly responsible for the population boom here in California. So, I say fuck it. Rain, baby, rain.

The other thing that bothers me about New Year's Day is the craze over resolutions. Why the hell do we wait until the end of December to make these life changes we so desperately need? No real reason. It just seems so neat, so easy to do. It's 1/1/06, time to lose weight, quit smoking, quit drinking, stop having reckless sex (wait, why give up a good habit?), quit cussing so much (fuck that). All empty promises we wait to see how long it takes to break. Nice. Here's a suggestion, quit snivelling, quit stuffing your piehole, get off the couch, quit blowing strangers, and change your life now. If you don't want to, fine; but don't make a big deal about the first day of January because you think everyone else does.

With that, here's my New Year's resolutions: Drink less beer; drink more gin. Have more sex, different sex, awesome sex; all with my wife; lift more weights; have more fun; eat more food; eat different food; live my life; fart more often (done); just do the things I'm already doing now, only more of it.

There, I feel better. Now I need to shop for gin. Bombay Sapphire. There is no other.

Cheap Trick drummer Bun E. Carlos; best drummer in rock. What's that you say, I'm nuts? What about (list your favorite, yet less competent drummer here)? They suck. No one is cooler; no one is better; no one defies logic like Bun E.

Why all the fawning over a guy who looks like your 7th grade algebra teacher? Just listen to "Auf Wiedersehen." I know it's not the mid-numbing assault on the senses ala Lars Ulrich. No triple kick drum beats, but he ain't no human metronome either. His drumming drives the song along and works seamlessly with the bass (a 12 stringer, no less) lines Tom Petersson was laying down. It's pretty fucking cool. Trust me.

You know the hits: Surrender, I Want You to Want me, Ain't That a Shame. Heaven Tonight? Awesome album and the one with Auf Wiedersehen. Great drumming throughout. The best examples though are on the Live at Budokan album. There you hear his drumming, warts and all. There's a major gaffe in the drum roll in the middle of Surrender. Does it stop the music? Hell no. Bun E. plows ahead, undeterred to the end. In Color, their major label breakthrough is also a showcase of Bun E.'s prowess. The man shows at each turn how he can sneak in the beats and add his signature to each of the power pop classics.

I know there are those out there who have written off Cheap Trick as some kind of a gimmick band. You know, two pop idols; two dorks. I say that just gets you in. The music makes you stay, and if you're like me, Bun E. keeps you coming back.

Bun E. Carlos, you are one cool brother.

With a little more work and time, this post would have totally kicked ass.

Well, I got the "Tookie" thing out of my system, no it's on to the mundane and self-absorbed crap that I want to write about.

Next up, Bun E. Carlos. Best drummer ever.

I'll be writing it soo enough. Just thought you, my loyal reader (that's not a typo) would want to know.

Soon. Soon.

I'll probably get the business from the powers that be for doing this now, but I had to get this out before I forget and the moment passes.

Tookie will die tonight. You know who he is; you know what he did; you know he's supposedly written children's books; you know he was nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize. Did I tell you I was nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize? Sort of diminishes the value of that argument, doesn't it? You bet it does. Did he win? Hell no.

Nobel committee: "Here, Stan, have the peace prize. We know you killed 4 people; founded one of the most violent street gangs that's responsible for thousands of murders, drug trafficking, extortion, and singlehandedly responsible for the downfall of South Central LA; and written some children's books that say "Gangs are Bad. So, here's the peace prize. You've certainly proven yourself worthy."

At that very moment, Lech Walesa jumps out of the audience, throws his medal at the King Gustav, and shoots himself in the head thinking of just how cheap his own peace prize and sacrifices had become.

In other words; give me a fucking break people.

Tookie ain't no saint (which he'll soon find out). Sure, he's changed. Death row has a funny way of changing a man. Look and see how many find Jesus in their darkest hour. Where was Jesus when they were killing, raping, and spreading havoc? In the getaway car? No. But, congrats scumfuck, you "found him" whilst awaiting a date with a needle. Too late for your victims, huh?

Back to Tookie. You know he hasn't apologized; hasn't taken responsibility; claims he was framed, and thinks his life is better spared. Hmmmmmm. Written any good books lately? No. Well, looks like today is your last. What about the celebs protesting his death? Usually misinformed. If we had to depend on celebreties to run things for us we'd. . . wait. Scratch that.
Trust it to say most celebs are shit-for-brained idiots who didn't know Tookie from Pookie 2 months ago, and won't remember him next week.

Homeless activist, Ted Hayes, said it best when he was asked whether Tookie should be granted clemency. Ted said, in so many words, Tookie can live as long as nobody is ever killed in gang violence again. Amen.

With those brilliant words, I must go before Big Brother gets wind of what I'm doing.

I don't know what the hell is wrong with me, but nothing has really been bothering me lately. I mean beside the obvious bullshit that we deal with in life. You know, overbearing Christians, stupid drivers, illegeal aliens, legal aliens, aliens period, and the futility of the NFL. What gives? Luckily, I still have 2 months on our free Cinemax offer from the Dish Network.

That means I have totally bad softcore porn after 8 pm every night. Not that I watch it. . .much. Just when I want to see boobies, I can go there; see them; go to bed. Just have to make sure the kids are asleep, or out of the house.

I guess I could get all fired up about Christmas and how much fucking money it's costing me, but really money doesn't bother me that much. I can always make money.

I could fire off another missive about young Americans getting killed in Iraq, but that seems to be slowing and we seem to be getting the upper hand. Who knew. Things keep going like this and we might be out, at least mostly, by 2008. But, we'll always have a presence in Iraq to stay close to our oil.

I could be bugged about getting old and how my body seems to be getting hurt whenever I try even the simplest lift. Shoulder, upper back, lower back, achilies tendons (yeah, both); all seem to grumble when I workout. It's a lot of fucking fun being 43. Can't wait until I'm 44. That's life. I know I'm in better shape than most men my age; at least my friends who are my age are all overweight and have bad knees. So, that doesn't bug me. . .much.

I don't think it's total apathy. Just over-contentment right now. Give it time. Someone, something, somewhere is going to piss me off.

Then it's on, motherfucker.

or not.

I had great thoughts about how we spend too much time hyping Halloween and Christmas and how Thanksgiving (my personal favorite) has been relegated to "Last Thursday in November" status (see the fact that K-Mart starts their sales on Thanksgiving, not after; but then, who shops in that ghetto-ass, piece of shit, Targetwannabe, disease ridden, store anyway) by retailers; but Dan beat me to it.

Besides, he's much funnier and a better writer than I. For now.

www.theartofdansilver.com Look for the Thanksgiving essay.

Gentle readers,
I've been pretty fucking lazy lately. That and i have to wait until I get home to post to my own blog. One reason for this is my employer's new policy of watching us while on line to make sure we're not spending all our time finding new ways to download porn around their very stout firewall.
Jesus.
OK, I'll admit, I like pictures of boobies as much as the next guy, unless he's gay; but, do I spend every waking hour finding pictures of men and women in various states of coital pleasure? No. Actually, there's something insidiously gay about seeing some dude's junk flopping around, even if it is doing the ol' in and out. Don't get me started on guys who like watching anal sex. Just believe me when I say, I ain't into the whole internet porn thing.

So, my school district decides it's a good time to become Big Brother and watch us as we go online. Well, they're going to get pretty bored watching me. I visit about 4 websites regularly: Crossfit (www.crossfit.com), T-Nation (www.t-nation.com), Fark (www.fark.com), and of course, The Art of Dan Silver (www.theartofdansilver.com). Nothing there that's going to set off bells and whistles. But get this; if we leave a window open with Internet Explorer running, it generates an exception report. Said report is given to our principal and we get called up for a spanking. Sweet! Our kids are struggling to write their own name, and I know why!! Their teachers are busy looking at nekkid women in chat rooms or something like that.

Hey, I know there has to be someone out there breaking the rules like mad to cause such a knee-jerk reaction. The question is, is it really that bad? I guess so, because why would an employer go to such extreme, Third Reich-like measures to protect themselves? I guess I don't have a pot to piss in on this one, but it bothers the shit out of me that they want to look over my shoulder like this.

Hey, bosses! Look at the test scores of my kids. Pretty nice, huh. So cut me a break and look over there. I think that guy is looking at the SI swimsuit edition on-line. Pervert.

Just wanted to pop in and thank all vets for their sacrifices and service to our country. Happy Veterans' Day.

In the U.K. they call this Red Poppy Day as it is celebrated as Armistice Day. Hence the pretty flower picture here.

Good day. I have to pick up the kids from the movies.

Three words: What the fuck?

Three more words: Aren't they dead? (yes I know aren't is a contraction and technically 2 words, but it's my blog: Fuck off)

I hear they're "enhancing" their concert sounds this tour as well (read "enhancing" to mean exactly the same thing it meant to Ashley Simpson on SNL).

OK, so back to this Christian fish thing.

So the atheists have their fish to go up against the Christian thing. Great. Now comes the response; the Christian fish eating the Darwin fish, only the Christian fish has the word "Truth" inside of it instead of "Jesus" or something to that effect. It's all very silly and it all leads to the same conclusion: If you see the stupid fish on the back of someone's car, get away as fast as you can. Switch lanes; speed up; swerve like mad; take the next exit, because if you don't one of these misguided shit-for-brains will run you into a ditch. No lie, they suck.
(oh, for a very well written and on-point essay on Christians and their man JC, see http://www.theartofdansilver.com/jesus.html. you'll love it)

This is the point I was getting to all along; no matter what the fish is on the back of the car, the driver is a raging buffoon who obviously got his/her driver's license via the internet. Think I'm exaggerating? Go for a drive. Pull up behind some car with the fish, or a "I love Jesus" bumpersticker, or better yet one of those idiotic "rapture" stickers (see last blog). The idiot driving is so engrossed listening to Ernest Ainsley or Billy Graham or those plastic as hell assholes from TBN, that he doesn't see the light change. Better yet, since God is their co-pilot, they don't need to signal to change lanes. Shit, since God's riding shotgun, they don't even check the lane to see your sorry ass driving along side. Here they come! Honk the horn, give 'em the finger; hell, give them the whole fist. They just smile, wave and mouth out the words, "Jesus loves you!" See, it's not their fault; God was supposed to tell them you were in the lane, but he must have forgotton. Nice. You want a sure way to develop road rage? Follow a "Christian driver" for a few miles. No one will be spared your wrath.

The problem got so bad that my daughters started pointing out cars with fish on them. They thought it was some sort of warning sticker, like in the U.K. where they plaster huge red "L's" on the cars of recent licensees. We'd be driving along and my kids would say, "Look out dad! There's another one with a fish!" and I'd smile quitely to myself. Like I said before, sport a fish; get out of the way.

and you Darwin fuckers ain't any better.

I've got to go lift heavy objects.

The Christian fish. We've all seen them. We know what they are and what they stand for. Heck, they just found one on the floor of an ancient prison in Isreal. It is one of the oldest symbols in the world and a way for Christians to identify one another anywhere in the world. It is also the international symbol of the worst fucking drivers ever to vex the roadways. That's right, God is your co-pilot and you are scaring the crap out of Him as you drive to church.

This all started out innocently enough, with Christians everywhere affixing plastic fishes to the backs of their Chevy Corsicas (you know the car I'm talking about; Katie Holmes drove one in Batman Begins) so everyone on the road could identify them, or at least their car, when the Rapture hit and their car, suddenly unmanned, swerved into a group of schoolchildren waiting for the bus to take them to their kindergarten class. Yeah, those fish. Soon, everyone was putting these things on their cars and no one was safe. Even the "borderline Christians" were under the mysterious spell of the fish. Fish everywhere, on every vehicle imaginable. It was like some sort of ichtiplague sweeping the vehicles of America.

Then the atheists got into the act and the Darwin fish, or are they salamanders, started appearing on beat up Sentras and Corollas. Quasi-intellectuals were slapping Darwins on their cars in defiance of their Christian oppressors and now the situation was way worse than before.

Where is this going? I'll tell you later. I have to go pick up my kid and watch some flag football.

Lucky me.

In defense of Dubya?

Well, in a word, yes. Or not. Maybe? You see, I can't stand the little fella. He stole an election; dodged military service in the worst way (c'mon, he used daddy's connections and was supposedly in the Texas Air National Guard. Who was attacking Texas during Vietnam anyway? Mexico? Does Mexico have an air force? ); was a cokehead; was a drunk; was the owner of the Texas Rangers (new record for futility by a baseball franchise); was asleep at the switch for 9/11 (waddaya mean there are terrorists in the U.S.? I thought they were all in Syria? and while I'm at it, do all Republicans still believe Clinton ordered strikes on terrorist targets in Afghanistan to make people forget about a stain on a blue dress and Whitewater? Please, people, don't believe the hype); has singlehandedly dumped our economy in the toilet; has singlehandedly (OK, he had help) ruined our foreign relations cred in Europe; believes that Iraq was a bigger threat to national security than North Fucking Korea (a country run by Dr. Evil for God's sake); lead a halfassed effort in Afghanistan (just like dear ol' dad); has the Devil himself as a VP (Cheney could be a Sith Lord, but Devil is just as likely); wants a constitutional amendment to prevent gays from marrying (yeah, there's a pressing need); can't find a suitable supreme court justice (it's like watching a soap opera. . . a bad soap opera); and now the big Cheney/Rowe/Libby debacle. There's probably more, but seeing as I haven't seen Farenheit 9/11, I'm out of ideas at the moment.

Yeah, I'm not exactly a "Bush Backer." Thing is, I love my country. I'm thankful for every day I live here. I'm thankful for the fact that my parents didn't live in Mexico when I was born. I'm thankful I live in a country where free speech, free press, free religion, free assembly, free love. . .scratch that one. . . and free guns are valued pieces in a way of life. I love th fact that our founding fathers, although a bunch of slave owners and FreeMasons, were smart enough to establish a representative democracy and not a new kingdom. Yes, I can work, play, watch football, drink, gamble, and look at naked boobies on the internet all because I'm a goddamned 'Merican. yeeha!

So, this is why I'm pulling for the Chief Executive in his latest little debacle. I'm speaking of the Cheney/Rowe/Libby mess going on under his nose and on his watch. You see, the Devil, let's call him Dick Cheney, has one of his minions, Scooter Libby (love the name, shoulda been a baseball player: "Now batting; number 27; shortstop; Scooooter Liiiiibbbby!) leak the name of a CIA operative to the press, thus endangering said operative and sending a bold message to her husband who happens to be tearing the lid off of Cheney's rationale for attacking Iraq; namely, the fact (?) that Niger (silly schoolboy giggle) was selling weapons grade uranium to Iraq so they could make their nasty WMD's. Now Karl Rove's involvement in the whole thing is a little fuzzy as he's barely mentioned in the indictments. What's also unclear is whether Cheney was involved and if he was, to what extent. What's clear? Scooter Libby is a total prick. OK, newspaper guy is going to Niger to invesitigate the intelligence reports of uranium sales. OK, his wife was being asked to go with him. Scooter doesn't like the sounds of this, so he casually "leaks" the real identity of the CIA operative, thus putting her life in immediate peril. Nice. Maybe "prick" is too nice. Total, flamming, hemorrhoidal asshole could be better. Penis hole dweller? I know this is the "Reader's Digest" version of the story, but you get my drift. Seems like a petty little action with possibly deadly consequences.

So, what's this got to do with George's son, George? Plenty. Being the man in charge he's ultimately responsible for what goes on in his administration. Don't think that's true? As Ken Lay if he got to use the "it's not my fault, I didn't know what was going on when all those bad men were doing all those bad things" defense. I believe you can e-mail him in federal prison. So, being in the location of all buck stopping, ie; the Oval Office, President Bush must take swift and decicive action in this case. Use the full force of the Justice Department to squish Scooter Libby like the cockroach he is (emphasis on the cock). Fire Cheney for being a lousy VP and one evil sonofabitch. He lied to the president; he lied to the nation; he had a guy named Scooter as his chief of staff. Fire his ass now. Karl Rove? Here's what you say Mr. President, "Haven't seen him for days. I heard he was going on a vacation to Costa Rica. During hurricane season. To be with his wife, no mistress, no wife. Yeah, his wife. That's the ticket!" When Rove never returns, who's going to miss him? Certainly not his wife. Not the American people. Not even you, because this human boil on the backside of the presidency has done the decent thing and disappeared. Things would smell better instantly.

Next, after you have cut out the cancer that is the Cheney vice presidency (emphasis on vice), develop an exit strategy for Iraq; fix the economy; get someone who's not to the right of Hitler appointed as a supreme court justice; play nicey-nice with the Euros for a while and remind them who bailed out their sorry asses in WWI and WWII; get the Isrealis back in our corner (why you didn't do this earlier is beyond me) because they know more about the terrorists than we'll ever know. Besides, the terrorists fear the Israelis, I think. Well, the Palestenians don't, but they're crazy fuckers (just kidding all my Palestenian friends!! Good job with the whole Gaza thing) In other words, get my country back to being the best goddamn country on the planet instead of the biggest laughingstock. Oh, and another thing: don't turn your back on China. They're getting damn good at buying things over here and no one is noticing. They want to make us an economic colony of theirs. Get them in check now. I'm being paranoid. . .maybe not.

So, Mr. President, Dubya, George W., Little George; let's get with the program and make things right. Oh, one last thing: Lay off the gays, dude. Really, who gives a rat's ass if they want to marry. Two guys getting married will not destroy my marriage. Going on a drunken bender in a strip club will, but not the gays getting married.

Got to go take a CPR class.

I just had a brilliant post written about why I would defend the president but the lousy software that controls this blog lost it when I tried to spell check.

I feel an anti-technology post a comin'.


I'm hungry.

Another game, another come from behind victory for my beloved Bruins of U.C.L.A.
We're going to Stateline in December to see the SC/UCLA game. We're all prepared for a letdown, but on the bright side, we'll be drinking and gambling.
Yipee!

Going to bed.

Well, I said I'd say something about music this time, so here goes:
I subscribe to Yahoo Music Unlimited. It has a million songs to choose from, many I'd rather not hear, and you can download them to your computer and portable music device (aka, Mp3 player).
So, I ponied up the 60 bucks, much to my wife's chagrin, and started loading up the hard drive. I also purchased a Creative Zen Touch 20 gig player, again the wife was chagrined, to store all the "subscribed music" I've downloaded. Great idea, right? Well, in theory anyway.
(seeing yesterday's rant/whine, you're probably wondering why it's free of cussing thus far. So am I)

The Creative Zen Touch (hereinafter referred to as the "Touch" I'm a lawyer as well, you know) was advertised as being compatable with MTP (media transfer protocol) files and would play subscription based music. Yahoo is a subscription service. In other words, I pay my 60 bucks (the price goes up to a whopping $120 a year November 1. Ain't I fucking lucky! ah, cussing) and I get the songs to use as I please for a year. I just can't burn them to a CD. That costs $.79 each or about $8 per CD. No matter, I'd planned to treat the songs as my personal whore and bend them over the nearest armchair and fuck them silly. Weird metaphor, or simile aside, I was subscribing only; not burning. Back to the Touch. It was supposed to be compatable with my hopes, dreams, plans. Ooops! It wasn't. I paid almost $200 for a player that would not do what I had hoped, and been told, it could do. I was pissed. Maybe just worried.

Everything changed this morning as I went to the Creative web site (Creative announced their quarterly profits were down 86% over last year; this added to my anxiety) and there it was: the firmware download I had waited for. The firmware that would allow me to listen to all my downloaded music for the next year. The MTP/Plays for Sure upgrade!!! Yipee. I downloaded. I updated. I synched my player to YMU. My battery ran out.

Bugger! (That was for you Karl, as my second official reader. Steve Stackpole was first. He's stronger, but you're British and that counts for something these days. I think Dan has read this as he told me to listen to a comedy CD called, "Quit your Crying, You Fucking Baby" by David Cross)

Being at work right now (I'm at lunch, so I'm not ignoring the brats I'm educating) without the charger, I'll have to wait until I get home so I can load up the subscribed music. Then it's non-stop with the Damned, the Modern Lovers, Buzzcocks, Devo, The Futureheads, Franz Fucking Ferdinand, The Kaiser Chiefs, and anything Dan suggests that I can download. Dan posts interesting choices on his website. Read them. www.theartofdansilver.com You won't regret it.
Problem is, Yahoo is lame when it comes to getting the licenses for some of these bands. I want to listen to Dillinger Escape Plan, but they don't got it. Shit. Being a cheap bastard, I'll wait. Anyway, I have 10 gigs of music ready to go and now power to use it. I'll get over it.

What I should have been writing about is the fact that most of my listening is stuck somewhere around 1987. Not much new out there I want to hear. I sure as hell am not listening to hip hop or rap (I understand they're two different genres, who knew?). My daughter, in her quest to become African-American (we're pretty damn pale around my house) listens to that crap, er music non-stop. Maybe I'm old, but the shit is horrible. I mean in indiscernable. Each song sounds like the other, except worse. No one is playing instruments because Pro Tools rules the studio. The singers are all over produced and synthesized to the point of sounding inhuman. Listen to Beyonce, if you can, and you'll hear it. Layer upon layer of crappy sound. Put it together and you get a hit single that makes your brain bleed.

My solution: Henry Rollins in the studio with one of these genius producers, say Pharrell Williams. Henry sits behind him and every time he tells a young singer, "That was great, I think we have a hit!" ol' Hank grabs the nearest heavy object and opens Pharrell's head; revealing as everyone expected, nothing. It's a fantasy, but it's all mine.

"We're not saying anything new here. We're just saying the same things over and over again, that need to be said until things get done."
-Astronaut Wally Shirra in The Right Stuff

I'm tired.

Having never done this, I don't know what to expect. I'm really not expecting anyone to read a blog from a boring old fart of a teacher/attorney/tired father, but what the hell; it's free.

Lately I've been thinking about the state of education in the state of California. Thanks to the worst president ever, we have a system called No Child Left Behind, or NCLB. It mandates all kinds of testing and reporting by schools to make them better imposers of education on our youth. In all, it's a crock of shit.

What NCLB does is pressure schools, and in turn, the teachers, to teach to a test. Yes, I know that all 5 of you home-schooling moms out there who Googled "education" or "NCLB" are reading that line and saying, "Stupid pisant teachers always blame the president for making them teach to the test." Well, yes Mrs. Christian, stay-at-home, my child won't touch those dirty illegal aliens, stick up my ass, mom; it does and here's how. Each year a school is given a report on how its test score have improved over last year's. You see, the feds in NCLB look at test scores and only test scores to measure the progress of a school. So, if a school's scores go down, the idiot teachers are obviously not doing their jobs. If the scores stay the same, no progress, something must be wrong. If they go up, must be the good parenting. All bullshit.
You see, even if a school's scores steadily improve over the years, as they have at my school, then you can still not meet the insane criteria set by President Big-Ears and his dipshit cronies.
They call us an "underachieving school." Nice. Kiss my ass.

The fine state of California goes one better. They say to the offending school, you've got 3 years to get your shit together, or we're coming in; kicking ass; and taking names. Like a state that can't elect a decent governator could come in and run a junior high school. Give me a fucking break. Now. (in case you couldn't tell, I'm not one for exclamation marks) My school is in the third year of being piss poor according to the unrealistic measurments set by the bureaucratic asswipes in Washington and Sacramento. In other words, if our kids don't get their collective asses in gear, I'm going to have some overpaid, long retired, brain dead "consultant" coming in and telling me how to get my kids to do better in school. That will be fun, no doubt. Please, someone, fuck me in the ass. It would hurt less.

The sad part of all of this is we have improved. Hell, we've kicked some serious ass in the past three years where test scores are concerned. You think someone from the Big Sac or D.C. would give us a laurel and hardy handshake? Hell no! (there, an exclamation mark, or is it point. happy?) They would rather tell us we missed our goals by .2% (I'm not making this up, we missed by that much in one of our criteria) of the EL students. Well, we obviously suck ass.

I could go on, but why? No one is reading this, at least not on purpose; and if they are, they don't care. Governator Arnold, kiss my ass. President W, get in line. You're both shams.

Oh, here's a great analogy about using test scores to judge a teacher's effectiveness. Say you're a doctor and you are evaluated by the state every year (they are, I think), but they don't actually evaluate you personally, they look at your patients' test results. So, they may look at patients' EKG's, blood cultures, HDL/LDL levels, chest x-rays, whatever, but you know that they always look at certain tests (in California, the state looks at a student's CST, or standards test, scores). So, as a bright doctor, what do you do? Why the answer is simple; start pushing drugs on the patients that will cause the certain tests to come out favorable. You might even put them on a diet, or suggest an exercise routine. Everything possible to prepare for those state mandated tests. But, what if the patient is a rebellious smoker with a penchant for Krispy Kreme doughnuts (don't get me started on that bunch of crooks. May Scott Livengood burn in Hell, smoking a big dog turd)? That one doofus could ruin your state scores and your license would be in jeopardy. Not fair is it? Welcome to the world of education. The only place where you have exposure to a child for about an hour a day and you're supposed to change all of his or her bad habits over the course of 180 days. Sucks to be us.

I'm tired of writing. I'm going to the gym and taking my kid to soccer practice.
I do CrossFit at the gym. Go to the website: www.crossfit.com. Get your ass handed to you; come back for more. I post there as Ron N. I talk more than anything else, but I keep most of my thoughts in as I have great respect for the Glassmans and the members of the armed forces
who frequent the site. Get some.

Next: Something about music, I think.