Here are provided seats of meditative joy
Where shall rise again the destined reign of Troy
To be honest, I never paid attention to what the hell was going on. My always voting Democrat was the result of that. . . .
I’m stunned that so many people who call themselves liberal yet are completely intolerant. I thought liberals loved everyone: the poor, the immigrant, the gays, the handicapped, the minorities, dogs, cats, all eye colors, all hair colors! Peace, love, bull! Curious they have no tolerance whatsoever for anyone who doesn’t think exactly as they do. You disagree and you’re immediately called a fool, a Nazi, a racist. That’s pretty f’d up!! I would never judge someone based on their political views. Their honesty, integrity, kindness to others, generosity? Yes. Politics? No!
All these years later, my son went to USC this morning, my alma mater, for a college interview, wearing a red shirt and his lucky tie bar.
Around noon, he texted me: “Sitting right next to jurrell casey and nick perry in the student center. No big deal”
Jurrell Casey is one of my favorite football players, not just because his last name is the same as my son’s first name. Every time we watch a game and he makes a good play, I yell “CASEY!”
There are two major universities in Los Angeles but at the other one, UCLA, no one will talk to you. Literally. They won’t talk to you.
It’s a government-run institution. Imagine the DMV operating a college. Or the IRS. Or the Post Office. UCLA is actually worse than any of them.
At those other places, eventually you’ll get to talk to someone. You’ll take a number and wait, and when you do talk to someone, they’ll be glum and uninspired, but at UCLA, they just will not talk to you.
I don’t mind if the boy doesn’t go to USC but I hope he doesn’t go to UCLA.
Created by Online Education
HIM: You look sad this morning. What’s the matter?
HER: Oh, my son left for college yesterday, and I just really miss him.
HIM: Let me share something with you. When my daughter went off to school, I gave her one very important piece of advice.
HER: Really? What was that?
HIM: Don’t get photographed sucking a dick.
HER: Hmmm. That sounds like great advice for your daughter, but it wouldn’t have any value for my son.
HIM: That’s not what I’ve heard.
Sammi: I just feel like I don’t know.
Snooki: I know how you feel.
I ask my boy how school’s going this year, his senior year in high school.
“It’s okay,” he says. “I don’t enjoy it that much but I do it anyway.”
When we get to the subject of his English teacher, he says, “He’s fine, other than he’s got a Napoleon complex and spends the entire class talking about himself. I know everything about him and I’ve learned nothing about poetry.
“He has a two-year-old daughter and another daughter six months old. He coaches a cross-country team. He considers himself the greatest runner of all time. We don’t know what pain is because he has a messed-up knee and he runs on it anyway.
“He thinks Mr. Plette [the AP History teacher] is soft because Mr. Plette give higher grades than he does but don’t tell Plette he said that because Plette’s his boy.
“He’s a San Francisco Giants fan. He’s missing class on Thursday to go to the Giants game.
“Did you know that he has a principal’s credential? When he took the test, other teachers were hanging their heads and walking out of the room, but he knew immediately that he passed it because he knows how to write essays.”
“I hope you’re not pointing these things out to anyone but your parents.”
“Are you kidding? It’s all I talk about.”
I believe in a world where I can set something down and it will still be there in the same place the next time I need it.
Unfortunately, this turns out to be a dangerously optimistic notion about what the world and other people are like.
Originally uploaded by Madness Rivera
Originally uploaded by Madness Rivera
Originally uploaded by wombatarama
Universal yanked a movie trailer in which Vince Vaughn’s character says “electric cars are gay.”
Fortunately, it’s a Vince Vaughn movie so no one will see it anyway.
What needs changing is the way the media deals with the conflicting claims of science and pseudoscience. You can’t be “fair and balanced.” You can only be fair or balanced. To be fair is to tell the truth; to be balanced is to tell a truth, tell a lie, and then let the public determine which is which — and this, of course, isn’t fair to anyone. People are busy! They have jobs to attend, children to raise, hobbies to pursue. They can’t go out and investigate every last crazy claim. They deserve a media unashamed of telling the best truths it can.
“Have you read ‘Break of Day’ by John Donne?” my son asks.
“I haven’t,” I reply, “but that’s more of a failing on my part than a reflection on the greatness of John Donne.”
“John Donne sucks.”
“You can’t talk about metaphysical poetry without giving it up for John Donne.”
“I don’t want to talk about metaphysical poetry. How is that ever going to help me?”
“Someday you’ll quote a snippet of Andrew Marvell in a status meeting and people will be very impressed. Verrry impressed.”
My best friend in college hanged himself. He wasn’t gay. It broke my heart, but nobody famous took any notice.
We’re all against bullying of course, but it’s a fact of life. Everyone gets targeted for whatever it is that makes them different, and if you’re absolutely normal in all respects, you’ll be targeted for being too perfect.
I put my son in tae kwon do classes at an early age. I said it was for fitness and confidence and all the usual stuff, but really it was so that any needlessly cruel behavior directed toward him could be addressed via a kick in the teeth.
Sometimes you have to beat someone’s ass to teach him how to get along with the rest of the human race . . .
