Oh my God....

I have to admit that a lot of the stuff my daughter watches on television is well beyond my comprehension. While she doesn't watch the Wiggles anymore, it's stuff like this that affirms my stance that my daughter will not have a television in her bedroom anytime in the next decade.

No teacher left behind

I saw something last night on the local evening news that was pretty indicative of the state of education in Georgia. It was a story about Miller Grove High School in Dekalb County. Under the criteria set forth in the No Child Left Behind act, the school failed to make "adequate yearly progress" this past year. Apparently the teachers were displeased at the low levels of parent participation and involvement at the school, and in an effort to remedy this, have scheduled what is in essence a pep rally at the school this weekend for the parents. They're using a number of methods to get the word out to parents, including using the media and standing in front of the school while holding signs. But what I found to be amusing in all this was the school's street front electronic sign. During the news story, they showed the sign displaying various messages about upcoming school events. When suddenly, on the sign appears the words, "Parent Ralley," with the time and date of this pep rally. I wasn't sure if I saw what I thought I saw, so courtesy of my DVR I rewound the story and sure enough, there was a big ol' glaring typo courtesy of someone at the school. I'm not surprised the school didn't make AYP this past year, and somehow I don't think parent involvement is alone responsible for their not making the grade. Maybe they should "ralley" their teachers instead.

Rummy leaves office

I've been playing with Photoshop for ten years waiting for this moment. My friends, almost all of whom would prefer that I not have their picture fearing what I'd do to them, can all breathe a collective sigh of relief.

Woot!

Geez, I'm too old to be using the word "woot." What the hell am I thinking? I guess I'm just in a good mood today in spite of the GOP taking over the state of Georgia, and in spite of finding out today that the 4% salary increase for state employees in January will be accompanied with a 12% increase in insurance premiums. Four more years...four more years of this crap. This is the only place I've ever worked where you can get a raise and actually be worse off and make less than you had been.

Perhaps I'm in a good mood for two reasons. One, it's official: the Democrats will take over both houses of Congress. Yee-hah! On one hand, I'm glad that they've won and will hopefully govern in a manner in line with what I think is important. On the other hand, I hope the Dems don't whiz this opportunity down their collective leg. The Democrats have been known the past couple of decades of pulling defeat out of the jaws of victory, of shooting themselves in the foot politically. Please, oh please, not this time!

I'm also in a good mood because for the first time in quite a while I bought hockey tickets yesterday! My friend Greg and I had been talking about going to a game last season but it didn't pan out, so we've been discussing going to one this season. As luck would have it, my beloved New York Islanders are coming to Atlanta one Friday evening in January! And I have tickets just six rows off the glass. In theory that should be close enough to catch a few broken teeth as players get checked into the boards. Atlanta has a good team this year, so I don't expect the Isles to come out on the winning end, but that's not the point. I get to see them play for the first time since 1991, when they came to Atlanta to play an exhibition game against the Boston Bruins. Sweet! Game on!!

Poll Dancing

I've got a serious Election Day hangover today. Not a hangover in the traditional sense, my serious drinking days behind me as at my age it's far too easy to pull muscles as you worship the Porcelain God the next morning and it takes far too long for them to heal. Rather, my hangover this morning is due more to sleep deprivation, having stayed up late last night to watch the election returns come in. Most political junkies like myself will be sleepily wandering around aimlessly today, looking for a Starbucks fix so that they can stay awake just a little while longer.

Here in Georgia the election results were disappointing but not unexpected. Sonny Perdue was re-elected as governor, handily defeating the Democratic challenger Mark Taylor. I still think Cathy Cox would have been a better match for Perdue, but hey, I just vote here. The Republicans won all the right elections in all the right places to consolidate their power in the state. Casey Cagle won the lieutenant governor's race on a platform of "hope and opportunity for all Georgians"...except for the gays who are still persona non grata with the Jesus Krispies here in the state. I didn't vote for Cagle but I'll give him a chance. Karen Handel won the secretary of state post. I'm not very encouraged by having someone with just a high school education under their belt being responsible for overseeing elections and professional licensing in the state. Talk about knowing all the right people! And everyone's favorite ripe jolly ol' elf, Kathy Cox, was re-elected state school superintendent. You remember Kathy, don't you? She's the one a couple of years ago who wanted to remove the word "evolution" from all the textbooks in Georgia and replace it with "gradual changes over time." With Georgia's continued lackluster performance in educational standings and SAT scores, all I have to say is "Congratulations, Georgia!" for re-electing someone who clearly didn't deserve it. I hope you enjoy wallowing in the mediocrity that you voted to retain.

As a resident and employee of the state I'm disheartened by what I see coming down the pike over the next few years now that there's nobody to stand in the way of the GOP agenda in the state. Four more years of lackluster state funding for the university system, meaning that I can't buy supplies for my department except when absolutely necessary and students had better get used to being taught by part-time instructors and graduate teaching assistants, not tenured and tenure-track faculty. Four more years of pathetic 2-3% raises, coupled with 8-10% increases in insurance premiums as the state dumps even more of its share of the cost onto state employees. Four more years of my wife and I buying classroom supplies for our daughter's classroom as neither her teacher nor school have the resources to buy them. Four more years of paying high property taxes because the county has to make up the funding for its school system the state pulled during the recession a few years ago and has conveniently not restored. Four more years of kids being creatively disqualified from the Medicaid and PeachKids health insurance programs. Four more years of discriminating against people because they're Hispanic or gay, or Hispanic and gay. Four more years of balancing the state budget by slashing state agency budgets to the bone, and in some instances into the bone. Four more years of Sonny Perdue. Four more years of mediocrity. Four more years.

On the bright side this morning, the Democrats took control of the U.S. House for the first time in twelve years. No more free passes to use the Constitution as so much toilet paper for our esteemed president, Halliburton. No, sorry, I guess technically our president is george w. bush--or dick cheney, depending on what day it is and who you ask. It remains to be seen whether the Senate will follow suit as there are two more elections in Virginia and Montana that are still way too close to call. It'll be days before they're decided, and I'm guessing it'll take at least a couple of weeks and will involved a lawsuit at some point. So while Georgia's looking quite depressing these days, the whole world at large is starting to look better.

Creepy, cooky, spooky, ooky

Ah yes, yet another Halloween in the books, another twelve months before my zombie costume comes out of storage again to be put to use. Though after last night, I’m of the mindset that next year requires a new costume as the zombie gig wasn’t scaring the kids like a couple of years ago when I first wore it. We don’t go overboard with decorating for Halloween; usually our setup consists of a pumpkin, a clear door cling with an image of a skeleton on it for our storm door, and a strobe light behind the storm door. I used a blue gel in the strobe last night and set it on a slow cycle, and the combination of the blue color and the appearance/disappearance of the skeleton on our storm door looked really good from the street. It’s not much, but at least it doesn’t scare off the kids like our neighbor did last year. He invested a lot of time and effort to create a spooky setting for his house, which included some of his friends coming over to assist in the effort (I remember the sound of a chainsaw coming from the direction of his house). He did such a good job that kids would get to his driveway, look at the house, then move on, too afraid to venture to the front door. When you’ve created a setting where a child is willing to pass on getting more candy rather than risk their life going to your front door, then Mission Accomplished!

The fall weather at the end of October reminds me of those times many years ago when I would go from door to door, adorned in some costume (usually my Hot Wheels or Batman costume), asking for candy. The neighborhoods where I lived in New York had sidewalks, which are very conducive for getting your parents to go out on an extended candy hunt. It was also not unusual for kids to begin roaming the neighborhoods in fairly large groups, adding new kids who were just hitting the streets and joining up with the larger groups. It was like having multiple, miniature riots roaming about, all with crazed looks in their eyes located behind their Ben Cooper masks seeking an evening of sugar-crazed, chocolate-driven hedonism and iniquity. Nobody had evolved to the point of egging or TPing houses that gave out bad candy, and flaming bags of dog crap were definitely out of the question as nobody wanted to risk a severe grounding/spanking for stealing matches from our parents. It was just a fun evening going around seeing how much candy you could fit into a bag that was almost as big as you were.

Now as a parent it’s my turn to play the role of supervisor for my daughter’s Halloween activities. The past couple of years I’ve stayed home and passed out candy while my wife took the child around the neighborhood on her Candyland Expedition. Last night, as I’ve done the past couple of years, I dressed in my zombie costume in which to greet the trick or treaters in the neighborhood, and there weren’t that many. I see kids around all the time, so I’m wondering if there are fewer than I think around or if they’re choosing not to observe a “satanic” holiday. Beats me. This year, though, rather than stay inside where the strobe light would give me yet another headache, I hid out behind the cars in our driveway. Once the kids got on the front porch, I crept up the walkway (the only way in or out) and yelled “BRAAAAAAAINS!” One of the first times I did that it was to a brother and sister who were obviously out for an evening to be scared by a middle aged person in a zombie costume. The girl screamed as I came up the walk, and did what every big sister would do in a situation like that: she grabs her brother and swings him around so he’s in between me and her. It was such a funny reaction on her part that I took off my mask and let them take whatever they wanted from our candy bowl. It was the funniest reaction I had seen since our trip to Myrtle Beach this past June when we tipped our crappy waiter at Joe’s Crab Shack $1 on a $45 bill (and he didn’t even deserve the $1, let me tell ya).

My daughter returned with my wife after about an hour, bearing a plastic pumpkin full of candy—and some good stuff at that. I know my daughter went out and got the candy, but I’m wondering if she’d really miss a couple of those Reese’s peanut butter cups. As a parent, I must taste test these things to make sure they’re okay for her to eat, after all! After my daughter went to bed last night, visions of Processed Sugars dancing in her head, I took a few minutes to dump out the contents of her pumpkin pail to look over her candy, and it’s a good thing I did. As I’ve already mentioned, she got some good candy this year, and some folks around the neighborhood spent some money on quality sugar-fixes this year. But there’s a cheap bastard somewhere in our neighborhood. As I rummaged through the pile of candy I discovered someone had purged their pantry of old EASTER CANDY and had passed it out for Halloween last night! I’m sure you’re thinking, “How do you know it was Easter candy?” You can tell by the wrapper. You’d expect a Halloween theme on the candy: a ghost, a witch, a monster, certainly. But the Easter Bunny? I doubt it very seriously. And I don’t think chocolate eggs are easily found on store shelves come October.

One on hand, that’s a good way to get rid of old candy in your house, and I have to admire their audacity in doing that. But what kind of cheap sonofabitch gives out candy that’s at least six months old to little kids? Probably the kind of cheap sonofabitch that has an adjustable rate mortgage on their house, in which case all I have to do is sit back and wait for the for sale sign to go up in their front yard and I’ll know who the guilty party is.