Mickey Z
Cool Observer
Saturday, November 26, 2005
A good one-liner in Provincetown...and Happy Birthday to Michele
HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO MICHELE...I hope that the 2 of you will make a wonderful memory today that will live in your hearts forever./////////
About the Bennington school situation. Today’s Bennington Banner ran an editorial about it. Remember, the Banner is the paper that refused to publish the beautiful letters of support that came from the Expendables...I am sending a link to ANOTHER editorial. This one was written by the BIG BOSS, the Superintendent. It gives his view of Thanksgiving, education, etc.
http://tinyurl.com/am2t6Posted by RMJ on from Churchill 4 Prez Hdqts 11/26 at 09:36 AMHappy 40th to Michele! And good luck with the final crunch on your Master’s quest. . .
Posted by suzanne on from 11/26 at 09:54 AMHappy 40th, Michelle!
Posted by JOS on from Calle Colón 11/26 at 10:52 AMI meant, Michele!
Posted by JOS on from Calle Colón 11/26 at 10:55 AMG’Morning, RMJ, Suzanne, and Big Country. I’m sure Michele will check in later to say hi. Unfortunately, she’ll be spending most of her b’day studying.
RMJ: I read the editorial by the school superintendent. You know, it’s so cliche that I’m wondering if he (or anyone) truly feels that way. It reads like a disingeuous political speech meant only to appease listeners with soothing affirmations.
“Over” and out…
Posted by Mickey Z. on from Astoria 11/26 at 11:06 AMhappy b day michele , hi mick keep it coming i love this page mike c
Posted by mike conner on from rockland 11/26 at 11:15 AMThanks, Mike. Good to know you’re hanging around here.
Posted by Mickey Z. on from Astoria 11/26 at 11:28 AMMickey and Michele, your story about the first time you touched hands inspired me to tell a story about how my wife and I got together:
I first saw my wife in freshman year English class at Boston College. I remember her and her friend well, though they hardly ever showed for class, because they were both extremely cute. The teacher was an old, proper and bitter white lady who seemed to hate them, not only because they didn’t show up much, but also because they were young, pretty and seemed like they were always having a fun time. She ended up giving them both F’s. I ended up getting an A in the class...she happened to like me. It would be the only A I received during my short time at BC.
Anyway, during our sophomore year my wife happened to be placed on the same floor as I was in Walsh Dormitory. I was in a room with seven of my buddies: a Nigerian, two Hong Kong Chinese, a Korean-American, a Japanese American, a Jamaican, a Haitian and then me, Big Country MFin Jo from the Ghetto. My wife lived with three other attractive females so I would end up over at their place at times to hang out. My wife and I became fairly good friends, but nothing more, thankfully, because I was an immature 18 years old with nothing on my mind but partying and women.
Fast forward 6 years and we had long ago fallen out of touch. I was living in NYC with one of my brothers up in Harlem. My wife was supposed to move from San Diego (where she had gotten her Masters in Family Therapy) to Boston with a girlfriend. After she had sold all of her furniture and VW convertible and packed up all of her possessions, the girl backed out on her. She had nowhere to go and a friend of hers who lived on the Upper East Side of Manhattan said that she should move to NYC and be her roommate. This woman was my wife’s ex-roommate from when she was at Boston College. So she moved to NYC.
One night I was hanging at my apartment with my Nigerian friend when he mentioned that a friend of his from BC had called him and said we should have a get-together with a bunch of BC people at a bar downtown. He mentioned a bunch of people I knew would be there including that cute Puerto Rican woman I used to know. I was a little down at the time and wasn’t to enthusiastic, but then he said, “Hey, you never know what could happen.”
We went and as soon as we saw each other we knew something wonderful was about to occur. We held hands all night. We talked all night. And when we finally parted ways I asked her out on a date for the very next night. We were married almost exactly one year later. In March we will have been married for 7 years.
Posted by JOS on from Calle Colón 11/26 at 11:33 AMRosemarie I read that editorial and I honestly have no idea how the writer found a position as a school superintendent. Regardless of whether or not one agrees with his point--what is his point, by the way?--he is inarticulate in the extreme. Shudder to think that such people are running the education of young minds.
One of the greatest teachers I had in public school was hired during a season of teacher shortages. He said things like “youse guys” and let us breakdance during snack time (it was 1983). He wore his hair long and had an earring, dressed in old t-shirts and jeans. Despite not looking the part he was a wonderful teacher who instilled in me a love of reading and a desire to see the world. What he may not have been able to articulate according to Strunk and White, he simply demonstrated--health and fitness by showing up to school in his jogging gear, a love of literature by serializing The Hobbit and Canal Boat to Freedom for us (we were eight years old), and, perhaps unintentionally, disdain for authority by the example of his own appearance and mannerisms. More of that! More of that!
Posted by Keir on from The Hague 11/26 at 01:21 PMHappy birthday to Michele and Owen, by the way. And thanks Mickey for putting me in the Big Leagues--top page at Mickey Z’s!
Posted by Keir on from The Hague 11/26 at 01:24 PMBig leagues, Keir? If only...but thanks anyway.
Big Country, thanks for sharing your own personal love story. It never ceases to amaze how people can meet, lose touch for years, live thousands of miles apart, and then end up in the same room at the same time and fall in love. One of life’s sheer mysteries. Wish you and your wife a lifetime of health, happiness, adventure, fulfillment, and enlightenment.
Posted by Mickey Z. on from Astoria 11/26 at 01:39 PMsame to you and Michele, Mick.
Posted by JOS on from Calle Colón 11/26 at 01:57 PMHappy Birthday, Michele.
My daughter’s birthday is on Dec. 4. If these “cosmic sign” Zodiac categories are at all correct, I’d guess you’re tough, smart, very good on your feet, and nobody to mess with, under any circumstances…The trip from this birthday to the next will be slightly shorter than the trip from your last one to today… and so on.
Yet, when my mother was just a few months from her death, at the age of 85, she said that, “way inside,” she still felt exactly as she’d always felt, even back to when she was a little girl. “Isn’t that funny?” she said…
Here’s hoping you can spend lots of time “in that place,” as the years pass. My mother seemed to live most of her life from “there,” and she used to astonish people with her youthfulness and almost limitless curiosity and delight…Happy Birthday to Owen as well. Hope he’s safe and happy, up there in the Pyrenees, this weekend.
Rosemarie, I’m with Keir, about Mr. Superintendent’s “essay.” Never has anyone said less with so many words - and so poorly, at that. Of course, school officials aren’t chosen for their education and wisdom, they’re chosen for their politics and tendency toward genuflection before power.
JOS, I enjoyed your story very much. Thanks, and best of luck, my friend.
Thanks for your story, too, Mickey. And a sincere thanks to Michele for being so supportive of you and this place…Posted by joe on from Oregon 11/26 at 02:56 PMhappy birthday michele and happy saturday everyone else.
we had buy nothing day a day after everyone else for some reason so i have been manning a stall in town and am going to set myslef to defrost for a while.
Posted by michael on from scotland 11/26 at 03:32 PMHi Mike, Michael, & Suzanne...thanks Mickey, Keir, and Joe for taking the time to read about the highest paid person in our school system. I don’t think that things are much different here than in the rest of the country. It is easy to see why kids are ready to join the military when they get out of high school. So why is there so much support for the educational system as it now exists in this country?
JOS, thanks for sharing your story.Posted by RMJ on from Churchill 4 Prez Hdqts 11/26 at 03:54 PMHi Michael - Are you selling “nothing,” at your stall? And, what does it cost? I’ll take two - I’m a hot-shot American, and one is never enough.
Just read a powerful piece on the political lives of Chaney & Rumsfeld, since the 70’s, by Sidney Blumenthal. These guys are right out of some creepy LeCarre novel. The notes in the comments section are, for me, perhaps even more disturbing. Jesus, sometimes I’m tempted to become a heroin addict and just settle down under some freeway bridge, somewhere…
Another sad piece, this time about language, at CounterPunch. This is something I’ve not thought much about. Here’s a teaser:
“...Of 6000 known human languages, half are in imminent danger of disappearing, and 90% could be erased forever within a century, according to dire UNESCO reports. One language system is lost every two weeks, the United Nations cultural agency warns--five Indian subcontinent languages were irretrievably wiped out during the tsunami that obliterated islands in the Bay of Bengal earlier this year...”
Posted by joe on from Oregon 11/26 at 03:56 PMthat was what we were shouting at the stall
“buy nothing and get one free!”
we were just handing out info and doing a swap-shop bartering thing to show people how it use to be in ‘ye olden days’.
most interest we got was from some nice older people saying it was just like they use to do in the war when rationing was on and stuff.
we also had a bit of help from CIRCA - The Clandestine Insurgent Rebel Clown Army
who are performing activist/artists who go to all sorts of protest things and then when anyone is about to be arrested they jump between the police and the protestors and start performing. they didn’t have to do that today!Posted by michael on from scotland 11/26 at 04:04 PMoh, and while we are on that note…
Q. Why don’t cannibals eat clowns?
A. cos they taste funny
Posted by michael on from scotland 11/26 at 04:16 PMExcellent joke, Michael. My kind of humor. I will re-post it on Sunday as part of a major mixed bag of stuff. Tune in tomorrow, Expendables…
Thanks for the links, Joe. I’ll read ‘em later. Right now, we’re heading out the “door.” I’m dragging Michele away from her computer long enough to have a little b’day dinner.
Posted by Mickey Z. on from Astoria 11/26 at 04:40 PMHappy Birthday Michele!!!
Posted by tm on from a chair 11/26 at 05:59 PMHi, this is Michele on Mickey’s computer. Thanksfor all the good wishes. I hope all your good vibes help me get through the last few weeks ofschool. Time to go eat now. Thanks again.
Posted by Mickey Z. on from Astoria 11/26 at 06:03 PMTookie news:
Posted by JOS on from Calle Colón 11/26 at 06:04 PMHas anybody discussed the “freegans” here before?:
Have fun at dinner, M&M.
Posted by JOS on from Calle Colón 11/26 at 06:08 PMSorry, one more for RMJ, about a Bennington School teacher:
I am off to go celebrate a frined of mine’s 2 years of sobriety.
Posted by JOS on from Calle Colón 11/26 at 06:15 PMThanks JOS...Here is a quote from the link that JOS just gave us. “...School Superintendent Wesley Knapp said he was taking the situation seriously."It’s absolutely unacceptable,” Knapp said. “They (teachers) don’t have a license to hold forth on a particular standpoint.”
Posted by RMJ on from Churchill 4 Prez Hdqts 11/26 at 06:39 PMHAPPY 40TH BIRTHDAY MICHELE!
And Mickey, I’ll email your first story about the dancing policeman and the gay couple’s reactions to some gay email contacts - very funny!
Hi to all of you MZ’ers from a rather cool and windy Daylesford, Australia - it is a mere 68F today.Posted by Helga Fremlin on from Daylesford, Australia 11/26 at 07:14 PMAnd if you, Mickey, Michelle or any of the expendables plan to come to Australia here’s what’ll be on in Daylesford in March 2006: http://chilloutfestival.com/2006/index.html
I can honestly say that never in my life have I been so gloriously entertained as in March 2005 - at this year’s ChillOut FestivalPosted by Helga Fremlin on from Daylesford, Australia 11/26 at 07:50 PMIn the spirit of Storytelling Saturday and thursday’s Don’t Feed Them, They’ll Just Want To Stay Day, it’s the rousing tale of how I picked a fight with a turkey.
Several years ago, I volunteered to help a friend of mine do blissfully menial tasks at Poplar Spring Animal Sanctuary (http://www.animalsanctuary.org) on one of my days off. The couple who run it take in and care for abused farm animals. Quite an operation.
I called it “The Dung Farm”, because I was responsible for harvesting this bountiful and fragrant crop. (Hint: If for some reason during the course of your day, you are asked to choose a particular dung to clean up, choose the small ruminants’. And tell ‘em Cart sent ya!)
While cleaning the chicken/turkey/peacock/guinea hen house I was greeted by Alice the Turkey, a wizened old crone of bird with a bad attitude and a hair trigger temper. I had once seen her rough up a Sanctuary volunteer just for the thrill. On this day Alice was in a strangely talkative mood and she gobbled at me as I moved about. I was a bit surprised by this apparent effort at interspecies communication. Was Alice offering some sort of reconciliation? Had she finally realized that the circle of turkey on human violence must be broken? Wanting to be part of this potential breakthrough, I returned Alice’s gobble.
She cocked her head and blinked at me. We continued to exchange gobbles. Each time Alice stepped closer to me and appeared more irritated. I was fascinated by the fact that I was somehow insulting a turkey. Finally she chest bumped my leg repeatedly, trying bully me out of the hen house. I accepted my rebuke and moved on. I still want to know what we were arguing about.
Posted by Cart on from near Warshington DC 11/26 at 08:51 PMHey everyone. Welcome, Helga (thanks for the invite), Cart (great story), and everyone else. Thanks, as always for the links, JOS.
Just got back from here: http://tinyurl.com/8gvdy. Recommended...if you’re anywhere near Astoria.
It’s 10:47 in Astoria. A little cold but shaping up to be a nice couple of days ahead. Thanks everyone. Be sure to check in tomorrrow for a maddening stream of consciousness mix.
Posted by Mickey Z. on from Astoria 11/26 at 10:46 PM
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