So, first this happened:
…and then this happened:
…and just like that, high school is over. Thank heaven, because I was ready for it. Toward the end there, her high school got several bomb threats, nothing Columbine-like, just the usual freakout over some bathroom graffiti. I hasten to add I understand the freakout — you can’t ignore that stuff — but the day I received an email from the district with this Scooby Doo subject line — North solves mystery and keeps focus on teaching and learning — I just kind of mentally threw in the towel. Bring on a new set of irritations. Microaggressions, climbing tuition bills, all of it. P.S. The mystery wasn’t solved. The day after they nabbed the kid they thought was making the threats, a new one appeared. Oh, well. School’s out.
I still can’t believe the Vipers booked a show the night of graduation. I had paid $70 for a ticket to the all-night party, and she was going to go, dammit. I made arrangements for her to be let in after the admission window had closed (you can understand why they have to do these things; someone might bring in a bomb) and she came home at sunrise with the usual party favors, including a pair of green boxer shorts with “Kiss me I’m Irish” all over them. Boxer Short Bingo, I gathered.
Now I will take a one-year break from caring who the superintendent is, the status of the teacher contract, and of course whether the district’s wifi will ever be brought up to snuff. I will commence caring again in June 2016. For now, I have no more fucks to give, as the kids say.
So, a little bit o’ bloggage as we start the week:
I found this story fascinating. A softball player at MSU is claiming an assistant coach threw two pitches at her head after she was overheard saying unflattering things about the program to a reporter, off the record. The coaches could be looking at assault charges, I expect. Laura Lippman has written several books with the theme that women’s worst enemies are often other women. I’ll say.
How Michigan is going to overturn its prevailing-wage law. Worth reading.
Honestly, I never expected a Bush — especially the smart one — to be this incompetent, but it’s just one thing after another with this guy. Or should I say, this guy!
The Rachel Dolezal case is simply a wonder to me. Someone on my Facebook feed wondered if this isn’t some sort of Munchausen’s syndrome. I wonder.
So let’s get the week underway, shall we?
Sherri said on June 15, 2015 at 12:19 am
Now I will take a one-year break from caring who the superintendent is, the status of the teacher contract, and of course whether the district’s wifi will ever be brought up to snuff. I will commence caring again in June 2016. For now, I have no more fucks to give, as the kids say.
Amen, sister. I did start caring again, and I’m serving on a committee for the district now, but I was so done with public education for a year. It’s easier now, because it’s easier to ignore more of it. It’s like handing the crying baby back to the parents.
There aren’t any assault charges under consideration, but Stanford softball has had its own drama, resulting in a coach being fired and allegations that another head coach in the Pac-12 was behind it: http://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Coach-s-ouster-created-schism-in-Stanford-6325754.php
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Pam said on June 15, 2015 at 4:27 am
Kate looks so beautiful! And the green cap/gown is her color, too. So the summer will be spent touring with the band? What are the gold tassels and medallion? When Joe graduated from OSU, one of the things that I was terribly disappointed about was the inferior quality of the cap and gown. They were pretty much like the stuff you get to wear at the hospital, disposable. I thought that at least the cap could have been better since you keep that and the tassel. But I see why they do it. It just looked terrible in the photos. BTW, I don’t know of too many parents who aren’t delighted at the end of high school. I know I was.
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Wim said on June 15, 2015 at 7:33 am
I’ve been trying to come up with a class rhyme, like:
“Sometimes mean and always green,
we’re the Class of Aught-Fifteen.”
But then I don’t know why.
Pam, you got to keep your cap? We had to turn ours back in. I did that on my way out of town.
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beb said on June 15, 2015 at 8:16 am
The prevailing-wage referendum: welcome to the Great state of “Michissippi” where ranking last in the nation is an honor.
The “JEB!” logo Bush is using for his presidential run puts me in mind of the Beverly Hillbillies although it was Jed Clampett not Jeb.
Come and listen to my story about a man named Jeb,
a poor Millinaire barely kept his family feed (in champagin)
Then one day while rustling up some votes
Up from the ground came a bubbling crude
oil millionaires, billionaries…
Well the next thbng you know Jeb’s a candidate,
his kinfolk said ‘Jeb, said some thing nice (about your brother)
So he loaded up the limo and moved to Beverly
(just outside Dallas, no Blacks allowed…
Clearly I’m no Coolzedad
While there is clearly something messed with the Dolezal woman, it’s not like she embezzeld money or anything so I’m not sure what the problem is.
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Heather said on June 15, 2015 at 8:57 am
The problem, in my mind, is that she (intentionally or not) decided to put aside her white privilege to enter a community (and ascend to a position of power, which is the real problem), while black people could never do the same thing. The level of insensitivity to that reality is the problem.
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BigHank53 said on June 15, 2015 at 9:30 am
I don’t think Ms. Dolezal is all that mysterious. Lots of us remake ourselves. We move to the city, try to drop our hick accent, and start going to museums and symphonies. Or we move someplace rural and start gowing organic shittake mushrooms for the farmers’ market. Or off to silicon valley, Broadway, or Hollywood to strike it rich.
I don’t why an identity as a black person was so much more appealing than the one she was born with. It sure wasn’t money or power.
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Julie Robinson said on June 15, 2015 at 9:38 am
Tavis Smiley on Dolezal: http://time.com/3919899/tavis-smiley-lol-whod-sign-up-to-be-black/. Here’s his conclusion: “What we need in America are fellow citizens not in “black face,” but ones who have the courage, conviction and commitment to unapologetically use their white face —and their white voice, hands, feet, head and heart to make America a nation as good as its promise.”
Congrats to Kate, and to Mom and Dad too. You deserve a break now. And do I spy some academic honors around her neck?
It’s back into the fray today after 10 days with our kids. I leave a little bit of my heart everytime I come back, but they are both thriving so I must be content.
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LAMary said on June 15, 2015 at 9:59 am
Back in my high school days, we had a few bomb threats called in to the school. The attendance lady solved the problem by checking to see who was absent every time we had a bomb threat.
Kate looks great in her cap and gown. Congratulations to her and to you for making it through high school parenting.
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nancy said on June 15, 2015 at 10:04 am
The medal is for the National Honor Society, and the cords are for having a GPA between 3.5 and 3.99. She finished with a 3.98. Two more hundredths of a point and the cords would have been white. Ask me how much I care about this. Answer: Not one whit.
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Joe K said on June 15, 2015 at 10:21 am
Would love to see a side by side of you at your graduation next to Kate’s,
Congratulations to the whole family.
Pilot Joe
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Bitter Scribe said on June 15, 2015 at 10:39 am
You’d think all Jeb has to do is keep his mouth shut and let those other stumblebums shoot themselves in the foot. Maybe that’s what he’ll do, but it’s looking increasingly unlikely.
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alex said on June 15, 2015 at 10:40 am
Rachel Dolezal is a puzzle. One might assume that she’s motivated by the same sort of daredevilishness that drives kleptomaniacs and embezzlers, but she reminds me of a guy I knew (not well) in college in the 1980s. He was obviously a white middle-class youth who decided to become a Muslim and affect the trappings, and he loved to bitch about Western and Christian bias in everything, forever raising his hand in class to challenge profs and fellow students over political incorrectness as adjudged by him. I have a feeling he was estranged from his family and that this sort of acting out was his way of rejecting them.
I’ve also known a few sociopaths who thrived on bucking the system or having one over on people, but these folks were generally malicious and contemptuous of others, and Rachel Dolezal just doesn’t seem to fit that profile, but the story’s still unfolding so anything’s possible.
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Deborah said on June 15, 2015 at 11:06 am
Congrats to Kate and to her parents for raising a cool kid.
So, if anyone is interested, here’s a link to a Facebook page for the playground project I’ve been working on with my husband https://m.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1589290098025314
If that link doesn’t work, if you search Facebook for Brubaker Playground you should be able to find it. There are a couple of posts on it, one about the imagination cars I designed that are being fabricated now and another about the groundbreaking. Posts will be added every Monday. The profile picture is a butterfly because it is being landscaped to be a butterfly habitat because it’s located in a monarch corridor in the Midwest and monarchs are in trouble for various reasons.
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Jeff Borden said on June 15, 2015 at 11:09 am
Kate has a winning smile. Congratulations on her admission to Michigan, too.
After years of reading the rapturous commentary on “The Wire” here, we’re finally watching it on demand. If anything, all that was said about the program didn’t do it justice. We’re deeply into season two –largely focusing on the docks– and are mesmerized. We’re almost happy the weather has been shitty. When it’s storming, there’s no reason to feel guilt over catching two or three episodes in a row.
Even though many are playing some bad folks, what a showcase for African American talent.
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coozledad said on June 15, 2015 at 11:45 am
http://wonkette.com/588376/george-w-bush-real-glad-he-won-iraq-war-misses-commander-guy-cosplay
Keep talking, murdering stumblebum.
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Judybusy said on June 15, 2015 at 11:55 am
Congratulations to the family and Kate especially for graduating! I think it’s great you pulled strings to get her into the all night party, too.
Beb, loved the Jeb ditty.
Costa Rica was just wonderful. I didn’t end up ziplining; my fear of heights killed that. However, I did rappel down a 150-foot waterfall, then freaked out a while later crossing a long-ass suspension bridge that was about a zillion feet high and looooong. The only way that it got crossed is by my talking about my garden so that I was in a different place mentally. I could do the rappel because my feet were on the ground, kinda. You just had to walk down the waterfall, letting out the line. The falls are to the left in the above photo. Saw lots and lots of animals and learned much about CR ecology from some great guides.
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Deborah said on June 15, 2015 at 12:04 pm
Nope, Judy Busy, I couldn’t have crossed that suspension bridge in a million years, you deserve a medal. But it certainly is beautiful. How did your niece do?
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Judybusy said on June 15, 2015 at 12:20 pm
Oh, the niece and wife were so excited. They did go on a different ziplining/canopy tour the next day; one of the lines was almost a mile long! My wife said it was a very good decision that I did not go. Our niece was so bubbly and happy all week. She comes from a very outdoorsy family (I heard many, many hunting, fishing and camping stories during the week!) so this was the perfect place to take her! The place where we stayed had agouti wandering around and if it wasn’t raining, capuchin monkeys would come to eat from the huge mango tree outside our room, which was on second floor. Great watching!
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Judybusy said on June 15, 2015 at 12:41 pm
Am still quite excited about the trip, as evidenced by the multiple exclamation marks. Am running on 4 hours of poor sleep due to getting in (on time) at 11:30 and just not being able to really wind down from such a marvelous trip. Back at work today.
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alex said on June 15, 2015 at 12:44 pm
Here’s the local story from Idaho that broke before Rachel Dolezal became a national story. Her parents are involved with Creation Ministries International. No wonder she disowns them.
In the article she claims to have custody of one of her adopted black brothers, so I suspect this may be part of her “legal dispute” with her family.
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Jeff Borden said on June 15, 2015 at 1:15 pm
I see via Charles P. Pierce that Lindsey Graham can’t wait to sends more sons and daughters to their deaths in the Middle East as he promises to topple Assad and defeat ISIS and al Queda from Day One of his presidency. Luckily, he will be denied that chance, but damn, aside from the also unelectable Rand Paul, is every single GOP candidate espousing war again? These are some truly stupid people if they’ve learned nothing since 2003 about war over there. Then again, they probably know how stupid it is, but want to make sure our military-industrial complex keeps humming along.
I’m not particularly thrilled with Hillary Clinton but the important things is not who is the Democratic candidate. The important thing is to keep the other side out of the Oval Office. Republicans are insane. Until they find their way to sanity, they must be kept from the levers of power.
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Brandon said on June 15, 2015 at 2:15 pm
Good riddance!
http://www.tmz.com/2015/06/15/rachel-dolezal-naacp-president-steps-down-quits/
http://jezebel.com/rachel-dolezal-told-a-student-she-didn-t-look-hispanic-1711101139
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Dexter said on June 15, 2015 at 5:01 pm
Big time, big city editor passes away.
http://www.legacy.com/obituaries/kpcnews/obituary.aspx?n=john-carroll&pid=175079423
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MichaelG said on June 15, 2015 at 5:24 pm
Congratulations to Kate! And best of luck at Michigan. What a smile!
Interesting article, Alex. La Dolezal sounds like a delightful person.
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alex said on June 15, 2015 at 5:29 pm
MichaelG, the story gets stranger still.
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Dexter said on June 15, 2015 at 8:05 pm
I had a horrible day, on the phone arguing over an insurance claim to multiple parties for the entire business day, and now I am going to vent here before my foul mood leaves me.
I am fucking sick of Lester Holt being some kind of stop-gap quasi-anchor at NBC.
The Post is saying Brian Williams is going to take a kick in the ass and be down-graded to some lesser job, so it’s time for Lester Holt to be paid the $ten mil that Brian got or else find someone else to take the anchor and sink it for a few years with a nice long contract. NBC , paying Holt $4 mil per year, is that treating him like some lesser person? No, because that’s a lot of dough and Holt was never offered the coveted anchor title. This whole saga is old. I just wish they’d give Brian another chance…guess that hain’t a-gonna happen, damn it. Time for hockey.
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devtob said on June 15, 2015 at 8:24 pm
Congrats to Kate, practically perfect academically, headed to an excellent university, plus she’s in a rocking band.
And to Nancy and Alan, who made all of that possible.
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Sherri said on June 15, 2015 at 9:39 pm
Remember my description of the three point Republican game plan over the weekend? Here’s the latest example: http://www.seattletimes.com/nation-world/house-committee-chairman-spin-off-air-traffic-control/
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Deborah said on June 15, 2015 at 10:06 pm
Geez, the money grubbing GOP business types just can not wait to get their hands (Mitts) on the government till, now the FAA and especially social security, they are salivating over all of the moolah they can scrape up out of the middle class. It is disgusting how many people they can dupe into their schemes by promising them their favorite little hate parties. Sorry, I’m in a bad mood and that link didn’t help, but it’s good to know.
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4dbirds said on June 16, 2015 at 10:59 am
Congrats to Kate and family. Woohoo!
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