Dudes0r. For the longest time, I couldn't log on to blogger. Now I am here, and what do I have to say? Not much, you horny bastards.
Rundown of shiznock from 2/17/04 11:37:07 AM CST to sometime in the afternoon CST on 2/18/04: Leave study hall, go to Decathlon prepared to die. Good news! The presentation that I thought I was to give that day was rescheduled to Monday before I could even tell Senor BEaton that we were not ready. Physics flies by with me in a half-doze for half the class (I get high As in there, but the shiznock is boring as hell). English comes, asks for homework, I say "NO!" English says "Ok," and then continues with "ICTW!" (in-class timed writing). I counter with "OMGWT! F!" (Old men grope wrinkly testicles! Fuck!). I write, I survive, and I hope I passed. Go to Computer Science Club with the Johnantor and play on the computer for about forty-five minutes while he does his thing (which is the time it took me to edit this template and put the link up and read up on my news). John and I then go down to Eric's house to find Eric (to my surprise and delight) unwilling to kill us. We then partook of the traditional ritual of ping pong and cake that has been passed down through the ages. Much excellent ping pong was played, and at the beginning I was a giant unbeatable fireball, but I was quite disappointed with the end, where I lost to both Eric and John, both games 22-20 (they were superb games, but it is the close ones that hurt most to lose... just ask the Panthers). After much regailing and general merriment, I came back here and collapsed promptly into bed sometime around 6:00 PM CST 2/17/04. The next day I woke up, picked up my Perrine's book and headed to school. Political spectrum in government; integrals, natural logs, and assorted fun in calculus; bullshit in multimedia; slightly more productive bullshit in study hall; pictures of people that were for the most part not me courtesy of the Houston Chronicle in decathlon; a surprisingly non-sleep inducing lesson about mirrors in physics (perhaps because I got 11 hours of sleep the night before?); and a lovely bit of assorted BSing--though of the intelligent sort--in English (and I forgot more homework).
Now, folks, we pause for a minute.
Here's where time slowed down; where the nasty ass of society rubbed itself harshly (and in slow-motion) in my face. We were in Mrs. Serrette's room for a Decathlon meeting. This particular one was on Economics, being taught by Genny and Lauren. There are two exceptionally large problems with such a situation:
1) Genny is a whore. An evil, heartless bitch that deserves no less than the fate of the fellow in Greek Mythology that had his liver eaten by a ravenous bird each day for all of eternity (the liver grew back, of course). Sanctioning a combination of her with Lauren will invariably result in a violation of our eighth amendment rights as guaranteed by the United States Constitution and not restricted by the Supreme Court within public schools that we shall not receive cruel and unusual punishment. (For the record, Lauren is actually pretty cool... just not when you mix her with Genny)
2) Genny's knowledge about economics is questionable at best. Her general ditziness certainly doesn't help her here. Her struggles in Economics (Christ, I sat so incredibly near her in that class) were quite notable, and her understanding of fundamental concepts was so shaky that I was amazed she understood any economic theory at all. Lauren has had even more struggles in the class, and was ecstatic when she learned that she passed the course.
Now, Mr. Eaton was probably hoping to use their friendship and apparent knowledge of Economics (they medalled at state... somehow) as an effective teaching tool. It's a pity that he picked the two seniors in Decathlon (it would be unwise to choose a junior since they haven't taken the course--although Connie scored higher than anyone else on the team in Economics... by one question :P) that were probably the least suited for the job. Even Noor, who I privately--and now publicly (sorry buddy)--criticize for being a poor teacher would have done a better job than those two did. Unfortunately, Mr. Eaton did not select Noor, Eric, David, or me to help in the lesson.
On to what actually happened today: I was busily castigating Noor for going to McDonald's and not bringing anything back for Eric or me (even though I mentioned that McDonald's was sick and that we wouldn't want anything, I just wanted to remind him that with any other eating establishment he should bring food and allow me to reimburse him). Noor was in the clear however; not only was he not teaching the lesson while being late, he was not teaching the lesson while being on time. The same cannot be said of Lauren and Genny, who arrived at about 3:00 CST 2/18/04, smelling of cigarette smoke (I only got a whiff of Lauren, but I am told that Genny smelled particularly "acrid"--when cigarettes get to the point of acridity, you cross the border of dirty and unpleasant and enter the realm of vile, putrid, and vomit-inducing). They had just come back from Taco Bell. I wasn't entirely certain, but I had a feeling that the seniors who were there with me had a strong desire to have whatever questions they had answered and get out as quickly as possible. I was right; at first it was just David at the computer table. Eventually Eric and Noor would join him, leaving me in a desk, obligated by my duty to make sure that Genny and Lauren didn't teach this shit wrong.
I can't even begin to remember exactly what it was that they covered first--they moved through everything with ridiculous speed and gave very vague and generally unhelpful explanations as they went. There were essentially two juniors there that had a significant need for economic knowledge: Anita and Dana. I can't remember Dana saying a word the entire time, except when she said something to Anita about sparing the tissues (our esteemed professors were using the overhead projector for their lesson, and when they needed to clean the overhead, they went not to the large roll of paper towels right next to it, but to the box of tissues--an understandable mistake, though, I will give them that. Anita pointed out the existence of that roll). It seemed to pretty much be Anita who was asking the majority of the questions. I'm too tired to think up all of the examples that these girls gave or what prompted them, but here's a dandy (my apologize for the Economese):
The girls had just finished giving a microeconomical example using an aggregate graph (a no-no, but one that would likely cause more harm than good if I pointed it out). Genny had also done considerably annoying things like drawing the AD curve with an actual curve instead of the straight lineness that it is, but that's not why I was angry. I was angry because Lauren then asked for the Determinants of Demand. I said to myself "ok, this is very basic stuff, but basic stuff that they will ask questions about and that will provide a decent foundation [yada yada yada]". Anita exuberantly gave them "income", which was indeed a determinant of demand. Unfortunately, the next example she came up with was government spending, which is actually a component of Gross Domestic Product, not a determinant of demand. Before I realized what was going on, Genny had drawn a graph with a forty-five degree line and a consumption curve (unlabeled, of course). I was, naturally, baffled. After trying to ask Eric if knowing what that graph looks like (which was not in any way a good explanation of why a change in income--I believe they had actually gone back to discussing that--would change the demand curve), Lauren made a statement in her gentle way, suggesting that I bring my query to light. I pretty much pointed to the overhead and asked if we even needed to be learning this. Anita then turned back in her seat and told me that even if I found this unimportant, she didn't, so she would like to learn it. I then tried to explain that this curve served no use to us, and would have gone into an explanation of its ineffectiveness at proving their point and the fact that it would probably end up confusing our juniors more than anything, but Genny cut me off and nearly burst out, but instead managed to retain some degree of decorum when she said something along the lines of "I promised myself that I was not going to do this, but Cantay, if you don't like what I'm teaching, then you can leave." With this, she pointed at the door.
I then stopped to think that I'd just called a teacher out and attacked her authority in front of the class. That is something that I would never ordinarily do, much less condone, because usually we are dealing with professionals whose occupation is to teach us whatever it is they are trying to teach us, and they at the very least deserve our respect. But Genny is a chain-smoking, ecstasy-popping, trash-talking piece of scum that has lost my respect time and time again. One that has done shit to prepare this lesson, and one that cannot be compared to a real teacher. (If you've read this far, I'm surprised; have a cookie) Now I have in the past inadvertantly poked fun at teachers or maybe done things that may have undermined their authority. "Europe is my favorite country too!" But I never felt a desire to embarrass or humiliate any of them. Genny is different.
Thankfully, my sense kicked in right about here. I couldn't make repeated attacks on Genny; if I did, the conflict would likely escalate to a very severe breaking point and the team would be split and burdened with even more emotional baggage before we got to compete at state. So I kept my seat and my cool and settled for correcting Genny and Lauren with as much respect as I could muster, elaborating on their points for Anita, and trying to help her get past confusing terminology (that's right, bitch, I can actually translate Economese into English... the Economese version is just much more succint).
It was tough, though, resisting the temptation to join my male brethren at the computers. Eric even posted a blog while Genny was teaching. Oh well. We got through it and eventually we all got to go home. Hurrah!
And I realize that I have sounded like a pompous ass throughout much of this entry... it's what happens when you have too much Genny exposure. Take back the mean-spirited things I said? Maybe when my memory's dulled. But it always does dull. I guess that's how I manage to get so disappointed with her.
Now I'd better get back to my IUP application. Don't turn into Genny, folks! Hasta la byebye!
Rundown of shiznock from 2/17/04 11:37:07 AM CST to sometime in the afternoon CST on 2/18/04: Leave study hall, go to Decathlon prepared to die. Good news! The presentation that I thought I was to give that day was rescheduled to Monday before I could even tell Senor BEaton that we were not ready. Physics flies by with me in a half-doze for half the class (I get high As in there, but the shiznock is boring as hell). English comes, asks for homework, I say "NO!" English says "Ok," and then continues with "ICTW!" (in-class timed writing). I counter with "OMGWT! F!" (Old men grope wrinkly testicles! Fuck!). I write, I survive, and I hope I passed. Go to Computer Science Club with the Johnantor and play on the computer for about forty-five minutes while he does his thing (which is the time it took me to edit this template and put the link up and read up on my news). John and I then go down to Eric's house to find Eric (to my surprise and delight) unwilling to kill us. We then partook of the traditional ritual of ping pong and cake that has been passed down through the ages. Much excellent ping pong was played, and at the beginning I was a giant unbeatable fireball, but I was quite disappointed with the end, where I lost to both Eric and John, both games 22-20 (they were superb games, but it is the close ones that hurt most to lose... just ask the Panthers). After much regailing and general merriment, I came back here and collapsed promptly into bed sometime around 6:00 PM CST 2/17/04. The next day I woke up, picked up my Perrine's book and headed to school. Political spectrum in government; integrals, natural logs, and assorted fun in calculus; bullshit in multimedia; slightly more productive bullshit in study hall; pictures of people that were for the most part not me courtesy of the Houston Chronicle in decathlon; a surprisingly non-sleep inducing lesson about mirrors in physics (perhaps because I got 11 hours of sleep the night before?); and a lovely bit of assorted BSing--though of the intelligent sort--in English (and I forgot more homework).
Now, folks, we pause for a minute.
Here's where time slowed down; where the nasty ass of society rubbed itself harshly (and in slow-motion) in my face. We were in Mrs. Serrette's room for a Decathlon meeting. This particular one was on Economics, being taught by Genny and Lauren. There are two exceptionally large problems with such a situation:
1) Genny is a whore. An evil, heartless bitch that deserves no less than the fate of the fellow in Greek Mythology that had his liver eaten by a ravenous bird each day for all of eternity (the liver grew back, of course). Sanctioning a combination of her with Lauren will invariably result in a violation of our eighth amendment rights as guaranteed by the United States Constitution and not restricted by the Supreme Court within public schools that we shall not receive cruel and unusual punishment. (For the record, Lauren is actually pretty cool... just not when you mix her with Genny)
2) Genny's knowledge about economics is questionable at best. Her general ditziness certainly doesn't help her here. Her struggles in Economics (Christ, I sat so incredibly near her in that class) were quite notable, and her understanding of fundamental concepts was so shaky that I was amazed she understood any economic theory at all. Lauren has had even more struggles in the class, and was ecstatic when she learned that she passed the course.
Now, Mr. Eaton was probably hoping to use their friendship and apparent knowledge of Economics (they medalled at state... somehow) as an effective teaching tool. It's a pity that he picked the two seniors in Decathlon (it would be unwise to choose a junior since they haven't taken the course--although Connie scored higher than anyone else on the team in Economics... by one question :P) that were probably the least suited for the job. Even Noor, who I privately--and now publicly (sorry buddy)--criticize for being a poor teacher would have done a better job than those two did. Unfortunately, Mr. Eaton did not select Noor, Eric, David, or me to help in the lesson.
On to what actually happened today: I was busily castigating Noor for going to McDonald's and not bringing anything back for Eric or me (even though I mentioned that McDonald's was sick and that we wouldn't want anything, I just wanted to remind him that with any other eating establishment he should bring food and allow me to reimburse him). Noor was in the clear however; not only was he not teaching the lesson while being late, he was not teaching the lesson while being on time. The same cannot be said of Lauren and Genny, who arrived at about 3:00 CST 2/18/04, smelling of cigarette smoke (I only got a whiff of Lauren, but I am told that Genny smelled particularly "acrid"--when cigarettes get to the point of acridity, you cross the border of dirty and unpleasant and enter the realm of vile, putrid, and vomit-inducing). They had just come back from Taco Bell. I wasn't entirely certain, but I had a feeling that the seniors who were there with me had a strong desire to have whatever questions they had answered and get out as quickly as possible. I was right; at first it was just David at the computer table. Eventually Eric and Noor would join him, leaving me in a desk, obligated by my duty to make sure that Genny and Lauren didn't teach this shit wrong.
I can't even begin to remember exactly what it was that they covered first--they moved through everything with ridiculous speed and gave very vague and generally unhelpful explanations as they went. There were essentially two juniors there that had a significant need for economic knowledge: Anita and Dana. I can't remember Dana saying a word the entire time, except when she said something to Anita about sparing the tissues (our esteemed professors were using the overhead projector for their lesson, and when they needed to clean the overhead, they went not to the large roll of paper towels right next to it, but to the box of tissues--an understandable mistake, though, I will give them that. Anita pointed out the existence of that roll). It seemed to pretty much be Anita who was asking the majority of the questions. I'm too tired to think up all of the examples that these girls gave or what prompted them, but here's a dandy (my apologize for the Economese):
The girls had just finished giving a microeconomical example using an aggregate graph (a no-no, but one that would likely cause more harm than good if I pointed it out). Genny had also done considerably annoying things like drawing the AD curve with an actual curve instead of the straight lineness that it is, but that's not why I was angry. I was angry because Lauren then asked for the Determinants of Demand. I said to myself "ok, this is very basic stuff, but basic stuff that they will ask questions about and that will provide a decent foundation [yada yada yada]". Anita exuberantly gave them "income", which was indeed a determinant of demand. Unfortunately, the next example she came up with was government spending, which is actually a component of Gross Domestic Product, not a determinant of demand. Before I realized what was going on, Genny had drawn a graph with a forty-five degree line and a consumption curve (unlabeled, of course). I was, naturally, baffled. After trying to ask Eric if knowing what that graph looks like (which was not in any way a good explanation of why a change in income--I believe they had actually gone back to discussing that--would change the demand curve), Lauren made a statement in her gentle way, suggesting that I bring my query to light. I pretty much pointed to the overhead and asked if we even needed to be learning this. Anita then turned back in her seat and told me that even if I found this unimportant, she didn't, so she would like to learn it. I then tried to explain that this curve served no use to us, and would have gone into an explanation of its ineffectiveness at proving their point and the fact that it would probably end up confusing our juniors more than anything, but Genny cut me off and nearly burst out, but instead managed to retain some degree of decorum when she said something along the lines of "I promised myself that I was not going to do this, but Cantay, if you don't like what I'm teaching, then you can leave." With this, she pointed at the door.
I then stopped to think that I'd just called a teacher out and attacked her authority in front of the class. That is something that I would never ordinarily do, much less condone, because usually we are dealing with professionals whose occupation is to teach us whatever it is they are trying to teach us, and they at the very least deserve our respect. But Genny is a chain-smoking, ecstasy-popping, trash-talking piece of scum that has lost my respect time and time again. One that has done shit to prepare this lesson, and one that cannot be compared to a real teacher. (If you've read this far, I'm surprised; have a cookie) Now I have in the past inadvertantly poked fun at teachers or maybe done things that may have undermined their authority. "Europe is my favorite country too!" But I never felt a desire to embarrass or humiliate any of them. Genny is different.
Thankfully, my sense kicked in right about here. I couldn't make repeated attacks on Genny; if I did, the conflict would likely escalate to a very severe breaking point and the team would be split and burdened with even more emotional baggage before we got to compete at state. So I kept my seat and my cool and settled for correcting Genny and Lauren with as much respect as I could muster, elaborating on their points for Anita, and trying to help her get past confusing terminology (that's right, bitch, I can actually translate Economese into English... the Economese version is just much more succint).
It was tough, though, resisting the temptation to join my male brethren at the computers. Eric even posted a blog while Genny was teaching. Oh well. We got through it and eventually we all got to go home. Hurrah!
And I realize that I have sounded like a pompous ass throughout much of this entry... it's what happens when you have too much Genny exposure. Take back the mean-spirited things I said? Maybe when my memory's dulled. But it always does dull. I guess that's how I manage to get so disappointed with her.
Now I'd better get back to my IUP application. Don't turn into Genny, folks! Hasta la byebye!
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