Here Oliver Willis argues that Gore is not soft on Iraq but is arguing a point that is consistent with his past postions. I agree. Al Gore is still flat-out wrong. To all the people who claim a political motivation for Bush's stance on Iraq and suggest peaceful solutions for ousting Mr. Hussein, I ask if they have been paying attention for the past eleven years. We have attempted other solutions and in the current climate we simply can't wait for Hussein to fall over and die (the only reliable way of replacing dictators and strongmen) for us to replace him. My contention is that Saddam Hussein will kill many Americans sooner or later and we won't even know we have been hit. Michael Kinsley from Slate.com is wrong, Joe Klein from Slate.com is wrong, Al Gore is wrong, and Oliver Willis is wrong!

Florida State goes down for a second year in a row!
Let me take a moment to state my opinion that expecting a team of college kids to defeat every other group of college kids they meet is ridiculous. College football is the only sport that predicates ultimate victory on perfection. College football needs three things:

1. A playoff system.
   
2. Fewer teams.
   
3. Better compensation for players.
   

The majority of schools have no business fielding major college football teams. Football is an expensive, brutal sport that crowds out other sports and cause strife on campus. I love football, but football loses money for all but the biggest schools. I don't support football when it's not self-sustaining or near self-sustaining. Title IX is a good thing and women deserve to play sports just as much as men do, that is not the problem. The problem is that most schools cut men's programs to find money for women's programs because football is draining massive sums of money from their programs.
The bowl system in football is a laughable, inequitable, haphazard method of determining a champion. The only sure way for anyone to know who is truly the best is through a playoff system. Shorten the season, use the lower tier bowls to eliminate teams, and move up to another tier of bowls to decide who advances to the next round. Finish everything the week before the Super bowl. It can't be that difficult!
A problem in all major college sports and not just football is that athletes are under-compensated. Granted a college education in exchange for athletic talent is a fair trade, but these students often have basic financial needs that go unmet and coaches and alumni aren't allowed to help. Students are also forced to pay for tings like health insurance out of their own pockets and simultaneously not allowed to work to make money to pay for these things. Based on my personal experience with college athletics, as soon as I knew I could make anything more than $100,000 playing a sport I would leave school. The average starting salary in computer science is $40,000 and for other fields entry level positions often pay just $30,000 a year. Staying in school and taking the abuse simply makes no sense unless you come from a middle class or wealthy home, with parents that will support you should you be injured and need support to finish college. Schools just don't provide enough incentive to remain in school.

Oh My God... There are certain things that I automatically think are jokes until I see them. That was one of them. I got the link from Espn. By the way, I love TMQ!

Lately in my young substitute teaching career, I have been attempting to find jobs closer to my home. Tomorrow, I teach at Bryan Adams High, a scant fifteen minutes from my house according to MapQuest. This has had the affect of exposing me to more diverse student bodies. Until Tuesday, every school I had taught at was predominantly black and hispanic. Woodrow Wilson today was mostly Hispanic, but I did teach a class that was mostly white children - a first for me. The diference is shocking. All the kids are fairly equal in intelligence. The environment in many of the poorer neighborhoods just isn't conducive to learning.
The first thing I would do, if I were in charge of administrating DISD is clean the schools. I understand that repairs and renovations could be expensive, but cleaning is imperative - it's a health issue. I'd say the most important duty of the school district is providing a clean and safe environment for learning. We don't need computers or technology or more testing. We don't even necessarily need better pay for teachers. Dallas schools need to keep teachers in the classroom everyday. My showing up in a class essentially means that students will learn nothing even in the best of circumstances. If paying teachers more will keep them in the classroom than we should pay them more. The one magic bullet to save Dallas schools that no one mentions is parental involvement. We could do without half of the gimmicks and new tests if parents would get involved. If a child fails it is usually his parents' fault for not asking about his progress and disciplining him. My prescription for fixing performance of the school district.

1. Clean the schools.
   
2. Reduce teacher absenteeism.
   
3. Have a massive campaign to get parents involved in the schools.
   

Any school district that could do all three would be the number one public school district in the nation. If any school district could just get parents involved the improvement would be astounding.

This is very lame I know, but on SaveKaryn.com there is a hilarious bit about selling people on eBay. Semi-direct link to it here.

Rangers play the spoiler again! Man! I love this. We can't get into the playoffs but we can make life difficult for everybody else in the West. Link from Msnbc.
All these links have me thinking, unless I fnd a way to really spread out and make my links really special, my links will be just a record of my web browsing - an online history file. Maybe I should post links to porno web sites? Nahh...

Selig's daughter is out as president of the Brewers. Is anybody surprised? The Texas connection here is that Doug Melvin, architect of the Rangers' roster disasters before John Hart got here and really screwed things up, is the new General Manager. Great man for the job! Link from Msnbc.

In the Way Far Out Department of ideas is this article about moving the Expos to Puerto Rico! Link from Msnbc.

Randy Moss isn't going to jail! Well not right away. At one time I was very sad that the Cowboys didn't draft him, as I am sure Jerry Jones was. Now I am not so sure. Link from Msnbc.

Realtors want to avoid the fate of travel agents. I stole this link from Shacknews. The original article from USA Today is here.

Uh Oh! bottom of the ninth, 2 out, one on. Score is 4 to 3, Texas.

I just love how the Texas Rangers have assumed the role of spoiler in the American League West. I just stepped over to catch a little of the game and Mike Young just walked to force in a run witht eh bases loaded and Rafael Palmerio - one of three future Hall of Famers on the roster - coming to bat. Isn't it scary when the worst team in a division has talent?

People in 'Nawlins need to get ready for Isidore. Got this link from Msnbc.

Blogging from Woodrow Wilson High. I really love the architecture of the campus. Red brick with white interlocking bricks at the corner and semi-gothic embellishments at the doorways and roof. The campus is old and very classy. Newer campuses in Dallas are ugly and soulless. I think the reason for the dramatic diference in architecture is age of the school and location. Lakewood, the neighborhood Woodrow Wilson is in, is a historic Dallas neighborhood (I know because all the street signs say so) and Woodrow Wilson is an older campus.
I am teaching World History in room 314 for Mr. Kirkpatrick. The class is predominantly hispanic, like the rest of the school, with a couple of black and white kids tossed into the mix. I parked in the student parking by mistake, and only realized it when I saw students getting out fo their cars next to me.
Nothing very interesting to tell yet today, and it doesn't appear that I'll have much opportunity for interaction with the students as the lesson plan dictates that most of the class period will be consumed by a test. I am going to go chill in the lounge now.

By the way the last one was from Slate.

Another Bush appointee in trouble. You know the problem with my links is that most of the come from Slate.com, or Shacknews.com. Maybe readers should just bookmark salte and the shack and bypassme altogether? Nahh...

God protect us from the more acts of the PC police! Link courtesy of Slate.com.

I just emailed the link to this blog to a friend moe liberal than I. I just wanted to say that I am not as right wing as I may sound at times... don't hate me! I did link Robert Wright's articles, and he's as liberal as one could care to get as far as I am concerned.

Wow, I wonder what the liberals have to say in reply to this?

Cool article about GoogleNews at slate.com.

By the way, the thing that upset me most about the bus ride, is that I saw this cute Spanish chick and didn't have the courage to meet her. :( A burly Mexican laborer did however, to my dismay. I joked with them briefly while sitting next to Shannon on the way to Bryan. They were eating tacos, and I asked them, "Te gusta la comida?" The man answered, "No gusto." I replied with "Da me la comida." Of course the next thing I said was: "Como se dice 'joke'?"

Now that I have updated the world on the useless details of my life I'll return to google-pleasing links like this one and this one. Both are highly recommended. Que Sera Sera is a blogger featured link, and I linked Sourmash not only because of Bob's open letter to blogdom, but also because something morbid in me really enjoys watching somebody else wallow in depression.

Whew, this is the first post in three days! I have a lot of catching up to do.
Friday, I left for Bryan, Texas at the same time my parents were leaving for Kansas City, Missouri. I was riding the train downtown from my house and I had exactly two minutes to pack and getto the train station. I strode in greeted my mother, threw clothes in a bag, and strode out. (Note the use of the word strode. When I am in hurry I stride, rather than walk. I look like a man on a mission.) arrived at the train station with time to spare, which shocked me, and boarded the train. I promise that from now on, any time I wish to go downtown I shall ride the train. The train moves slowly but cuts such a direct path to all the major nerve centers in Dallas between my house in Lake Highlands and downtown Dallas that driving by car seems a little silly considering the cost in stress, gas, parking, and time. I arrived downtown less than a block away from the Greyhound station and had enough time before boarding my bus to stop at McDonalds to eat a heart disease burger. (YUM!)
The bus ride to Bryan was a disaster. Two bolts sheared off the bus before we arrived in Waco, Texas (Home of the Branch Davidians!). A bunch of college students (what a carefree designation, what I wouldn't give to be designated as such again) boarded the bus and sat with us for the next four hours at the bus station. I met a friendly girl from UT (University of Texas) named Shannon, whom I bought carrot cake for at a Dino's Diner in downtown Waco. Like all the girls I meet, she had a boyfriend. Which isn't her fault, she was nice enough. When we finally did get to Bryan she rushed off to ride into College Station with her friends without saying goodbye, probably so she could be present to kiss her boyfriend at the Aggies' traditional Midnight yell. Which was quite remarkable when you think about it - she made a nine to ten hour nookie run, or well it is possible it was chaste - with just the one kiss.
My friend picked me up in Bryan and we hung out for the next day, and he drove me back to Dallas Saturday night. I missed the performance by Martin Short and Tim Curry, but then who is Martin Short? I am fairly certain he is short, and I can name one movie (Innerspace) that he appeared in. Maybe I didn'tmis all that much.
Monday, I substituted for Bob Burns, at Florence Middle School in his science class. The students were relatively well behaved. The computer was borked though so no updates from school on Monday. Nothing especially remarkable happened that I can remember.
Today something remarkable happened today though. I taught a class with more than one white child in it. I realized it, after the fifth period. It wasn't a predominantly white class - I don't think that is possible in Dallas. Instead the kids were a charming rainbow of skin colors and nationalities. The class looked as if someone had interrupted a Benneton ad mid-shoot. The kids also thought I looked like the comedian Godfrey from the 7-Up commericals. Upon reflection, I realized I did - white shirt, tie, and blue green vest. (Godfrey must be a handsome brother!) Once again the children were amazed at my capcity for remembering their names - they told me that even the regular teachers needed two weeks to learn all the names. After school, the Nigerian teacher the next door down, whom all the kids feared and hated, gave me a short lesson on Nigerian geography. I gave him my business card. I consider us even.

Umm.... Wow! Yesterday was interesting. Never riding Greyhound again. I also got to see downtown Waco. More later...

Does anybody know how to play Clue?

Candidate for office in Sweden running on porn platform. Got this link from the Shacknews.com.

You know a lot of people boost traffic to their sites by posting random photographs of unclothed women. My question is why? I've considered it, but the people who come for the nudity don't stay or visit more than once. I suppose you'd attract attention from search engines too; but again, it strikes me as cheating.
One thing I learned from another blogger (I forget which or I'd link him) is that adding more links attracts traffic - legitimate traffic. A node in a network is only as valuable as what can be reached from it, so the more connected a node is the better. Google exploits this principle by ranking sites based on its connections to other sites. Google rewards linking. Sites that are dead ends, that don't link you anywhere, don't get many hits. Unless, of course, they have some other value, like lots of pictures of undressed women.
I wanted to stay PG-13 so I added more links.

I don't know if I have mentioned this before, but Ihavedevelopedthemostannoyinghabitofrunningmywordstogether.

Another link from the Escribitionist. Curious readers may also note another link from the 17th that I didn't include. I must say that it is the sickest thing I have seen in some time and is only funny if you have ovaries. Or not. Men may laugh too I suppose, if their women will let them.

The next dance craze from Europe? Some people still haven't learned the Macarena. I scored this link from the Escribitionist.

George W. is related to Lady Di and Churchill! Who would have thought it? Linked from msn.com. (Like Msn needs me to link to them!)

Geometry and basketball. Link from Sportsbabel.

Bob Hayes is dead. :(

This is why inspections in Iraq will never work. Got the link from VodkaPundit.

The strange and sordid tale of Aileen Wuornos. I ran into this link while surfing Norah's BlogJam. Aileen's execution for the murder of her first victim is coming any day.

Mickey Kaus thinks that Arnold Schwarzenegger is running for governor of California.

Snow White learns kung fu! I got this link courtesy of Shacknews.com.

Wild and crazy Zero Gravity technology discussion.

Another one of those pics. Although I could swear that the picture is actually of Avril Lavigne. Just the way the eyes look at you, you know?

I feel much better today. My voice is almost all the way back, well I am not going to be joining any singing contests soon so it doesn't matter. I am not working today though. Listenting to Bic Runga's Sway. Beautiful song, and great for singing when your voice isn't that strong. It's written to be crooned not belted.

Did I say I was addicted to Hot or Not.com? Pictures like this one are why. Girls slay me.

Self portraits in the digital age.

Never ever do business deals with Nigerians.. I say that and I am Nigerian. The problem is that Nigeria is populated by very educated thieves. Nigerians are also very well traveled so Nigerian con artists and criminals dot the globe.
My family recently experienced this when somebody intercepted a letter from my mother to my aunt. The con artist amended the letter to include a request for several hundred dollars to be delivered to a man who would arrive at an airport shortly, to repay a debt on my mother's behalf. My aunt was instructed to keep the matter secret. The ruse was only caught when my father called my aunt and handed the telephone over to my mother. My aunt immediately mentioned the money and my mother denied having sent her such a letter. My aunt read the letter to her and my mother was shocked to see how her letter had been repurposed.
The moral of the story is that you should never trust communications from Nigeria.

If you're a comic book fan and a blogger than you should bookmark Die Puny Humans! now.

If you're a sports nut and a blogger than you should bookmark SportsBabel now.

Sick behavior by a weblogger

I just did a quick bit of ego-surfing and I was surprised by the result of putting my name in Google. This site does not come up once but a number of posts made to game programming lists do. Here are the links if anyone cares:

• GameProgrammer.Com Mailing List (by thread)
  ... Adrian Brown. No Subject, peter.bedford: RE:, Idahosa Edokpayi. No
  Subject, Martin Olsson; No Subject, Bobby: Re:, Derold; RE:, Idahosa ...
  www.gameprogrammer.com/archive/html/thrd2.html - 25k
  
  
• GameProgrammer.Com Mailing List (by thread)
  ... list, Tom Webb. hope u can help me!!!!! Nigel Freedom: RE:
  hope u can help me!!!!! Idahosa Edokpayi: RE: hope u can ...
  www.gameprogrammer.com/archive/html/thrd35.html - 28k -
  
  
• Yahoo! Groups : opengl-gamedev-l Messages :12747-12776 of 20967
  ... Idahosa I. Edokpayi, Tue 2/1/2000. 12757, Re: Change display mode on
  the fly, notnot@x... Tue 2/1/2000. 12758, Re: Where is the open source
  ? ...
  groups.yahoo.com/group/opengl-gamedev-l/messages/12747 - 21k
  
  
• Yahoo! Groups : opengl-gamedev-l Messages :12777-12807 of 20967.
  .. Idahosa I. Edokpayi, Wed 2/2/2000. 12791, Re: Where is the open source
  ? Idahosa I. Edokpayi, Wed 2/2/2000. 12792, Re: I am a beginner. ...
  groups.yahoo.com/group/opengl-gamedev-l/messages/12777 - 21k
  
  
• : By Date
  ... Ratcliff; Re: Sample Implementation Source Code and Console Targets Neal Tringham;
  RE: Sample Implementation Source Code and Console Targets Idahosa I. Edokpayi; ...
  apollo.iwt.uni-bielefeld.de/~ml_robot/ OpenGL-02-2000/date.html - 81k
  
  
• : By Thread
  ... Re: GLTrace 2 Keith Harrison. RE: GLTrace 2 Chris Jurney. Re: OpenGL window requirements
  Neal Tringham; re: OpenGL window requirements Idahosa I. Edokpayi; Re: math ...
  apollo.iwt.uni-bielefeld.de/~ml_robot/OpenGL-02-2000/ - 87k
  
  
• Geocrawler.com - gdalgorithms-list - 2002/3
  ... Mail archive - 2002-03. Thread/Subject, Author, Date/Time. ... Idahosa Edokpayi, 03/30/2002
  23:01:02. ... Maltez, 03/25/2002 16:16:10. ... Idahosa Edokpayi, 03/25/2002 08:47:57. ...
  www.geocrawler.com/archives/3/4856/2002/3/0/ - 30k
  
  
• Geocrawler.com - gdalgorithms-list - 2001/9
  ... Idahosa Edokpayi, 09/30/2001 17:37:45. ... Ken M, 09/30/2001 17:21:03. ... Jon
  Watte, 09/30/2001 17:17:27. ... Idahosa Edokpayi, 09/30/2001 08:02:11. ...
  www.geocrawler.com/archives/3/4856/2001/9/0/ - 30k
  
  
• The Blast Soccer Team
  ... Nosa's trading card photo. Top row from the left: Idahosa Edokpayi -assistant
  coach (that's me!) , Tim McCarty - coach, Devin Dickinson - defender, Scott ...
  www.utdallas.edu/~ninja/photos/blast_soccer_team.htm - 3k
  
  
• Personal Home Pages (at UEL)
  ... E Sogunwa. Noel East. Irene Ebong. Brian Eccleston. Aloysius Edoh. Uwa Edokpayi.
  John ... Oluwabunmi Onadosu Dagunduro. Evelyn Onyango. Uche Onyemenem. Oretta Gayle. Idahosa ...
  homepages.uel.ac.uk/ - 68k - 18 Sep 2002 -
  
  
• Biniunitedatl.com
  ... USA, Inc PO Box 434 Atlanta, GA 30301. MEMBERS. Mr. & Mrs. Sam Idahosa ... Relations)
  Mr. & Mrs. Gabriel Ogbomo Mr. & Mrs. Dickson Aikhionbare Mr. Joseph Edokpayi Mr ...
  www.biniunitedatl.com/html/members.htm - 4k
  
  
• Gmane -- GNU Mail To News And Back Again
  ... Joe Collins. 01.08. Re: [GD-General] Pong ball mechanics. Javier Arevalo.
  31.07. [GD-General] Pong ball mechanics. Idahosa IO Edokpayi. Back to Top.
  news.gmane.org/ thread.php?group=gmane.games.devel.general - 4k
  

It is interesting that my old personal homepage does not come up but a link to apage about my soccer team does. Weird

I now have some measure of understanding for people who conduct their lives by telephone. I used to conduct mine by email, but now that I am a substitute teacher, my wireless telephone is glued to my hand as soon as I walk in the door. I sleep with it under my pillow practically, which is the reason I get so little sleep. And when you expect a call and it doesn't come that is one of the worst feelings in the world. Trying to call somebody and not knowing why they don't answer drives me crazy; people very seldom answer when I call. I always feel like people are trying to avoid me, like I am annoying them. I know in my head it's not true but I can't help wondering.
On a happier note, I am feeling better. I'll go to work tomorrow if I can find any. Or I might not... I don't know, still waiting on that phone call.
I watched Fast Lane tonight and I was impressed. My Dad watched with me and he didn't like the sex, drugs, violence, and rock'n roll theme but I enjoyed it. I had been anticipating this show for some time and promised myself I'd watch the first episode. Now I have to find someone to tape it for me. :- (

With luck I should be able to pick up a chick who can afford my airfare back to Dallas.

Where is all the good stuff on the web? I feel as if I should be doing something useful, but I can't muster the energy and focus to do so, so I surf the web instead. Lately my surfing has been a depressingly small circle and I need more entertaining sites to spice up my web crawling.

Just discovered that Dallas had on of the most unfavorable (at least to my way of thinking) male-to-female ratios in the country. If it wasn't for the fact that guys from all over swear up and down that Texas women simply look better, I'd be packing my bags now.
While I am thinking along these lines, I wanted to say maybe I should be examined by a doctor. I was just reading something about the biochemistry of love, and I'd like some heartless-rake elixir. Being chemically hardwired to favor being a nice guy is boring.

Crystal's picture is staring me in the face again...weird, but not unwelcome.Fortunately, it's not one of those pictures in which the subject appears to be looking you directly in the eye. Crystal seems to be looking right through me but not at me. Otherwise, I'd never look away.

One of the fringe benefits of having an unpronouncable name becomes apparent when screening calls. People who can't pronounce your name don't warrant a returned call.
I am doing nothing tomorrow... so no suprise at school.

I finally met the class that likes to go to lunch twice. I didn't let them of course.
I feel really weak; my body aches, and my throat feels as if it had been given a vigorous rubbing with sandpaper. Is it flu season already?

Umm... no surprise today, maybe tomorrow.
The voice is all right so far, I scored some cough drops on the way to school. I feel better after eating some lunch. I want to take a nap though.
I had another kid get up and dance today. When I accused the kids of disrespect they claimed innocence. "If we was disrespecting you, we wouldn't do the classwork. We would just look at you crazy when you told us to do something."

I was just thinking about freak dancing again, and really it is simulated sex. Discovering freak dancing was a revelation for me; the idea that a woman - possibly multiple women - would willingly pretend to have sex with you in public, even when fully clothed, was mind-blowing. So it was immediately obvious that students freak-dancing was a bad thing; no one should be allowed to have that much fun in school, and certainly not a teacher!

I have a surprise for tomorrow's blog. Regular readers will be rewarded. :P Not that I have any regular readers. The thing I just realized, is that even though I only have each class for 90 minutes, I spend the entire 90 minutes falling in love with each group and I want the whole world to do the same. Even the kids who give me problems touch me.

A heart-warming story about the demolition of high-rise public housing in Chicago.

Has anybody in their life had occassion to get up and freak-dance other students in class or watch someone else do it? I did today, during a "sheltered" English class. "Sheltered" is a term used in the DISD for a class consisting of kids who all speak the same language, in my case Spanish, and aren't quite ready for full-contact English classes yet. The kids told me that it was an ESL class, but I have learned something - the first rule of substituting is to never ask the kids anything since they will lie. The kids can't be trusted. The kids pull something new on me every day and each class has its own special trick. They usually get away with it too! I usually don't know I have been fooled till after they leave.
I am wondering how I will teach tomorrow with no voice. Somehow it seems wrong for a substitute to call in sick. More echinacea and sleep.
Kids always surprise me with their boldness. Today the kids wanted me to teach them how to dance. I have been known to freak-dance before, but somehow, freak-dancing students seemed to fall under the heading of

Things Not To Do.

Kind of like sleeping with students.

As rowdy as the kids are, I realized I don't really feel threatened at all. No disaffected white loners with firebombs and shutguns in Dallas public schools, Columbine would never happen in a Dallas school, especiall because we have metal detectors. On the other hand, I could certainly get shot in the parking lot coming to or leaving school. :P

Blogging between periods at Justin F. Kimball High. I suppose I should be glad that when teaching in the 'Cliff and the Grove(Oak Cliff and Pleasant Grove, neighborhoods in South Dallas for those not in the know) I should be grateful I am teaching students in AP classes. As rowdy as AP classes are, I am very frightened by the prospects of teaching really bad kids.
I am feeling slightly under the weather, but I can't afford to be ill. Time for the echinacea.
Before I go, I want to throw in some comments about Bush's Iraq policy. In a word, brilliant - Bush has pushed the Democrats in America into an unfavorable position before the election and forced the UN to accept war in Iraq or face irrelevancy. He challenged the UN to enforce the terms of its own treaty or watch as the US does it for them. Democrats are forced to acquiesce or go against public opinion and they also are distracted from the domestic agenda where they are at an advantage. Bush not only saves face but comes out looking like a commanding leader despite the internal strife in his administration.

Teaching at Kimball high tomorrow... I am not sure if that's Oak Cliff, but it is definitely South Dallas. I need money for gas now!

Cowboys 21, Titans 13. :)
Quincy Carter carried the offense today, a huge improvement over last week.The defense was a disruptive force and produced a touchdown. The Cowboys could actually be very good this year, the first week's embarassment notwithstanding. The only disappointment, was the run-blocking. Pass protection was very good but the Titans dominated the offensive line in running situation. Larry Allen's health had a lot to do with that.
I need to learn Spanish, just had to reject two jobs that required Spanish. I can muddle through a conversationin Spanish thanks to two semesters in college, but I am not confident eough in what I know to risk it.

Titans 10, Cowboys 7...
Q's play is much improved from last week, when he was the lowest rated passer in the league. The offensive line is frightful though. The defense, as always has been solid, if not stellar. I am happy so far. :)
Sunday is a day of worship for me, church and Cowboys. :)

Went to a Dallas Burn soccer game with my brother tonight and scored a free "game-worn" jersey, i.e. it has been used by an exceedingly sweaty and anonymous soccer player. The jersey is wrinkled but doesn't smell. The number is eleven so the player was most likely a midfielder or perhaps a forward. Everybody advised that I dry clean the jersey before I frame it; I'll dry clean it, but I intend to wear it. The jersey has the greatest value to me when worn - no one is going to pay money for a jersey stained with sweat from an obscure soccer player in Dallas. It'll be my good luck charm. I had a blast and we went to the Old Mill Inn after the game for the "Group Leader" dinner. (Thank you Roger Allen!) The perks included were meeting the players, a coupon for a free drink, and entry in the raffle for Dallas Burn goodies (how I got the jersey). Notice that dinner is not listed anywhere as a perk of the "Group Leader" dinner. We discovered this after attempting to order the most expensive meals on the menu. Fortunately, the Old Mill was operating on a restricted menu that omitted all of the expensive items.
The only downside to the evening was that I was not in the company of a woman. I love my brother dearly, and I enjoy his company more than any other single person I have ever met in my entire life, but everywhere I go I feel like something is missing. When I lie on the couch watching television, my chest aches to feel the weight of someone leaning against it, and my arms encircle air as if to hold someone that should be there. I feel like a hollow man.

To continue about today at school though, a substitute could make his living at Spruce High. The secretary in he office asked if I would be back Monday and who knows I might. The lady in the office, seems to want me back too, she said that she'd been hearing good things about me. How she head that I don't know, I had only been there one day.
The more time though I spend in public schools, I amazed that kids learn anything at all. Today I had to skip part of the classwork because we couldn't locate the textbooks. I'd always thought that every child would have his own copy of the textbook, but the kids hear all share copies with each class the teacher teaches. Kids go, books and teacher stays. Another thing is the discplinary problems - eve the best kids can be a problem. I taught two AP classes today (supposedly the smart kids) and all that was differnt was that the kids were not as scruffy and fewer in number. The AP kids looked a if Mom and Dad might care a little and check homework but they were still rowdy.
One thing that I did that surprised the kids, was that I remembered there names. The kids did a surprisingly good job of pronouncing mine, (a few called me Mr. PIE-YEE) so I did my best to remember theirs. One student told me, "You are really good at remembering names, I hate that in a teacher!" Indeed, the kids were startled every time I called them by name. I remembered how much I feared professors who knew my name.

The archives are back, strange...

I am suffering from a little writer's block today, a first for me while blogging. Today at school I made my first serious attempt to deal with troublemakers. I wrote referrals for three students but I eventually tore one up. The principal did get the other two. A little hispanic girl came to class today in a black tie and black wide leg JNCO style jeans with a white shirt. Her best friend (well I am assuming she was) had black fingernail polish. It is very odd to see the goth and skater culture amongst hispanic teens in Pleasant Grove, but it shouldn't be surprising. The hispanic girl (who honestly couldn't have been that little since she was in a 9th gade Geography class) also wanted to know after class whether I was gay or not. Her friend quickly explained that the kids were talking about it and automatically think anyone who talks without using slang, and dresses well is gay. I wanted to laugh, but I did say that I was "straight like a board".

Blogging from a school again. Today, I am teaching AP Geography at H. Grady Spruce High School, which again, is in Pleasant Grove. I accept jobs in Pleasant Grove readily because I am familiar with the area. I don't get lost on the way there - well I shouldn't get lost on the way there, I did Wednesday.
I have noticed something very odd lately. I keep meeting people who swear up and down that they have met me somewhere. People sometimes claim that I look like a movie star or famous entertainer, but very seldom can they remember which. I should be in pictures.
When the job was assigned to me I was told I would be teaching "language arts". When I arrived I learned that "language arts" translates to English as a second language, which in Pleasant Grove means Spanish. I can understand Spanish - yesterday a girl asked me in Spanish, "what are we supposed to be doing here" (I can't remember the Spanish phrase she used) - but teaching in Spanish would be a nightmare for someone with only two semesters of college spanish to fall back on. So, the kindly lady in the office offered to let me teach geography.

Where are my archives? I am very pissed... My archives, for some reason, have suddenly decided not to appear on my webppage.

Today in school, teaching what the substitute system labeled as "undefined secondary" (theater arts) was the classic substitute nightmare, complete with children throwing wadded-up paper, screaming, playing cards, and a couple getting as close to making out as middle school standards would allow (even though the girl was a little reluctant). The teacher who handed the class over to me clucked sympathetically as she left as if she was witnessing a lamb being thrown to hungry young lions. I did however get to do the Abbot and Costello routine "Who's on First?". The problem was students regarded the class as a "goof off" class and resented any efforts to maintain order.

Pop, soda, or Coke?

One man's ability to enrage me with 5 words is amazing.

Why do Democats and so-called progressives demand silly things like:

...full public disclosure of what Condoleeza Rice has called the increased "chatter" of intelligence cables concerning a possible al-Qaida attack before it happened.

I culled that quote from this article. He has a point, and what he urges is important for America's adversarial political system to work, but what he is demanding may have been the exact thing that enabled the terrorists to succeed. When asked who specifically should be held the most culpable for the failure to stop Bin Laden, the Bush administration immediately mentioned that they had tapped Bin Laden's satellite telephone and were privy to his most private conversations and were able to use the conversations to link Bin Laden to several attacks. Until an unknown beaurecrat decided to leak the information to the press. Bin Laden watches CNN and immediately stopped using his phone. This was shortly before 9/11. Disclosing sensitive information like the "chatter inthe system" would reveal more than what the "chatter" can tell us directly. It could likely tip off terrorists to what we know and inadvertently cause another attack. I always wonder why liberals reflexively demand more information, even when disclosure does more harm than good. The public may have a right to know what, but knowing may kill them.

You know, now that I realize what a colossal opportunity I missed the first time in college, I think if given a second chance, I would chase women full time.

I am really disgusted with the current treatment of spiritual belief in popular culture. In particular, what bothers me is the encouragement to not hold concrete beliefs, but to instead subscribe to a vague spirituality. A recent example is this discussion in Slate.com. I don't like this statement in particular:

As I said yesterday, I'm not anti-religious, just anti-literalist fundamentalists; I'm pro-spirituality.

My problem is that "spirtuality" is really worthless without some practical way of expressing it. I think that most of the public's ideas about spirituality are nonsense. Parents of this generation have not passed their religious beliefs to their offspring as much and so children of today only have the vaguest ideas about spirituality and no practical applications of their spirituality.
My beef against vague spirituality is that it strikes me as the easiest way to cop out of having to do anything. Making religion/spirituality (I hate religion) a part of your life is actually very demanding and requires strict adherence to principles.
Kevin Smith's movie Dogma is another example of pop culture destroying traditional spirituality in avor of vague personal beliefs. I have read the script and love the movie, but in the end the main character also talks about moving from the strictures of traditional belief in the Catholic Church and a more amorphous spirituality. That is crap. Without literal belief of a church's orthodoxy you lose the point of being apart of that church. (I also don't like the Catholic Church.) By divorcing yourself from a church's carefully constructed spiritual framework, without replacing it with a new well thought out framework you discredit and thus devalue what the church stands for.
In effect, what I am saying is that there is no point in being anything but a fundamentalist of some type or the other. I think everybody should have a well thought out rationale for their spiritual beliefs, and from personal experience from numerous encounters with many people, only the fundamentalists in any belief had a reasonable explanation for what they believed. Middle of the road people in religion and politics do nothing and go nowhere. In politics, I think this is acceptable and at times preferable, since most people have beliefs about politics that are just as loony as what they believe about religion. It is bad for religion, and worse for us as a nation because it means that we really only hear from the lunatic fringe from every religion/creed/system of beliefs. Only the wackiest catholics, baptists, buddhists, athiests, pagans etc have anything to say because they are the only ones who know that they are saying.
So go out there and believe something.

Required reading...

It's lunch time and I am back with a bit more. The students look extremely young compared to who I normally hang out with. They are also more respectful than I expected, but not much. Of course, they have tried to take advantage of the fact that I am a sub but for the most part they haven't been able to.
The school administration attempted to organize the students in a ring around the campus just before lunch and succeeded mostly. They were supposed to lock arms but that never happened. A news 'copter did fly overhead though. Another thing that struck me is how the students were dressed. Even though it is against the rules, several girls were wearing tiny mini skirts. Everything else is allowed though it seems so you see students looking as if they were planning an excursion to the club right after class, even though none of them are old enough to get in. The boys are required to tuck in their shirts and most do. A few students were weariing their patriotism on their sleeves, and pants legs, and shorts. Well I gotta go,time for class!

Blogging during a break from teaching. I have a scant 5 minutes to write this post, but I will say that it has been intriguing to say the least. Even high school juniors and seniors look young! More later...

I swear on my mother's grave that I am going to see this movie the instant it arrives in Dallas. It also helps that my mother isn't dead.

I am very excited to be teaching tomorrow in Pleasant Grove, my old neighborhood no less. I use to drive by the school I will be teaching at all the time. The teacher was even kind enough to leave instructions and a lesson plan. Wow! Totally different than what I was told to expect. I am still nothing but a human prokchop to those kids though. I need to go to sleep though, so at least I will be a well rested porkchop.

The text of an email I sent to a prospective employer at his request:

I have taken quite a bit of time to respond to your request not from reluctance or lack of interest, but in search of inspiration.
As you mentioned, this is a time of transition in my life and an obvious time to decide where I will go. What I am looking for is inspiration. Every great achievement in my life has been the result of great inspiration. I want the next job I take to be the same. My ideal job is a company that uses technology in a new, unimagined - inspired - way to lead, not follow. My place in that company, to begin with, would be programming the software that enables that inspiration.
I spoke to Craig about your products and I am honestly intrigued. I am curious about the ways software could be used to see what is going on in the brain and make sense of test results. I want desperately to be in on the next technical revolution and I believe your company could possibly be uniquely positioned to be a part of that. I think that the next big step after the IT boom will be biological in nature. The only way I can get in on that next wave is by writing the software that makes sense of the biology.
The skills I learned in school were all geared to take advantage of the IT revolution. The most impressive technical skill I have is my ability to program. I have worked primarily in C++ and it has become a hobby for me and honestly at times it has been an obsession. Any skill I develop must first be an obsession. C++ is my most natural programming language but using other languages is not much more difficult. I am also proficient in C, Visual Basic, and I even do a little web design with HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. UTD's training program in programming is so thorough in inculcating basic programming prinicples that picking up a new language is just a matter of days now.
Other than courses on C++ programming, my best course in school was Calculus. The story behind my success in Calculus begins with the fact that I had no high school preparation for advanced mathematics. I arrived at UTD with a scholarship for high scores on the SAT but with a 750 on the VERBAL portion of the SAT and a 600 on the mathematic portion - the opposite of the typical computer science major. My Dad had been pressing for me to enter MIT and one of the conditions was that I had to take the SAT 2 math test. I scored a 600 again, not enough for MIT but enough to test out of Precalculus at UTD. Skipping Precalculus was the worst/best thing that could have happened to me in my college career. I was not even close to ready for Calculus at UTD. The professors claimed that UTD was the hardest place to take calculus in Texas and I had never even taken trigonemetry. I would have made a D the first semester had I not dropped the class. The second semester I returned and made an A. Looking back at my experience and the experience of several other people is that the only thing that could have prepared me for calculus at UTD was calculus at UTD.
In spite of my computer science training, I would say my greatest asset is my understanding of written communication. At UTD I contributed to the school newspaper sporadically and I maintain a personal website with featuring almost exclusively material that I write. I regard this skill as my trump card and what truly has the potential to make me special. Unfortunately, I haven't been able to take as much time getting formal training to develop this skill or explore how it would serve me in the business world, but I see it as big part of my potential value.
I hope this explains what I am about and where I am going adequately. I apologize for the length, but I felt it necessary to try as hard as possible to explain who I am. I am hopeful that you will give me consideration for the position and thank you very much for your time. Feel free to contact me by telphone or email (idahosaedokpayi@yahoo.com).

Idahosa Edokpayi

Blogging has had a humbling effect on my spelling. I keep seeing egregious spelling errors and I am working without the benefit of spell check. Blogger Pro is looking like a generous bargain. Perhaps after I buy a domain name.

I had a conversation with a friend about the Joe Boxer commerical and he pointed out a similar commerical with a white man in it that had similar results:

ME: to me the ad is innocuous
ME: but many people have become hypersensitive
Friend: if I had just seen the ad without reading about the controversy....with that stupid grin he wears, I woulda thought more than anything that he looks gay...Uncle Tom and minstrals wouldn't have occurred to me....
ME: he does look gay
ME: I think that added to the offense a lot of people felt
Friend: =-O
Friend: :-P
ME: but so what
ME: what does it matter?
Friend: that's interesting...
Friend: it doesn't, not in the slightest...what I think is funny...
ME: yeah
Friend: is that some people have said that the reason people are responding to the ad is precisely because he's black....that because he's black and looking kinda dorky and silly..it makes some people subconsciously "nostalgic" for the old Jim Crow portrayels of blacks in popular culture...but that argument doesn't hold because....
ME: yes
Friend: they are forgetting about this VERY famous commercial...I think it was a McDonald's or Burger King commercial...that ran in the late '80....
ME: yeah
Friend: in which there was this brief clip..no longer than Vaughn's...that showed this fat WHITE young man doing this silly dance....
ME: uhuh
Friend: and he became FAMOUS because of that and started making personal appearances and even had his own fan club....for about 15 minutes....
ME: yes
ME: so people laugh at fat white dudes dancing too
Friend: people were responding to the joyousness and silliness of his dancing...not his skin color...so all those people saying people are responding to the boxer just cuz the dude is black are full of it...

The one problem is that the first actor was fat. It is possible that people were mocking his fatness. Still, it is evidence that the ad is not dependent on the actor's blackness.

Hallelujah! The DISD substitute system has finally seen fit to give me a job!

en·nui Pronunciation Key (n-w, nw)
n.
Listlessness and dissatisfaction resulting from lack of interest; boredom: “The servants relieved their ennui with gambling and gossip about their masters” (John Barth).


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
[French, from Old French enui, from ennuyer, to annoy, bore. See annoy.]

Ennui is one of the many demons I fight. Why am I not motivated? So what I wasn't born to wealth and power, I don't need those things to get where I am going. All I have to be is motivated. I don't have to be intelligent, handsome, tall, or anything - just motivated. Why can't I bring the same desperate desire to succeed that I had in soccer and every sport I play to the rest of my life?
Why do I lose almost every game I play in regardless of my ability relative to the competition? Why does it not matter that I want to win more than anyone else? Why am I always saddled by teammates who are inept, clumsy, and uncaring? Why is it that when I have teammates who care and are able I am not allowed to be a part of their success? Why?

My Dad just showed me a baby picture and pointed out that I was so happy. (Note the use of bold and italics. I call this super italics.) He wanted to know what happened to that happy child. He said it was my fault that the child was gone. I don't know what happened, but I don't have the time to worry about it.

The DISD's automated substiute teaching telephone information system leaves much to be desired. I have yet to successfully land a substitute teaching job and the lack of timely notification is to blame. No jobs are ever available until late in the morning when there is too little time for me to actually make it to the job on time. This morning the system assigned me two jobs. The first at Lincoln High had already been filled. The call came at 7:43 and I wasn't told that the job was unavailble for at least another 30 minutes - precious minutes wasted when school starts at 8 am. I immediately called looking for another job but I quickly discovered that the teacher who I was replacing didn't even teach at that particular school anymore. There was nobody to replace... Why is everything in my life so hard? Am I the only person, for who it seems that things that things that should be simple and uncomplicated become long, tortuous affairs requiring multiple phone calls and much waiting? I am not angry, I just honestly want to know. What are the major difficulties in the lives of most college grads my age?

I don't know the people involved in this story, and this happened some time ago, but even time cannot lessen the tragedy of Naytero Ormond's death.

You know I was just thinking that if people visit the links on my site I am generating traffic for other people who care nothing about me and wouldn't divert any traffic my way. As old school and unhip as it is, I wonder if I could join some sort of link exchange for bloggers, or as they were first known, webrings.

Auto-save in Microsoft Office has spoiled me. I keep losing posts through clumsiness and I am frustrated when I can't recover them with a simple "undo" command.
I ran into a great blog that I wrote quite a bit of stuff about before I erased the last post. He also linked a realy good article from a converted dove.
My Dad wants me and my brother to come up with a system with publishing invoices on the web so a customer can clearly see what has and hasn't been paid for yet. He wants it done tomorrow! Fun!

Somebody by me some clothes!

Somebody finally has a reasonable suggestion about what to do about Iraq.

I just checked... in 4 weeks I have written 20 pages of text in my blog, 11, 722 words, 53, 455 characters, 130 paragraphs, and 835 lines.
At this pace in a year I would have 260 pages; 152,386 words; 694,915 characters; 1,690 paragraphs; and 10,855 lines. Not a lot everyday but if I could do something productive with my time at the same pace it could be really special.
I am always amazed at my ability (and the ability of others) to process text.

Would everybody just lay off of that Joe Boxer ad? I suppose I shouldn't be surprised that the black activists in the political correctness movement would react in horror to the sight of a black man dancing happily in his underwear. I just want to know why these people insist on being killjoys? Why can't black people allow black people the pleasure of being black? Why can't the actor in the ad dance if he wants to dance? At issue is the opinion that the ad is a success because the actor is black. I admit that a white man in the ad probably would not have the same effect. Black people seem to be reacting to the perceived stereotype of the old "black" entertainers, often just white men in black face paint sporting foolish grins. Black people resent having been mocked for entertainment. The average white person knows nothing of this particular grievance and is probably reacting to another subtle stereotype. White people (and other ethnicities also) tend to think of black people and black men in particular as sexual superiors. In fact, I would not be surprised if white men actually feel a little threatened by a muscular black man in his boxers. The silliness of the dancing probably defuses a lot of this sentiment though. The truth is though, that my analysis and just about any analysis is going to be complete rubbish since the ad wasn't conceived with any deep motive in mind. The truth is that people like to dance in their underwear and watch other people doing it. Vaughn's (Vaughn is the actor in the ad) dance evoked an instinctual response from the ad agency and it touchd a lot of other people too. People just like goofiness.
Read the article on slate.com that alerted me to this debate.
See the ad.

The great substitute teaching experiment was a bust today. I'll have to make another attempt tomorrow. I rolled out of bed today at 8:30 and called the system. I got a job at Lorenzo De Zavala Elementary. The problem was that this school was on the south side of Downtown Dallas and I live on the north side of Dallas. When you take traffic into account, the commute takes at least an hour. The principal, being a conscientous man with deep concern for his students' educations, distributed them among other classes by the time I arrived at 10 am. The moral of the story is plan ahead. Scheduling jobs at the last minute is not good and taking jobs that far away is silly when you drive a 1987 Camry that makes a harsh grinding noise whenthe automatic transmission shifts gears and burns inordinate amounts of gas. Oh well...

Noel Ignatiev is a white guy who thinks white guys are evil. Rachel Lucas thinks he is smoking some very expensive crack. I agree. Visit Mr. Ignatiev. Ask for a hit of what he's smoking. By the way, Rachel Lucas is cool. This adventure in blog land was brought to you By Gene Expression!
Pete Sampras actually won a tennis tournament! You could make a career out of beating Andre Agassi.
Can someone explain to me exactly what went on in Reliant stadium last night? I suppose I was silly for expecting so little from the Houston Texans and so much from the Dallas Cowboys; but I am a fan and objective reasoning about my team's chances really isn't possible. My Mom looked on as my Dad cursed and I abused the helpless pillows decorating our den. The Cowboys lost miserably because of their inept offense. Quincy Carter simply stank and the running game never got untracked. Really, Carter should have thrown at least three inerceptions, but Aaron Glenn has hands carved from stone. (probably the reason he's a DB and not a receiver) The defense was even better than it was last year if you exclude the slipup that allowed David Carr to throw his second touchdown. The Texans could not run the ball at all on the Dallas defense. Often it looked like the linebackers were eavesdropping on the Texans offensive huddles and were just waiting for the snap so they could hogtie James Allen one more time. La'Roi Glover led the manhandling of David Carr and was in the backfield all night. He even snagged an interception. The offense always had poor field position and never seemed to be able to do anything to improve it. Special Teams was also a nightmare because Billy Cundiff missed a kick and Jason Bell came back to haunt his old team like the Ghost of Kickoff Coverage past. Wide Reciever Randal Williams played well on kick coverage I thought. It's a shame someone that big and fast can't catch passes. Randal Williams ran a 4.1 forty in training camp - more than a tenth of a second faster than Joey Galloway's best time. The Cowboys seemed really promising this year but the offense looks like it will once again disappoint. Serious adjustments need to be made NOW!
I can't help going all crazy about the Cowboys, I have only watched every game every Sunday for the past 16 years. The Cowboys are almost my second religion - and I don't even consider myself a serious fan. There are people in Dallas whose levels of fanaticism for all things related to the Dallas Cowboys would frighten you.

Texans 10, Cowboys 3... WHAT!?

In reference to what I said here, I think, now, that there will always be a place for textual information. Visual and audio communication does not supercede text. Because people can watch video, and listen to CDs doesn't mean that they stop reading books. Blogs, as a written media, will still exist. The hype will most likely have faded in the future though.

Miami crushed Florida. Doh!
Serena Williams dominates Venus again. They are so good it's boring. They've taken a little drama out of the women's game. I am willing to bet a few people are very displeased with the current state of affairs as the sisters rub a few people the wrong way. (in my opinion through no fault of their own). The big story is the tennis game between a couple of old guys that they're holding in Arthur Ashe stadium.
Odd dream update: This morning right before I woke up I had this dream. It was very odd. I saw this woman enter a storefront and I heard something about Kevin Faulk, who if I am not mistaken is Marshall's little brother, and Kevin Faulk owned a dating service. Only when he walked up it was a muscular white man standing there which is odd since Kevin Faulk would be black. Maybe it was Kevin Falk. Which would be odd, but they don't exactly explain spelling of names in dreams. I think I thought it was Kevin Faulk the football player in my dream too. I kept seeing a counter, the same woman walking up, and Mr. Falk/Faulk walk up too.What this all means I don't know.

A simply beautiful blog template here.
Government projects are not all doomed to failure and heinous cost overruns.
I went to see Mostly Martha tonight. It would have been a really great date movie, if it wasn't for the fact that a friend of mine, whose opinion I respect, told me that movies are terrible dates, and also that I don't know any girls who want to date me.
A friend of Bug Selig's spotted David Wells at a restaurant.
Let me take a moment to tell you about AOL and the great instant messaging wars. Does anybody remember the uproar when Microsoft tried to make MSN Messenger interoperable with AOL Instant Messenger? I do! AOL immediately modified AIM and decried Microsoft's attempts to "hack" the system. Microsoft soon gave up after taking the uncharacteristic position that all Instant Messaging software should support "open" standards and adhere to a common framework. AOL eventually agreed to join an industry wide effort to formulate instant messaging standards. In fact, as part of the conditions of Time Warner's merger with AOL, the mergedcompany was required to open its instant messaging network. AOL instead closed its network and promised to comply as soon as its engineers had finished making the necessary modification for opening the network. We are still waiting.
Into this mess walked the good folks are Cerullian studios. Their product, freely available from trillian.cc, is a universal instant messaging client that can operate on: AIM, MSN Messenger, IRC, ICQ, and Yahoo Messenger networks. People (like me for instance) who before had to open multiple im clients to talk to all their friends, could now talk to anybody from one Instant Messaging client. Best of all, users could stick it to AOL Time-Warner - who now owns AIM and ICQ. What is more, it gave harried AIM users an attractive alternative to the notoriously buggy AIM client. AOL constantly updates AIM now to introduce incompatibilities with Trillian, in contrast to Microsoft who actually notifies Cerullian of possible problems in Trillian and provides information on how to interact with MSN Messenger!
Here is an example of Microsoft playing the good guy and AOL playing the bad guy. The problem is that AOL pretty much always plays the bad guy and gets away with it.