Trying valiantly to catch up . . .

I have so many things I want to post that I just don't know when I am going to get to them all.

So I will start pecking away.

1. When I was a reporter, I used to cringe when people said "You know, there's a lot of good news going on in our school, too." Now I am saying that myself. ;) We've been taking a beating in the papers lately, largely because of our long-running football coach saga. Meanwhile, since I got back from taking five teachers and 10 kids to South Carolina for Habitat For Humanity, I have also written press releases on our Culinary Arts kids and Banking Bowl kids winning events, the Seniors holding a huge dinner/auction fund-raiser, our upcoming Empty Bowls Dinner (more later), our sports kids getting several student-athlete awards, our Drama kids getting nominated for awards and our Chorus and Color Guard kids winning awards. The only good news out of the football coach saga is that they made the perfect hire -- a guy who is a great teacher and has a clue about how to mold young men.

2. Meanwhile, I am compiling a list of volunteer opportunities, most of them coming from people calling us because in our town, the answer to "Where can I get volunteers?" the answer ism "Call the NHS guy at the high school." Yeah, I love it.

3. There's a great Jukebox! on John Valby's web site. Hey, baronessmartha, he's gonna be playing a Harbor Cruise in Boston in June.

4. It looks as though I am gonna be at Crown. Yay! Let me know if there's anyone particular you want pictures of.

5. Boston provides free wireless around City Hall. People complain because there's filtering software on it. I said FREE! You pay, you can complain.

6. Eight weeks left in school. Looks like we get out June 19. Then a nice relaxing . . . PANIC AS WE PREPARE FOR THE WEDDING . . . then a honeymoon . . . then Pennsic (we hope) . . . then a couple more weeks, and school starts again. Remind me again, I went into teaching because it was less stressful and we got a summer vacation . . . No. The kids. I am doing it for the kids.

SCA post: My thoughts on background checks . . .

rufinia is hosting a great discussion on the SCA's decision to require background checks for those supervising children's activities.

I cranked out a post, but I decided to put it here so as not to clutter her post up with a rant.

You see, this is one of those shiny read buttons.

Let me first say that I agree with the decision, and I support the society seneschal and others involved.

But -- and you knew this already -- I have a few opinions of my own.

First of all, this is not very much about child safety.

It is mainly about the liability of the corporation.

It is about, so when the trial comes, the SCA can say, "Yes, we did take steps after previous incidents."

This check would *not* have avoided a recent major East Kingdom incident. (I would be interested to know how many of the 29 SCA-recorded incidents it would have stopped).

Yes, I support this, but no, I do not think it's going to keep all abuse from happening.

As far as believing your kids, yes, pursue it. Care for them, get the authorities involved. But be aware, as we have found out in a recent case, the allegations may be just that.

I will say, that as an SCA parent, I did find that there was an informal network of folks who let us know if someone was "sketchy" and we should keep our kids away.

Both of my kids grew up in the SCA, and I do not believe there were ever any problems for them. Of course, when they were teen-agers, "uncles" like industrialblues, metasomething, stevefava, thorsbaby and others, we had no issues with boys, either.

If you are EK List (you poor soul), you also know that I think it would be more financially effective for those of us who are already CORI-checked (or have similar credentials) for work should be able to use those rather than go through the SCA vendor. Just my opinion. I do want to ask faheud about it, but I figger he's a little busy right now.

That's it. ;)

But, wait, there's more . . .

1. Has anyone seen "Pathfinder" yet? Anyone, anyone. Bueller, Bueller?

2. Apparently, the word of the day is "Pooptastrophe."

3. So I am on a "geek" list, and I gotta say, one of the greatest "I am a Geek" introductions came across today, starting with . . . Let me a'splain. No, there is too much. Let me sum up.

4. My favorite book by the late David Halberstam was "The Fifities," a terrific history of the decade. My only criticism: It needed chapter titles!

5. True fact. There is a huge mascot on a trailer at a local Chrysler dealership in our town. A student recently said to me, "Hey, Mr. T. I need an accomplice. I want to steal the pink elephant."

6. Also overheard in C-385: "Rosa Parks is the one on the bus, right?"

7. Ya know, if Sears is gonna host Land's End, it oughta get ;em in all the stores. There's a full one in Burlington, but right now at Cambridgeside, it's basically one display table. But when I asked for the Land's End shop at the Sears in the mall in South Portland, Maine, the lady said, "You should check out our big sale section instead." Yeah, they are tearing up the store to put a Land's End in, but right now it's got all the 90 percent off stuff and torn-up walls. At least it did a couple of weeks ago.

8. I am a bad man. When I heard that a Congresswoamn died, my immediate thought was "Democrat or Republican?"