Apparently I'm in the minority here.

...which is a weird thing for a white, straight, English-speaking male to be saying, I fully realize.

I've been to a lot of baseball games. I don't know if it's more or less than the average person attending a professional game -- on the one hand, I'm a big fan; on the other, I spent a good deal of my life nowhere close to a stadium. But what I do know is when we're at important parts of games; it's a full count and the bases are loaded and it's a tie game and the world is ending or something.

Consequently, I don't need the scoreboard to tell me to MAKE SOME NOISE!!!!. Firstly, I'm not the scream-and-yell type, unless something actually deserves it ("You suck, Jeter!"). But, more importantly, I know when to make damn noise. Putting this up on the scoreboard in the fourth inning of a game with a 2-1 count with the bases empty and one out and our team up by three does not make me want to make the aforementioned sounds.

To SkyDome's credit (and yes, I still refuse to refer to it by its corporate name), they've done a hell of a lot less of this lately. It's a much better atmosphere in there these days, in comparison to the days where every. single. foul. ball. was accompanied by the sound of glass breaking, for example. Comerica Park in Detroit, home of my boys the Tigers? Eh, not so much.

So, I wrote to the Tigers telling them as such.

First off: lifelong Tiger fan, attend several games per year, if I ever got a tattoo it'd be an Olde English D.

I live in Toronto these days and attend many games at SkyDome, and in recent years they've really scaled back the scoreboard/PA sound effects, urgings to "Make Some Noise!" and the like. It used to be really obnoxious... but they've done a great job, and fans legitimately know when to cheer.So when I attend games at Comerica and are constantly subjected to these requests, I find it really detracts from my enjoyment of the game. Perhaps some fans enjoy hearing the [Harry Belafonte] "Day-O" clip, but I believe I heard it quite enough, thanks.

That said, I'll still go to Tiger games, don't you worry. It's a bit of a drive from Toronto, but I'll make it.

Go Tigers,
J

To my mild surprise, they wrote back. To my mild dismay, they ain't changin'.

J,

Thank you for your email and interest in the Detroit Tigers.

We are so happy to hear of your dedication to the team.

We will consider your request for the scoreboard. We do get a lot of compliments that fans like the atmosphere when the scoreboard prompts them to cheer. We understand we can't please every fan, every moment, but we strive to do our best.

Thank you for your suggestions.

GO TIGERS!

Really? People write into the Tigers saying, "Ooooh, we love it when you tell us mindless idiot drones when to cheer! It makes us feel amazing! Wheeeee!" I find that somewhat surprising if it's true, and somewhat dubious overall. But hey, maybe I'm truly in the minority here.

That being said, Tigers/Jays at the Dome next week, four games. You know where to find me.

Tomorrow ain't gonna be a fun one.

I'm the union rep for the teachers in our school -- it's a job with a lot of glory, a lot of prestige, and gives me a hefty pay hike.

(It also allows me to make a lot of shit up, such as the three things listed at the end of the above sentence.)

Tomorrow is a step in the staffing process where people board-wide, if they tentatively don't have a job for September, get to find out if they got placed into a position -- thereby bumping-out the least-senior teacher on staff with similar qualifications. This process, perhaps unsurprisingly (and unglamorously), is called "bumping." (No grinding, though.)

There are a lot of people on my staff that are feeling pretty edgy about Monday. And even though I'm extremetly likely to stay where I am, I'm feeling edgy too -- if someone gets The Letter, I have to be in on that meeting. And that's a very, very shitty room to be in.

I got bumped in my first year of teaching, but things eventually shook through and I got recalled. Which was great, of course -- I've only ever been at the one school, and frankly I don't see any reason to leave. We've got a good thing going.

I can clearly recall being bumped, and sitting in the staff room looking at another teacher who was a bit of a dingbat but who had so much seniority there's no way in hell she would've been bumped. I remember thinking, "I work my ass off, and she's kinda crazy. How come I have to search for a new job, and she doesn't? This is unfair."

It may have felt pretty unfair. But the point is that this entire system, which is based on seniority, is equally unfair to everyone. If it wasn't, you'd have situations where people, who might be doing a great job, get left out to dry because they weren't coaching the principal's favourite sport. Or maybe they spoke up about problems they had with admin a little too much, and got the boot. Perhaps the principal didn't like the way the teacher parted their hair.

But that's why you have unions: to make sure the rules are fair for everyone. And yes, that means that occasionally you'll get a bad teacher protected the same as a good one; it's a standard criticism of unions, and frankly it's one that I share to a point. The problem is, everyone thinks they're an expert in education because they were once a student... but just because you've been a patient in a hospital, that doesn't mean you're an expert on how to run one (or how to perform a liver transplant).

So yeah, Monday's not going to be one of those fun days at the ol' schoolhouse, that's for sure. There may be some tears in these meetings. It's happened before.

Things kids say.

As you well know, kids say some pretty strange stuff from time to time. I mean, take a look at any toddler growing up -- they pick words up from everywhere (so you'd better watch what you say around them). So, naturally, when they're teenagers, not only do they pick up new words, but they have the mental capacity to invent completely new ones -- which they do with alarming frequency.

Being a teacher surrounded by kids from every imaginable background, I get to hear quite a few of these novel words. A good number of them are somewhat vulgar... but hey, take a look at the word vulgar itself: it's the Latin word for common, as in, it was the commonly-spoken language of regular people (as opposed to the hoity-toity language used by the upper classes).

I'd say a good percentage of the new words I hear come from, or are inspired by, all sorts of Patois from all kinds of Caribbean countries, chiefly Jamaica (although Guyana and Trinidad have a pretty rich vocabulary too). When you mix all these kids together, they pick up on each other's slang, and come up with new combinations all the time. Definitions are fluid, spelling is approximate, and (perhaps most importantly) hearing your teacher say them is apparently hilarious.

(Hey, I do what I can.)

So, here are a few examples of what I've heard recently. This is by no means an exhaustive list, and six months from now these words might just disappear. But if you're looking to speak fluent South Scarberian in mid-2013, you'd better take some notes.

gursh (adj.) — gursh
Definition: extremely ugly -- "like roadkill," apparently
Example: "Did you see Alice the other day? Oh my god, she's so gursh."

gwala (n.) — gwa′ la
Definition: money
Example: "A new iPhone? That's a lotta gwala."

wha gwan (interj.) — wha gwan
Definition: an informal greeting upon seeing someone, cf. "What's going on?"
Example: "Hey Bob, wha gwan?"

cyatty (n.) — kya′ tee
Definition: a woman who is probably a little on the large side, wears brightly-coloured or loudly-printed tights or tight pants, and has a weave and/or extensions
Example: "Charlene is such a cyatty."

N.B. a year or two ago, this used to define a woman who might fit some of the physical descriptions listed above, but who would very specifically chase men who they couldn't or shouldn't be chasing, e.g. men who are already in relationships.

Cyatty Tuesday (n.)
Definition: the five-dollar Tuesday movies shown at the theatres in Scarborough Town Centre mall, ostensibly because they attract cyatties
Example: "Dave went to see Ironman 3 on Cyatty Tuesday."

I'm gonna miss these kids over the summer, I really am.*
______________________________________
* Not too much, though.

So, Rob Ford.

I started writing this a week ago, not long after the whole "the mayor may or may not have been seen in a video smoking crack with known-shady people" thing broke. But I held off thinking that, jeez, when this smoothes over, maybe I'll take another crack (hah!) at it.

Because this is apparently never going to smooth-over, though, I figured I might as well throw my opinions around while the maelstrom is still whirling.

Bullet-points seem appropriate here.

• The mayor might have a crack problem.
• His family has a history of substance-abuse problems (see his sister's unfortunate case).
• He's too stubborn to resign.
• He absolutely knows that things are going badly, but he can't ever admit to the public that he's rattled.
• There's no way he's getting re-elected, but I wouldn't be surprised if he ran. Not at all.

If he'd come out after this video surfaced and said, "Look, this video is false, that's not me, but I do have alcohol and drug issues, I need a while to get myself clean," took a leave of absence and let Doug Holyday run the city for a while... y'know, I might've respected the guy a little. I'd have been proud that he admitted having a problem -- which has been no secret around here for years -- and he's gotta look after his health.

But that's not what he did. He's been trumpeting the "it's business as usual around here" line all week, in an uncharacteristic bout of availability to reporters (although for trivial things; he won't take questions about this controversy at all). It's a good thing we have a weak-mayor system around here; all he can do is be one vote on Council and stack his Executive Committee (who are all turning against him anyway these days, even hard-liners like Jaye Robinson and Dennzil Minnan-Wong). Hell, even my own Councillor, the former PC MPP John Parker, sent a Ford cartoon out in an email to constituents today (falling on Stephen Harper and Mike Duffy).

The sad thing is that a lot of Torontonians voted for this guy, even though at the time of the election in late 2010 he'd already had a very public track record of being an asshole and someone who couldn't hold his booze. Smitherman was gay, though, right?

Your guide to having a great weekend.

As I write this, it's almost midnight on Thursday night. And you know what that means: it's almost the weekend!

(Skip forward to about 2:25 unless you want to watch the members of Loverboy engaging in semi-staged faux-witty banter.)

Because the weekend is only two short days long, you're going to want to make the most out of it. But it's not like back in university, when you'd shotgun a couple of beers at the crack of noon on Friday and keep the party rolling until sometime Monday afternoon* -- you work for a living! So, here are a few tips to make sure you squeeze the most out of your grown-up reprieve from responsibility.

* * * * *

1. Get a good sleep on Thursday night.

It's almost midnight, and I should really be under the covers already. If you're up late Thursday, you're gonna feel terrible all day Friday, and by 8pm you'll be fast asleep on your couch in front of a rerun of Just Shoot Me. So, bed down early, quaff a little NyQuil if you need to, and you'll wake up all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed Friday morning.

2. Pace yourself.

You've made it through Friday, and now it's nighttime and you're ready to party. Now, I know what you might be thinking -- I have a trunk full of beer, a mountain of coke and some knives already jammed into the stove elements; what man can stop me? -- but you're going to want to watch it, Pedro. Friday's merely a dry run for Saturday, so don't blow your wad all in one night. Besides, you have to get up early the next morning to pick up some eleven-sided bolts at Ikea that they forgot to pack in your Flüvënhävën or some shit like that.

3. Eat sensibly.

It's Friday night, it's 3:30 in the morning, and you've been going pretty hard. What could be better than a double Big Mac meal with poutine and a side of bacon grease? The answer is, absolutely nothing. Go ahead and pound it into yourself. It doesn't matter anyway; you'll probably just be puking it back up in a little while. But, damn, that's gonna taste good.

4. Make the most of your Saturday.

Farmer's markets, craft shows, free samples aplenty at the Costco: these are things that happen on Saturday mornings. Since you probably hit it too hard the night before, you're best off sleeping until past 4 -- woken up by intermittent bouts of projectile-vomiting, of course. Stay in bed, asshole!

5. Saturday night is the real thing.

Well, you made it through Friday without any (permanent) damage to your liver, a few hours in the drunk tank, or somehow waking up wearing someone else's socks on the outskirts of Owen Sound. Saturday is the real deal: get yourself gussied-up, pimped-out, whored-down, whatever's the parlance of the day. Then, plunk yourself down in front of the TV and watch that episode of Frontline on PBS you've been meaning to catch, maybe make a donation and get a nifty tote bag, and turn-in early. Besides, there's church tomorrow morning, if that's your thing.

6. Sunday is a day of rest.

• Meet the Press: NBC, 9am
• This Week with George Stephanopoulos: ABC, 10am
• Question Period: CTV, 11am

There's your plans right there. Make yourself a nice pot of coffee, grab the coziest blanket you have, and catch all those riveting round-table discussions on flat taxes, congressional redistricting and the latest goings-on in the Centre Block. Take notes; there's bound to be water-cooler talk on Monday about them, and you don't want to look the buffoon, do you?

7. Have a nice family dinner.

Grab a chicken from the coop, kill it, gut it, dress it, stuff it, and put it in the oven. (You all have chicken coops, right?) Make up a nice big pot of mashed potatoes, invite over the family (or someone else's, if you're an orphan), and enjoy each other's company -- until your mom asks you again if you're sure you're not gay because she hasn't met a girlfriend of yours in a while. Or ever. And you respond the same way you always do: Mom, just because your life has been an abject failure and "the 'beetus" took your toes doesn't mean you have to take out all your aggression on your children. But maybe that's just my family.

* * * * *

Whoops! Midnight, the "witching hour." And speaking of witches, has anyone heard from Ann Coulter lately? Anyway, it's off to bed for me. Good night, and have a fantastic weekend.
___________________________________________
* I went to Waterloo, so this never, ever, EVER happened.

We might be doomed after all.

My grade 9's are in the Electricity unit right now, and we're doing some very simple calculations involving power, energy and time. Seriously, folks, I'm giving them formula triangles which are simple as hell -- they don't even have to rearrange a formula, just cover up the one thing they want to solve for with their thumb, and the triangle tells them what the formula needs to be.

For the record, power = energy / time, or P = E/t. The triangle goes like this:

The question I presented to the class, and had them work somewhat independently to solve, went like this:

A refrigerator has a power rating of 3.2 kW, and it runs for 12 h. How much energy does it use?

This one kid, B, has trouble with math. Hell, B has trouble with everything; s/he's in their grade 11 year, but hasn't yet passed grade 9 science (failed it first time around, didn't manage to get it in Credit Recovery the next year (and if you can't do that, I'm sorry, there is really something wrong)). It really doesn't help that B can't seem to shut the hell up for more than 15 consecutive seconds.

For the record.... B and I got into a bit of a verbal back-and-forth a couple of weeks ago in class. I asked B, for the bajillionth time, to stop talking during the lesson. B shot back with the standard, "Sir, I'm not the only one who's talking!" -- and it went predictably for a while. But I got thrown a "Why are you picking on me?" and decided to go for broke. I shot back with, "I'm picking on you because I care about you. If I didn't care about you, I'd let you do whatever the hell you want. But I don't. So, stop it." And B stopped. But I can't keep bringing out this bazooka every time B can't stop talking, which is every fucking day. For the record, if you tell a kid to move across the classroom to an unoccupied desk and they don't... what then? I mean, you could send them to the office to get dealt-with down there, but honestly, that has always seemed like a huge cop-out to me. I'm not saying I've never done it, but the number of kids I've sent to the office in my nearly-11 years of teaching is very likely in the single-digits.

Anyway, I'm circulating around the class, helping kids individually that needed it (about half the kids, far as I could tell, managed to solve it on their own), and eventually I come around to B. Naturally, B hasn't even started -- but I decide that, darnit, we're going to get through this.

The first thing I have the kids do, after they've read the question at least twice, is to go through it and pick out the numerical information. These are grade 9s, so I don't pull tricky stuff on them like giving them extra numbers that don't mean anything; I play it straight with 'em.

I'll refresh your memory:

A refrigerator has a power rating of 3.2 kW, and it runs for 12 h. How much energy does it use?

me: "Alright, so, let's read this... 'power rating of 3.2 kW' -- what do you think you have there?"

B: "Uh.... [long, long pause] that's power, right?"

me: "Yup, it is. So, write P = 3.2 kW right there in the 'Information' section."

B: [writes it down]

me: "Alright, good. So, let's keep reading... 'runs for 12 h'. What do hours measure?"

B: "Ah...."

me: "OK, so, if you say that a baseball game takes three hours, what does 'three hours' measure?"

B: [utterly bewildered look]

me: "Look, it's going to be one of three things: energy, power or time. Look at the formula you're using. So... what does 'twelve hours' measure?"

B: "I... [long pause] uh..."

me: "All you need to say is one of the words 'energy,' 'power' or 'time.' So, which thing would '12 hours' measure, out of these three?"

B: [cautiously, but without any sort of certainty] "...energy?"

me: [head nearly exploding] "Um... no. Hours measures time. It's time. So, write t = 12 h here."

I'd like to say things got better, but they didn't. Meanwhile, as I'm trying to teach B some exceptionally basic mathematical reasoning skills, the rest of my class is starting to go insane and bounce around the interior walls of the place.

As I've said before, my job is ridiculous.

With co-workers like this, eh?

Around the lunch table today...

me, licentiously: "That Serena Williams, man. YES."

several people: (laughing)

R: "Oh god. No thanks."

me, more licentiously: "YYYYYYEEEESSSS."

V: "Really? Her? I thought you were into petite Asian women."

me, puzzled: "Um... what?"

V, backpedaling a bit: "That's... what you're into, right?"

me: "Hey, I'm not gonna say I've never dated one in the past, but I wouldn't say I'm exclusively into them."

V, disappointed: "...oh."

* * * * *

I fully realize Serena Williams is an acquired taste. But, brother, have I acquired it.

Ain't nothin' wrong with that.