Facebook friends I should unfriend

There is a certain proportion of my Facebook friends who I should probably unfriend, I tell myself sometimes. But if I did, what (and who) would I have to entertain me? So I continue to follow these moronic people with whom I attended elementary school (usually) or worked (less often, but there are plenty of those idiots, too) and am then forced to physically restrain myself from making some snarky comment about their moronic post(s). Instead, I'll post about it here.

Here's something I noticed today on my Facebook "timeline", written by a "friend" from elementary school (I hope she didn't get much further than that in school; if so, I will have to have even less faith in our public schools):

Thank you to the ppl who broke in my car & took my wallet, credit cards, licence, birth certficate, insurance cards, school books/binders, tanning lotions, iPod, etc. first night I sleep good in weeks & wake up to that!

Please stop and think about what you have just read for a moment. See if you had the same reaction/question that I had.

.... 

Ready?

Now, because you are reading this blog, I'm assuming your reaction was something like "Why was all of that stuff in her car?" If so, good! If not, that's okay, I won't make fun of you... this time. But read on...

Let's break this down. Remember, all of the items mentioned above were stolen from her car:

--Wallet: I can understand leaving your wallet in the car for a few minutes, but based on the context of her post (I am going to ignore all the spelling and grammar issues this time around) I'm assuming this robbery happened overnight. Why would you leave your wallet in the car overnight?

--Credit cards: Same as above, but it makes even less sense to leave your wallet in the car when they are full of credit cards (and when, based on prior posts I've seen from you, you already have a major credit card spending problem).

--License: Again, this was probably in your wallet. It's a good idea to have your license in the car when you are also in the car, you know, in case anything happens, so you can be identified. 

--Birth certificate: This might be the strangest part of all. I do not understand this, UNLESS for some strange reason, she happened to be transporting her birth certificate from one place to another. Even so, I would not leave my birth certificate in the car overnight.

--Insurance cards: This makes sense assuming it's her car insurance, but I'm guessing she is referring to her health insurance card...

--School books/binders: This makes the most sense of all the items that were stolen. It just makes me really sad that she is in school. And I'm not sure you need your school books in the car when your school is the University of Phoenix.

--Tanning lotions: This girl is already way too dark. She is going to die of skin cancer. I do not understand how it is perfectly acceptable to scream at strangers that they shouldn't smoke, yet our society condones (and prefers) sun-baked bodies. Ugh. 

--iPod: So I leave my iPod in the car sometimes... if it were ever stolen, that would be my own damn fault, and I would not complain about it on Facebook.

Now let's examine some of the sympathetic comments made on my "friend"'s post:

Wtf!!!!! Ash dis has to be a.damn dream!

Wow. That is so insightful.

Oh honey! I am sooo sorry - lemme know if can do anything 

You should tell your friend to stop being such an idiot, maybe?

#Norfolk 

(Response from my idiot friend): Va beach nice neighborhood not mine my parents 

So she means a white neighborhood. And apparently it's okay to leave ALL OF YOUR BELONGINGS in the car overnight, as long as it's in a "nice neighborhood". Oops. Not so much.

Oh hell no! My shit got broke into twice in virginia. Sorry honey

So based on this poster's empirical study, no one should visit Virginia. Ever.

damn thats crazy 

It's crazy? Really? You're surprised?

Did you put a fraud alert out on your name

I like this above post. No sympathy expressed. Just some good advice.

:( oh my gosh. I'm so sorry girl, that's horrible! 

Not as horrible as having skin cancer...

Probably shouldn't leave your wallet and shit in your car.  

THANK YOU!

Sigh. That is all.

Doorway Blockers

My father told me at a young age that if there is a space to be filled, then people will fill it. I didn't really know what he was talking about, until now!

Some idiotic people, lots of them, in fact, will be casually moseying in a public place. A crowded place. They'll be following the flow of the crowd. And then they reach the doorway, and they stop. For no reason. And then they stand there and have a conversation. They could have that conversation anywhere, but the doorway is the best place. Because then the doorway blockers get to be rude and look at people like they're offending the blockers when they say excuse me and squeeze by!! Choose another space, please.

It’s not difficult

Today was the first day of end of grade testing…yay!  That means hours of silence followed by keeping the kids occupied before it’s time to go home.  I don’t mind the testing part because it’s peaceful and quiet, if also boring.

One of the students I was testing was wearing a shirt that read: “Its’ only Funny until someone gets hurt… then its’ hilarious!” [emphasis mine].

Let’s ignore the unnecessary capitalization of the word funny. Instead, let us focus on the misplaced apostrophe in the word it’s.  A big pet peeve of mine is the confusion between the words it’s and its.  To me, it’s not difficult.  The former is a contraction of a pronoun and a verb, while the latter is a possessive adjective.  But what this person had on their shirt was neither: its’.  I don’t get it.  I can understand people making a mistake when typing quickly.   But making the same mistake twice suggests that the person who designed the shirt is an idiot and doesn’t get messages proofread before printing t-shirts.  It also makes me wonder about the person who purchased the shirt for the boy.

Hmm

Have you ever watched a show about people with pet lions?

After you!

I was trying to leave school this afternoon, more specifically, waiting to turn left onto the main road out of the parking lot.

At that moment, two individuals, who I assume were parents, were coming from opposite directions and attempting to turn into the school. One needed to turn right and the other needed to turn left.

Both drivers gestured to the other, "after you!" with palm outstretched. Well isn't that polite! Neither man took up the offer, instead each gesturing to the other again. Haha! Still no one is moving. Ok, this is now obnoxious and idiotic. This false chivalry continues for 20 to 30 seconds. Finally the man who needed to take the left turn entered the parking lot, honking angrily as he passed by. I don't get it. Does that make him less chivalrous? Was his manhood injured by being the first to turn into the damn driveway? Was it better to keep stupidly holding up traffic? Now I just think both of them are assholes.

I don't know why I didn't honk.

Testing brings out the best

So it's testing time again; everyone's favorite time of year. Evidently, it's also the time some of us educators show our own deficiencies.

The other day, one of the staff math teachers let me know that she recommended that I have a 'read aloud' group of students for the math section of the test (some students get their questions read aloud to them as an accommodation). She let me know it wasn't because she didn't like me and wanted me to have extra work, but instead because she knew I could read the middle school math expressions correctly. At first, I thought she was joking. She must have seen the look on my face because she explained, "No, really. I've had some non-math teachers read "x^2" as " 'x' two" instead of " 'x' to the second power." I didn't know reading exponents was such an upper level skill.

This afternoon, I found out that one of the teachers had students take the 1st quarter part of the test (we are in the 3rd quarter). Yes, all of the quarter tests share the same book, but each section and its page numbers is clearly labeled on the front of the book. Additionally, the script we were supposed to read to the students word for word clearly said "3rd Quarter" at least twice. So now that teacher has to hunt down those students and have them take the correct test. How could you mess that up if you read the script? Oh, I think just answered my own question.

Can't Help Myself...Sorry, More Facebook Statuses...

People just can't hide their stupidity now that the free world is at their fingertips.

On Sunday, I noticed this status from a girl I know from middle school:

had a wonderful day with the boyfriend... church, wings for lunch, free tanning & some walking on the greenway!! :)

Okay, okay, I'm glad that she had a nice day, and it doesn't sound that bad.

Fast forward to Wednesday's status:

I have melanoma. found out today. Having emergency surgery tmrw on my arm. Please keep me in your prayers!

I'll let you flesh out all the rest on your own. Just had to share.