My speed

Mack: The Photocopier Squeals

This kind of relates to my last 2 posts about the end of summer and the returning to school for the kind.  My many thanks to Mac Hall for letting me post this. 

 

 

The Office Photocopier Squeals

 

The office photocopier can be a marvelous source of wisdom as well as of trivia. Sometimes one clears the scanner glass and learns what joys and revelations a fellowship / church / ministry / outreach / under the inspired leadership of Reverend Doctor Bishop Brother So-and-So has planned for the next Sunday.

 

Our lesson for today, however, is taken from a science quiz, the original of which was left in The Machine that knows all.  Here are some of the many connected bits of knowledge our tenth-graders are expected to master systematically: 

 

What substance releases hydroxide ions in solution?

 

What category of elements makes up Group 2 in the Periodic Table?

 

What are single-celled prokaryotes, organisms that lack a nucleus and membrane-bound organelles?

 

Define abiotic factors.

 

What is the biological mass in an ecosystem called?

 

What is a form of asexual reproduction in which the genetic material of the cell is copies and then the cell simply divides in two, forming two identical daughter cells?

 

What chemical substance slows or prevents the growth of bacterial microorganisms?

 

How many thanks do we owe Sister Thus-and-Such for playing the piano…wait…wrong document…

 

I conclude by making my own modest contribution: What is the predominant meter in Garth Brooks' "Friends in Low Places?"

 

A. Iambic pentameter
B. Trochee
C. Anapest
D. Budapest

 

For us parents the most important question in September is this: do our children have a set place and time for study?  Is their need to work to improve themselves respected by all in the household?  Do they have a quiet corner and good sturdy table at which to work?  A desk lamp?  Pens and pencils and calculator and paper?  A few basic reference books, beginning with an ordinary dictionary?

 

After all, life is not entirely about drunken movie starlets named after geographical features.

 

-30-
 

 

I would never wear someone else's name or likeness on my clothing, even if I weren't the man I admire most.

--
RMSTringer
+++++++++++++++

Blog Problems...

I am having trouble logging in to my blog tonight from work.  It will be a problem for em to get a post out other than a text post. i hope that this problem corrects itself soon.

 

Thank you,
--
RMSTringer
+++++++++++++++

Another realization of the end of summer...

As I wrote the last post, it got me to thinking about other memories.  One was that with the end of summer, there would be more order at the house. All of the kids have been out for the summer and have been able to say up all night and watch TV or surf the net.  They would sleep all day and repeat this again.  I was not real bad about this; perhaps only when I had a friend over and we would watch movies, o net was available back then. With the advent of school approaching, kids have to go to sleep at a descent time.  Our time for daughter is 10.30pm to be in bed and asleep. Not to be up asking questions and saying I forgot or I need to tell you something. Growing kids need their sleep and rest and this is an issue that we try to make daughter understand.  I was really never that bad about sleep.

 

Another realization is that there are no more real holidays until Thanksgiving and Christmas. Yes it is a long stretch until then.  Halloween comes around, but that is not a  holiday unless you are a pagan then you might try to get the day off. I can remember when I was in college having to go to football games during that weekend with the band.  When I was younger, I would go skiing with my father to Colorado. So that was something to look forward to during that long stretch between September and November.  After that, Christmas comes very quick so I would make my Christmas list and give it to all concerned…

 

Perhaps more later as I think about things.

 

RMStringer

^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Let teachers and priests and philosophers brood

over questions of reality and illusion.

I know this: if life is an illusion, then I

am no less an illusion, and being thus, the

illusion is real to me. I live, I burn with life, I

love, I slay, and I am content.

(Robert E. Howard, Queen of the Black Coast, Weird Tales, May 1934)

 

Steak!

Need I say moor?

Lador Day BBQ

A nice steak makes all happy!

The End Of Summer...

Well my friends, another summer has come to a close.  Labor Day has come and tomorrow it will have gone the way of all other holidays of yesteryear.  With the closing of summer, all the kids will be going back to school with their mothers not believing that they have advance to another grade and they have grown another 2 inches!  One might say “ We just bought you jeans in March, I can’t believe that you have outgrown them.”  I have heard my wife say that many times.  With the closing of summer, people scurry around to get last minute items on the school list that their kids need. 

 

I always hated the last day before school started because the realization was there that school will start tomorrow.  Understand though, I did not dislike school. The Jerry Lewis Telethon that plays all day Labor Day long was always a final reminder to me that summer is officially over.   I always had a friend over that day and we would play but they had to go home because school was the next day.  I would always look forward to the weekends so I could go or have company at my house or stay with a friend on Friday night.  Another sign in the finality of summer is the fact that the day are starting to get shorter and the night longer.  With a hurried pace, kids will be going to school and getting assignments to take home and projects to work on.  With the Labor Day weekend nearly finished, families will finish up their last minute vacations and will return home to get things in order for the new school season.  But with the ending of summer, some things come anew. 

 

I always anticipated the starting of a new Television Season as the ending of summer always marked a new season of new shows and the continuation of old TV series.  Yes, the summer season of reruns is nearly over with the ending of summer. I can remember me eagerly awaiting the newest episode of Saturday Night Live or way back in the day, Miami Vice. With the ending of summer, the Big Networks will do Labor Day Marathons of the big TV hits from the last season so as to let everyone that did not get to see them the last year or missed a few episodes to catch up and get ready for the shocking conclusion that left you hanging in May of that year. Labor Day was always bitter sweet for me.  It meant that most of my Friday Nights were tied up with Football Games and performing with the band and long trips to away games.  They were hot trips as in Texas “winter” never really hit until December or January and the band uniforms were wool. It was also a time to make new friends that might have moved into the town and reunite with old friends that you lost touch with over the summer. 

 

The end of summer also meant that it was time to get new clothes for the upcoming school year.  I always love to go to the mall and get the latest fashion for men and getting a few new pairs of shoes. I was always a coat man and I love to be able to get a new one for the new year and I could not wait until it was cold enough to wear it! Yes my friends, the end of summer is and always will be a bitter sweet time for us all…

 

God Bless!

RMStringer

^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Let teachers and priests and philosophers brood

over questions of reality and illusion.

I know this: if life is an illusion, then I

am no less an illusion, and being thus, the

illusion is real to me. I live, I burn with life, I

love, I slay, and I am content.

(Robert E. Howard, Queen of the Black Coast, Weird Tales, May 1934)