Oh, and while I'm going on and on about Metallica--
--A story, from my teaching days!
I started listening to Metallica in the early 90s (I bought the Black Album first and then worked backwards.) I also started teaching elementary school in the early 90s. Metallica was touring with the Black Album at the time and played a show in Moncton (I was living an hour or so north, in Miramichi, at the time.) So my brother and a friend of mine got tickets. It was a terrific show with a great deal of audience participation, I then drove home, got in at probably two in the morning, and got up the next day to go to work.
Now, by "audience participation" I mean yelling along and headbanging, so I arrived at work the next morning--
(a) feeling about half-past dead,
(b) totally hoarse, and
(c) unable to move my head because my neck hurt.
I mentioned that I taught grades three and four, right?
So the kids asked what was wrong, and naturally I lied to them and said I thought I might be catching a cold. I was fine the next day and the whole thing blew over.
But a year or two later, I was talking to the mother and stepfather of one of my current students, who was the little brother of a kid who'd been in my class that first year. (This was the same family who gave me Coney and Kinsey, so I've always had a major soft spot for them.) At some point in the conversation the parents remarked that the fourth-grader, who was the nicest kid in the world, had started listening to Metallica and they wondered whether they should be worried.
I remarked that it didn't seem to be doing me any harm, and when they looked startled and amused I told them the story of the concert and its aftermath, which they thought was hilarious. (I, um, do not look like anyone's idea of a headbanger. I looked even less like it then.)
The next morning, my student arrived at school wearing a Metallica t-shirt. He said nothing as he sat down at his desk, but I could tell by his expression he was waiting for a reaction.
Me: "I like your shirt."
He: "Thanks. My mother said you would."
And we both smirked and went about our business.
(Strangely, I don't recall any of the other kids mentioning this, so it appears the kid kept the story to himself. Unusual, for that age--perhaps he was a Spy Kid!)
I started listening to Metallica in the early 90s (I bought the Black Album first and then worked backwards.) I also started teaching elementary school in the early 90s. Metallica was touring with the Black Album at the time and played a show in Moncton (I was living an hour or so north, in Miramichi, at the time.) So my brother and a friend of mine got tickets. It was a terrific show with a great deal of audience participation, I then drove home, got in at probably two in the morning, and got up the next day to go to work.
Now, by "audience participation" I mean yelling along and headbanging, so I arrived at work the next morning--
(a) feeling about half-past dead,
(b) totally hoarse, and
(c) unable to move my head because my neck hurt.
I mentioned that I taught grades three and four, right?
So the kids asked what was wrong, and naturally I lied to them and said I thought I might be catching a cold. I was fine the next day and the whole thing blew over.
But a year or two later, I was talking to the mother and stepfather of one of my current students, who was the little brother of a kid who'd been in my class that first year. (This was the same family who gave me Coney and Kinsey, so I've always had a major soft spot for them.) At some point in the conversation the parents remarked that the fourth-grader, who was the nicest kid in the world, had started listening to Metallica and they wondered whether they should be worried.
I remarked that it didn't seem to be doing me any harm, and when they looked startled and amused I told them the story of the concert and its aftermath, which they thought was hilarious. (I, um, do not look like anyone's idea of a headbanger. I looked even less like it then.)
The next morning, my student arrived at school wearing a Metallica t-shirt. He said nothing as he sat down at his desk, but I could tell by his expression he was waiting for a reaction.
Me: "I like your shirt."
He: "Thanks. My mother said you would."
And we both smirked and went about our business.
(Strangely, I don't recall any of the other kids mentioning this, so it appears the kid kept the story to himself. Unusual, for that age--perhaps he was a Spy Kid!)