The End of an Era
Hello all, I am back. The past couple years have been quite crazy. I'll give you the rundown of what happened. That camping trip I went on kinda sucked because it was cloudy. For those of you that forget, I went on that camping trip specifically for astronomy. Anyway, ignoring that, there was nothing extremely negative that I can remember. One of our "neighbours" had an accident where a child was burnt (I assume) and that caught my attention. From where I was standing it seemed pretty severe, however the child's parents were able to handle the situation pretty damn well. I hope if that happens to any hypothetical children I might have, I know what to do and I don't panic.
Anyways, that was 2 years ago. Since then I spent another year in high school, yes, I know, that would be seven years, I suck, but here's the rundown.
I took a World Issues class and the highlight was a scenario we ran. We split into groups and designed our own country. The next day our teacher said that in each of our countries, our entire population was being evacuated because another group of people, with every other nation on earth behind it, wanted to return to their homeland, our nation. My group came up with the idea of smoking them out, finding a way to get them to want to leave. For those of you who don't know, this is the same scenario encountered by Palestine when the Jews wanted to form the nation of Israel...so...yeah. I'm not sure why it happened to begin with, I guess because the Jews were widely disliked, but there are no talks to do that to any other faith. Maybe a factor was that the Christian Bible predicts that the Jewish people would return to their homeland. That's what I like to call a self-fulfilling prophecy. Now I don't think the Palestinians are right for bombing Israel, but it shouldn't have happened to begin with, and now that it has happened there's not a whole lot they can do.
Later on an interesting event happened. I can't remember when exactly but I believe it was two or three months before the end of the school year (which would be the end of June for those unfamiliar with the Canadian high school system). Our awesome principal, and our new vice principal, who started the beginning of that year, were both transferred. What irks me was not that they were transferred, that is not a big deal, what irks me is that they were transferred at such an odd time. They couldn't wait a few months? The main reason was apparently they don't like any one principal to stay in one seat for too long, (she's been in that position for 6 years), but I doubt anyone would have made a big fuss over her staying just a little while longer. Another factor was there was a principal at another school who was stepping down. So they needed to fill a position, our vice-principal could have taken that position over and our principal could have stayed, but that didn't happen. But what really stuck in my craw was that the teacher who was promoted to vice-principal once said, to my face, that I was not smart enough to be in her history class. Those were probably not her exact words, but that was the message that came across. That's what I like to call a bad first impression.
Another interesting event involved my Chemistry class. I will start by explaining the instigating event. It was a lab on temperature...something...thing...I forget. Anyway a lot of people were stupid and forgot goggles. It's noob-shit 101, bring goggles when working a chem lab. The lab we were working in didn't have community goggles, so they went next door with our teacher's permission. A lot of people grabbed goggles one at a time. A good idea would have been to get one person to grab an ass-load of goggles, but that didn't happen. Anyway, the teacher who was in the room text to us came into our class and started yelling at my classmates about interrupting her class. I told her she needed to calm down and my teacher kicked me out of class. You know the interesting thing is that when I told the vice-principal that there were better ways she could have handled the situation, The VP said it didn't matter and that that teacher had the right to do what she wanted to do. This is something I don't want anyone to ever forget: Having the right to do something doesn't make it the right thing to do. I have a right to say anything I want, including any racist comments, that doesn't make it the right thing to do. Fred Phelps, a pastor in Kansas who protests the funerals of American soldiers and gay people, has a right to do what he wants, it doesn't make it the right thing to do. So to this day I stand by what I did, the right thing, because if someone is yelling at my friend/colleague/associate/acquaintance, I will stand up to them. I don't care that they are not yelling at me, I don't care if it's none of my business, and I don't care if they are my so-called "superior," especially considering that if they were superior to me, they would know better.
Anyway that chemistry teacher, you know, the one that didn't yell at me but did kick me out of class, I began giving her the cold shoulder. Before that date, I considered us good friends, I was not nice to her because she was my teacher, I was nice to her because she was a nice person who I got along with, which is a good definition of friend if ever there was one. But after that incident, I felt betrayed. It wasn't long before this teacher wanted things to go "back to normal." How could they? She scheduled a meeting between me, her, and the new VP, you know, the one who called me an idiot a long time ago. Anyway I told them why I was acting different, and that I considered her a friend and felt betrayed and they said that me calling her a friend was "inappropriate."
I'm sure there are a lot of people out there who agree with them but let me explain something first, I would never ask a friend for preferential treatment, that would make me a bad friend. Let's say I'm conducting a job interview and the choice is between a friend with plenty of experience and skills or a stranger with the same experience and skills. I would hire the friend because I would get along with them and I would trust them. However if it was between a friend with little experience and skills or a stranger with more experience, I don't care if he was the best man at my wedding, I would hire the stranger. I would say, "Dude, I love you but you are simply not cut out for this job, someone else will hire you." The point being, a true friend never takes advantage of someones friendship. They would never ask or expect preferential treatment. So I would never have expected preferential from my chem teacher, I am not insane, however I would have expected them to stand up for me, at least slightly. I doubt her job would have been in jeopardy if she told the other teacher that she was sorry and she would take care of it, you know, diffuse the situation, instead of escalating it, so that is what I mean when I said she betrayed me.
Anyway, that single sentence got me to thinking (her saying that friendship is inappropriate). So I decided that I no longer felt betrayed, I felt like we weren't friends, so I treated her like anyone else, I maintained a professional relationship and no longer treated her like a friend. But because things weren't "back to normal" as she wanted, she kicked me out of class permanently. I didn't care, because I already had the credit, I was just there to earn a decent grade, and I am glad I retook it, even though I didn't get a grade this time, because things make more sense the second time around.
Another event that freaked me out involved my cat. He likes hanging his head out the window in the back of our house and breathe in the fresh air and look at the back yard. One day, late at night, I was reading for a very important assignment on apocalyptic literature, I was way behind so I was reading my ass off. Anyway as I was reading I heard kitty scratches and a plop. He fell out the window onto the ground, two stories below him. He apparently was trying to attack the moths that were congregating near the lamp. I panicked and ran down stairs and I think I scared him off. I was so worried that in his vulnerable state, a bear would eat him. I couldn't sleep so I continued reading and checking for the cat every so often. After an hour or so, I can't remember exactly, I heard a dingle-dingle of a kitty bell. So I went to look for him and I found him under the neighbour's shed. He was in shock and when I tried to grab him he got in defensive mode. I fought him and brought him in. That morning we went to the vet. He had a sprained paw but was pretty good otherwise. No broken bones or organs and a few weeks later he was back to normal. So we don't let him hang out the window anymore.
Moving on, I was reading a Scientific American when I ran across this little...I wouldn't call it a story...and it was too much to call it a brief...let's call it a thing, and it was about Linux, so I decided to give it a shot. I duel-booted my laptop with Fedora Core 6 and I fell in love. The things I learned...wow, I mean...it's free and can do almost everything Windows can. I'll admit I had problems, but all of them I was able to fix fairly easy, (most by switching from 64-bit to 32-bit), but the best part is the free. It can't play most games but a program called WINE can, it's a program that allows one to run programs with the Windows API under Linux. I also attempted to build a server to store all my data that I can access over the network but the hard drive I was using to boot from was apparently on its last legs. It worked well at first but the hard drive kept having problems and then the video processor gave out. Thankfully my data was on another drive that I got from eBay. Anyway, now I have nothing and more recently that hard drive I had all my data on, broke. So until I find an identical hard drive made in the same production run, I am screwed.
Also, I found this awesome ass show called Hak.5 and it is the best show on not television. It's IPTV which apparently got big when I wasn't looking. I hate being a late adopter, I feel inferior some how. Anyway I started watching at the end of its second season and they just finished season three which seemed to be kinda half-assed compared to their previous work. Their motto is "Trust your Technolust," and I do. Anyway, Hak.5 is partially responsible for my current interest in network security, which is a euphemism for hacking.
Anyway, that is all for now. I'll continue this post later but until then, I am hoping any grammar Nazis can proofread my stuff, I welcome it.
Anyways, that was 2 years ago. Since then I spent another year in high school, yes, I know, that would be seven years, I suck, but here's the rundown.
I took a World Issues class and the highlight was a scenario we ran. We split into groups and designed our own country. The next day our teacher said that in each of our countries, our entire population was being evacuated because another group of people, with every other nation on earth behind it, wanted to return to their homeland, our nation. My group came up with the idea of smoking them out, finding a way to get them to want to leave. For those of you who don't know, this is the same scenario encountered by Palestine when the Jews wanted to form the nation of Israel...so...yeah. I'm not sure why it happened to begin with, I guess because the Jews were widely disliked, but there are no talks to do that to any other faith. Maybe a factor was that the Christian Bible predicts that the Jewish people would return to their homeland. That's what I like to call a self-fulfilling prophecy. Now I don't think the Palestinians are right for bombing Israel, but it shouldn't have happened to begin with, and now that it has happened there's not a whole lot they can do.
Later on an interesting event happened. I can't remember when exactly but I believe it was two or three months before the end of the school year (which would be the end of June for those unfamiliar with the Canadian high school system). Our awesome principal, and our new vice principal, who started the beginning of that year, were both transferred. What irks me was not that they were transferred, that is not a big deal, what irks me is that they were transferred at such an odd time. They couldn't wait a few months? The main reason was apparently they don't like any one principal to stay in one seat for too long, (she's been in that position for 6 years), but I doubt anyone would have made a big fuss over her staying just a little while longer. Another factor was there was a principal at another school who was stepping down. So they needed to fill a position, our vice-principal could have taken that position over and our principal could have stayed, but that didn't happen. But what really stuck in my craw was that the teacher who was promoted to vice-principal once said, to my face, that I was not smart enough to be in her history class. Those were probably not her exact words, but that was the message that came across. That's what I like to call a bad first impression.
Another interesting event involved my Chemistry class. I will start by explaining the instigating event. It was a lab on temperature...something...thing...I forget. Anyway a lot of people were stupid and forgot goggles. It's noob-shit 101, bring goggles when working a chem lab. The lab we were working in didn't have community goggles, so they went next door with our teacher's permission. A lot of people grabbed goggles one at a time. A good idea would have been to get one person to grab an ass-load of goggles, but that didn't happen. Anyway, the teacher who was in the room text to us came into our class and started yelling at my classmates about interrupting her class. I told her she needed to calm down and my teacher kicked me out of class. You know the interesting thing is that when I told the vice-principal that there were better ways she could have handled the situation, The VP said it didn't matter and that that teacher had the right to do what she wanted to do. This is something I don't want anyone to ever forget: Having the right to do something doesn't make it the right thing to do. I have a right to say anything I want, including any racist comments, that doesn't make it the right thing to do. Fred Phelps, a pastor in Kansas who protests the funerals of American soldiers and gay people, has a right to do what he wants, it doesn't make it the right thing to do. So to this day I stand by what I did, the right thing, because if someone is yelling at my friend/colleague/associate/acquaintance, I will stand up to them. I don't care that they are not yelling at me, I don't care if it's none of my business, and I don't care if they are my so-called "superior," especially considering that if they were superior to me, they would know better.
Anyway that chemistry teacher, you know, the one that didn't yell at me but did kick me out of class, I began giving her the cold shoulder. Before that date, I considered us good friends, I was not nice to her because she was my teacher, I was nice to her because she was a nice person who I got along with, which is a good definition of friend if ever there was one. But after that incident, I felt betrayed. It wasn't long before this teacher wanted things to go "back to normal." How could they? She scheduled a meeting between me, her, and the new VP, you know, the one who called me an idiot a long time ago. Anyway I told them why I was acting different, and that I considered her a friend and felt betrayed and they said that me calling her a friend was "inappropriate."
I'm sure there are a lot of people out there who agree with them but let me explain something first, I would never ask a friend for preferential treatment, that would make me a bad friend. Let's say I'm conducting a job interview and the choice is between a friend with plenty of experience and skills or a stranger with the same experience and skills. I would hire the friend because I would get along with them and I would trust them. However if it was between a friend with little experience and skills or a stranger with more experience, I don't care if he was the best man at my wedding, I would hire the stranger. I would say, "Dude, I love you but you are simply not cut out for this job, someone else will hire you." The point being, a true friend never takes advantage of someones friendship. They would never ask or expect preferential treatment. So I would never have expected preferential from my chem teacher, I am not insane, however I would have expected them to stand up for me, at least slightly. I doubt her job would have been in jeopardy if she told the other teacher that she was sorry and she would take care of it, you know, diffuse the situation, instead of escalating it, so that is what I mean when I said she betrayed me.
Anyway, that single sentence got me to thinking (her saying that friendship is inappropriate). So I decided that I no longer felt betrayed, I felt like we weren't friends, so I treated her like anyone else, I maintained a professional relationship and no longer treated her like a friend. But because things weren't "back to normal" as she wanted, she kicked me out of class permanently. I didn't care, because I already had the credit, I was just there to earn a decent grade, and I am glad I retook it, even though I didn't get a grade this time, because things make more sense the second time around.
Another event that freaked me out involved my cat. He likes hanging his head out the window in the back of our house and breathe in the fresh air and look at the back yard. One day, late at night, I was reading for a very important assignment on apocalyptic literature, I was way behind so I was reading my ass off. Anyway as I was reading I heard kitty scratches and a plop. He fell out the window onto the ground, two stories below him. He apparently was trying to attack the moths that were congregating near the lamp. I panicked and ran down stairs and I think I scared him off. I was so worried that in his vulnerable state, a bear would eat him. I couldn't sleep so I continued reading and checking for the cat every so often. After an hour or so, I can't remember exactly, I heard a dingle-dingle of a kitty bell. So I went to look for him and I found him under the neighbour's shed. He was in shock and when I tried to grab him he got in defensive mode. I fought him and brought him in. That morning we went to the vet. He had a sprained paw but was pretty good otherwise. No broken bones or organs and a few weeks later he was back to normal. So we don't let him hang out the window anymore.
Moving on, I was reading a Scientific American when I ran across this little...I wouldn't call it a story...and it was too much to call it a brief...let's call it a thing, and it was about Linux, so I decided to give it a shot. I duel-booted my laptop with Fedora Core 6 and I fell in love. The things I learned...wow, I mean...it's free and can do almost everything Windows can. I'll admit I had problems, but all of them I was able to fix fairly easy, (most by switching from 64-bit to 32-bit), but the best part is the free. It can't play most games but a program called WINE can, it's a program that allows one to run programs with the Windows API under Linux. I also attempted to build a server to store all my data that I can access over the network but the hard drive I was using to boot from was apparently on its last legs. It worked well at first but the hard drive kept having problems and then the video processor gave out. Thankfully my data was on another drive that I got from eBay. Anyway, now I have nothing and more recently that hard drive I had all my data on, broke. So until I find an identical hard drive made in the same production run, I am screwed.
Also, I found this awesome ass show called Hak.5 and it is the best show on not television. It's IPTV which apparently got big when I wasn't looking. I hate being a late adopter, I feel inferior some how. Anyway I started watching at the end of its second season and they just finished season three which seemed to be kinda half-assed compared to their previous work. Their motto is "Trust your Technolust," and I do. Anyway, Hak.5 is partially responsible for my current interest in network security, which is a euphemism for hacking.
Anyway, that is all for now. I'll continue this post later but until then, I am hoping any grammar Nazis can proofread my stuff, I welcome it.