Truants From STATE SCHOOLS to be Watched 24/7 by out2theblack

Well, consider my situation once I got pissed off enough to tell them where to stuff their education(read: indoctrination) system and bagged up the GED two years early.

Part of that was due to credit shuffling, in spite of never failing a class, I would have had to pull either 2 MORE years, or 1 year and summer school just to graduate, and I just couldn't take it.

The other part was that from about the end of middle school I wasn't learning nothing IN school, and was far enough ahead of the curriculum that I could practically phone it in - one of my teachers would "accidently" leave advanced course materials on a specific table knowing I would borrow and return them.
(I read voraciously, if you leave a book I haven't read layin around, it'll get read even if it's awful)

Not to mention I despised the fucked up prison-yard social structure, a feeling that was entirely mutual to the point of nearly absolute isolation - other than the folk who sat at my table at lunch to mitigate boyfriend or bully problems, no one would even come NEAR me by the end of things, which is of course why some of those folks chose to eat lunch there.

So, screw em, bagged up the GED the moment I could loophole my way into it, not sure you can pull that stunt anymore, but it was useful then, and I took it.

Only to find out that Maryland law *requires* you to attend school at that age, and shortly after, as an Emancipated Minor with no Legal Guardian, getting work at all was a pain in the ass, and dodging truant officers was worse - cause you know, all teens are 'lying manipulators' (thank you SO much, Sembler and Lichfield, you fucks!) and thus incapable of uttering the truth, so they weren't gonna listen to a damn thing I had to say cause I was a non-adult (read: non-person).

Have any of YOU ever been late for work because you were hiding on a rooftop you'd climbed to dodge the police ?

I did get caught once, coming out of the bathroom, and when this dipshit dragged me back to my last school of record, it was actually quite amusing to watch the argument between him and Malone, the Admin, cause Malone wanted me OFF the property post-haste, or arrested for trespassing, and the Cop wasn't having any of it.

During their little spat, I used the crowd cover of changing classes to pull a fade and bribed a buddy who still attended to give me a lift back to my workplace.

Folks leave school for all kinds of reasons, and sure, not all of them are good, but instead of taking a sledgehammer approach to a system that's already badly broken in the first place, maybe they should put that kind of effort into fixing it in the first place ?

Oh, and teens are humans, PEOPLE, something that once again gets glossed over and forgotten in the nature of a proposal that treats them like errant livestock.

-Frem

It cannot be said enough, those who do not learn from history, are doomed to endlessly repeat it

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Saturday, August 23, 2008 6:21 AM

OUT2THEBLACK

" And these children that you spit on as they try to change their worlds;
are immune to your consultations, they are quite aware of what they are
going through. " -David Bowie

That's the quote I was looking for , but on the way to this find , there was a site I found that tickled me a bit , and it might tickle you , also...

http://www.forbisthemighty.com/acidlogic/mm_breakfastclub.htm

Anyways , when I found that news item , I thought of you straight away , 'cause I couldn't wait to see your response...

Once again , you do not disappoint...

Thanks for your insights and experiences . Truly...

First time I went ' over the wall ', I was still in preschool...

Second time , same thing , preschool...

Worried Ma , a bit , it did...

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Saturday, August 23, 2008 6:23 AM

This one oughta tickle your fancy then.

http://www.schoolandstate.org/Case/case2.htm

I might not wholly agree with em, but they have a holy hell of a lotta good points.

EDIT: Also worthy of note was that to pull the GED trick at the time, you could NOT be a current student of any school, and they were very, very reluctant to let me go, so I MADE them kick me out with a sequence of events and deeds that made Ferris Bueller look like a piker, imma see if I can find that post, meh heh heh.

-F

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Saturday, August 23, 2008 6:35 AM

RIVERLOVE

Why are you proud of that? What's wrong with going to school to learn and grow and interact socially? What makes you so different? What rightous awareness do you have that the vast majority doesn't? Your HS adventures sound bitter and anti-social to me, but I know you had lot's of fun on the outside.

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Saturday, August 23, 2008 6:39 AM

Shut up, Riverlove.

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Saturday, August 23, 2008 6:47 AM

RIVERLOVE

Whatever you say.

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Saturday, August 23, 2008 6:57 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by Riverlove:
Whatever you say.

Good, 'cause you weren't making any sense there...maybe you just don't know Frem well enough, bein' somewhat new & all.

You may now continue.

isall

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Saturday, August 23, 2008 6:58 AM

Quote:
Why are you proud of that?

Because in the end I won, up against a system designed and refined over many years to crush any invididual personhood and "dangerous thoughts" out of folk like me.

-F

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Saturday, August 23, 2008 9:18 AM

Freedom is Important because People are Important

Hello,

First, very bad rudeness directed at Riverlove. Her question was valid, regardless of who our resident anarchist is or how long he's been here or how long River has been here.

The question of what, precisely, the school was doing to you is a good one. The question of why, exactly, you couldn't get along is a good one. "Crushing my spirit" is a little vague.

For my own part, I'd be happy to share my least favorite school experience, which occurred in Middle School. Middle School is where I learned that the educational system was badly broken. Before then, I didn't care much about school, but I didn't detect any blaring problems with it, either. In Middle School, my eyes were opened.

*****************

If you can get into your way-back machine, you may remember the 80's. In the 80's, personal computers were a neat new thing. Most people didn't have one. Most people didn't care about them. My Elementary school had one room with ten Apple II computers that could be shared amongst the hundreds of kids that attended. They introduced this innovation in my sixth year. We had 'computer class' where simple programs were used that did very little. The best that can be said about that class was that it exposed us to the idea of computers.

In just 5 or 6 years, all of that would change. Computers would become an important, intregal part of most schools. But I was still on the near side of that hill, unable to see over the peak to the future of education. Fortunately, my father was a computer programmer by trade. He programmed the big room-filling mainframe computer that the City of Hialeah operated for its utilities and such. I was the only kid on my block at that time with my very own Apple II computer in my very own room.

Wanting to further my education in computers, my father enrolled me in a Magnet Program for Middle School. Magnet Programs were ostensibly public schools that drew in children with particular interests, like Music, or Creative Writing, or Math, or whatever. It seemed like a great idea to me. You could attend a school that specialized in what you wanted to learn. The school my father enrolled me in was a Computer magnet school. Every class had computers! Wow! It was like the school of the future!

But I soon came to know that the Magnet School was not an educational tool designed to suit kids with particular interests. Rather, it was a political tool designed to integrate children of varying races and social classes.

Enter Horace Mann Middle School.

Horace Mann was a poor quality school in an economically shattered neighborhood populated by 90% Black folks. (Leter to be termed African Americans.) The paint was peeling off the walls, the textbooks were old and had pages falling out, the classrooms had no air conditioners, and the teachers cared for little more than making it to the end of the year. It was a disaster of a school. But thanks to 'Integration,' the school was about to undergo a magic transformation.

A new, high technology educational center was built on site. A huge, air conditioned building filled with brightly lit and well decorated classrooms... Classrooms that each had 30 computers ready to be used by children eager to learn. New, motivated teachers were recruited from throughout the region, assigned to teach in this educatorium of tomorrow. (Educatorium is what I used to call this high tech building.)

The poor black kids in this poor black neighborhood would have been thrilled with this multi-million dollar upgrade. Imagine the opportunities they'd get! Good teachers, good classrooms, and skills that would be important to the next generation of humanity!

Only... They didn't get to enter the Educatorium. Instead, Middle Class Family kids like me were imported from faraway neighborhoods via a special bus line, and deposited into the Educatorium. Meanwhile, the economically crippled rabble got to watch in anger and envy from their dilapidated school buildings. The two groups of children never crossed paths... Except at lunch.

Only one Lunchroom, in the Dilapitarium (the Black po-folk part of the school) was available for all students. Students were urged to eat quickly and move out to make room for more students to eat. After being rushed through your meal, you were forced to enter the 'Spillout Area' (read: Prison Yard) which was a gated area patrolled by security guards. Children were forced to remain in this Spillout Area until the next period started. The guards were there to protect the fence, because they sure didn't interfere with any bullying until it was all over.

I still remember 'Cracker Day,' which was a monthly holiday to impress upon the imported children how important it was for adults not to shit all over the disenfranchised. Many a pint of blood was spilled in that Spillout Area.

I learned a lot at Horace Mann. Just not what the establishment was trying to teach me.

--Anthony

"Liberty must not be purchased at the cost of Humanity." --Captain Robert Henner

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Saturday, August 23, 2008 9:55 AM

Freedom is Important because People are Important

As an aside,

Which is actually more on-topic. The subject of tracking devices on school kids?

If I was such a child, I would sabotage the device. And I'd be tempted to bill the state for any cost of materials associated with upholding my Constitutional rights.

--Anthony

"Liberty must not be purchased at the cost of Humanity." --Captain Robert Henner

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Saturday, August 23, 2008 10:13 AM

RUE

I have a vote and I'm not afraid to use it!

Tracking devices 24/7. I'm glad I give $$$ to the ACLU.

FremD, AnthonyT:

This society would rather spend money on prisons than schools.

Did you read about the Supreme's decision a couple of years ago - which said that there was no 'unequal protection under the law' if poor neighborhoods got less per capita state school money than rich ones ?

The fact that not ALL public schools are hell-holes tells us it's completely possible to have good public schools for all. We just have to be willing to spend the money - and spend it fairly, where it's needed.

***************************************************************
Global warming - it's not just a fact, it's a choice.

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Saturday, August 23, 2008 10:34 AM

KHYRON

Chris, maybe you should drop the "Shut up" thing. It's not funny, you come across as a bit of a prick when you use it on people who don't deserve it (like Riverlove above) and it scares newcomers away.

And yes, I realize that the response to this post of mine will probably be "Shut up, Khyron".

------------------------------

This isn't my signature. I have to type this every time I make a post.

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Saturday, August 23, 2008 10:52 AM

When I was in middle school, I went through a serious bout of depression that included suicide attempts and multiple trips to the psychiatric ward. I was diagnosed as having a school phobia, which resulted in me being absent from school more often than not. While the school did attempt to work with me, I ended up being convicted of truancy (never mind the fact that all of this stemmed from my depression and anxiety, not a desire to just cut class). So if this was about ten or eleven years ago, I'd be one of those kids in the article.

Quote:
Why are you proud of that? What's wrong with going to school to learn and grow and interact socially? What makes you so different? What righteous awareness do you have that the vast majority doesn't? Your HS adventures sound bitter and anti-social to me, but I know you had lot's of fun on the outside.

What you're describing here does not work for everyone Riverlove. I don't know all the specifics of Frem's case, but for me, I was just as miserable out of school as I was in school. Only after I got my GED was I finally able to straighten out my life. The public school system has always operated on a one-size-fits-all ideology that just cannot work for some kids, me and Frem being some of them. I don't believe Frem was trying to be an ass just for the hell of it; he was chafing against a indifferent system that refused to even consider his needs. So yes, some of us are damn proud of the fact we jumped ship and got our GED's, because frankly, it was the only thing that was going to save us.

**************************************************

"This is my timey-wimey detector. It goes ding when there's stuff. Also, it can boil an egg at 30 paces, whether you want it to or not, actually, so I've learned to stay away from hens. It's not pretty when they blow."

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Saturday, August 23, 2008 10:55 AM

"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." -- William Casey, Reagan's presidential campaign manager & CIA Director (from first staff meeting in 1981)

Shut up, Khyron.

:)

(Kidding. I was just trying to oblige.)

Mike

"I supported Bush in 2000 and 2004 and intellegence[sic] had very little to do with that decision." - Hero, Real World Event Discussions

I can't help the sinking feeling that my country is now being run by people who read "1984" not as a cautionary tale, but rather as an instruction manual. - Michael Mock

The Myrmidons were an ancient nation of very brave and skilled warriors as described in Homer's Iliad, and were commanded by Achilles. - Wikipedia

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Saturday, August 23, 2008 12:35 PM

Well, at the root of it, how to even explain...

Whatever innate thing inside folk that makes them like other people, NEED other people, want their approval, and to be around them...

I was either born without it or it was burned out of me prior to the period where longterm memory starts, either way, I just don't have it.

It's not that I dislike them either - I ... just. don't. care.

And I was pretty miserable anyways, as every single day it became clearer and clearer to me that my beliefs, my morals, hell, everything I WAS - was quite unwelcome in this world and always would be.

I think the defining moment of that was when I refused to utter the Pledge of Allegience cause I HATED "Their God" and his evil servants, and considered the statement "Liberty and Justice for all" to be flat out bullshit even at MY age.

As you can imagine, that did not go over well, especially when my mother backed me to the hilt and the school backed down and let me remain seated and silent while the rest of the mindless drones sieg-heiled.

Once I became adept enough at personal violence to make the idea of engaging me genuinely dangerous, cause I WOULD NOT STOP till physically restrained or beaten unconscious, I got left strictly alone, and I mean ALONE.

You've no concept of the hell that this can be - I recently watched a seriously disturbing Anime called Elfen Lied, and for those who have also seen it, let's just say that without going into a the details, I had my own "puppydog incident" which defined the course of my relations with schoolmates for the rest of those days quite clearly enough to me.

For almost a decade I lived alone in an arms length circle of potential violence so horrific NO one would cross that line, with no parental support because my mother was working 14 hour days to keep the bills paid, and food on the table, and at every opportunity, legal or not, I supplemented that income however I could.

On top of that, the school's "history" class was so chock full of laughable distortions and fictions that it was one of the few times I cracked the walls open and spoke, between that and the social studies class in which they asked what kind of Government we had and I responded "Totalarian Oligarchy" - I was pretty sure my viewpoints and thoughts on the matter would never really BE welcome in this society, even less so in the artificial prison yard social structure of the school system.

It wasn't that I didn't feel welcome, it was that WHO I WAS would NEVER *be* welcome, because it conflicted with the established order and the direction it was going to take....

And sometime during that period on a weekend morning, I had an epiphany of sorts, and some part of my mind caught on fast foward and ran all the way down the course of events (in a general sense) that has lead us to the miserable pass our society is at in the post 9-11 era, almost twenty YEARS before it came to be and I have set aside a great portion of my life fruitlessly trying to prevent it.... and that train of thought went further down the rails too, so I have a pretty good idea of how it's *going* to go, and I don't wanna talk about it right now, although I have here in the past, go find it if you wanna know that bad.

Anyhow, the greater portion of the problem was that my mindset, beliefs, morals, even my personhood, was completely unwelcome within the school system, and if they could not change or alter it - then they damn well meant to destroy it.

Not every single one of them, mind - there's a few shining examples of humanity among that morass, Dorsey, Chaffinch, and not the least of which the nameless lunch lady chasing a pack of punks out of the back courtyard with an oversize ladle... that's one I'll treasure forever.

Arghh, the whole mess is too depressing right after working on Fremgirls crappy Kia for six hours and with eight more on the road to pay the bills coming up, so imma just cut it short.

Oh, Anthony ? I *did* once file an invasion of privacy charge against one school over the homework, since it was mostly hours and hours of shit-work three grade levels behind me serving no purpose but to fuck up my free time.

I might have been subject to their rule over my life on the grounds, but I did not feel that bullshit extended to my home - FWIW, the court pitched the case, but they never DID get their homework back, I simply quit doing it, as it wasn't enough of my grade to put me at risk of failure, since I coulda phoned the whole damn curriculum in, beginning to end, if I wanted to.

I was reading the sixth grade textbooks, teachers manuals and study guides with suggested studies for entertainment by the beginning of fourth grade, and their shitty second-grade busywork would have cut into that, you see.

-Frem

It cannot be said enough, those who do not learn from history, are doomed to endlessly repeat it

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Saturday, August 23, 2008 1:55 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by AnthonyT:
Hello,

First, very bad rudeness directed at Riverlove.

Shut up, Tony.

(In case you don't know, that's in the tone of Bill, when he tells Ted to shut up- it's not all that serious, dude.)

And what's this?
"What rightous awareness do you have that the vast majority doesn't?"

That invites snark, IMO

Chrisisall

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Saturday, August 23, 2008 7:13 PM

Freedom is Important because People are Important

Hello Chris,

I know you, and you can tell me to shut up, and I won't take it too hard. I do worry about losing new ones like Riverlove.

You can tell a friend to shut up. And if you are the King of Spain, you can tell other hispanic world leaders to shut up.

But your average pedestrian might not take it the right way when you run them over.

--Anthony

"Liberty must not be purchased at the cost of Humanity." --Captain Robert Henner

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Sunday, August 24, 2008 9:47 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by AnthonyT:

I do worry about losing new ones like Riverlove.

Seriously Anthony, peeps see right away that this can be a ferocious arena, & rarely show up without screens & shields ready, and anyway, I've crossed paths with Riverlove in other threads- she's tough, and can even take a joke, to a certain degree.

Chrisisall

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Sunday, August 24, 2008 10:29 AM

KHYRON

She hasn't posted since you told her to shut up.

------------------------------

This isn't my signature. I have to type this every time I make a post.

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Sunday, August 24, 2008 11:19 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by Khyron:
She hasn't posted since you told her to shut up.

Oh, okay, I'll PM her with an olive branch

BadChrisisall

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Tuesday, August 26, 2008 5:08 AM

WULFENSTAR

http://youtu.be/VUnGTXRxGHg

"Well, at the root of it, how to even explain...

Whatever innate thing inside folk that makes them like other people, NEED other people, want their approval, and to be around them...

I was either born without it or it was burned out of me prior to the period where longterm memory starts, either way, I just don't have it.

It's not that I dislike them either - I ... just. don't. care."

Great....a sociopathic, cab-driving, anarchistic, high-school drop-out... and you are running for office? That makes absolute sense.

Somehow this quote from the Dark Knight seems to fit...

"Bruce Wayne: I knew the mob wouldn’t go down without a fight. But this is different. They crossed the line.

Alfred Pennyworth: You crossed the line first, sir. You hammered them. And in their desperation they turned to a man they didn’t fully understand. Some men aren’t looking for anything logical. They can’t be bought, bullied, reasoned or negotiated with. Some men just want to watch the world burn."

So Fred, do you have business cards, or are they all just Jokers from a special deck?

lol
=)P

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Tuesday, August 26, 2008 6:31 AM

JONGSSTRAW

I stayed in school even though I really despised it. Even back in the Dark Ages when I attended High School I found the whole thing boring, and I couldn't wait to get out. The in-crowd enjoyed school, with their ring dances, pep rallies, and proms, but for me it always felt like a jail sentence. Back in my day there weren't a whole lot of options like there are now.

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Tuesday, August 26, 2008 6:34 AM

Bwahahaha, nice to know you can give as good as you get, Wulf.

Quote:
And in their desperation they turned to a man they didn’t fully understand. Some men aren’t looking for anything logical. They can’t be bought, bullied, reasoned or negotiated with. Some men just want to watch the world burn.

And some just want to watch it grow up.

That's my theme, you see - as a species while technologically and intellectually advanced, we've still and yet to evolve emotionally, socially, and morally beyond the "Have bigger club, take your stuff!" mentality.

Not to mention we have a codified social system that actually works to suppress or destroy all the things which make us truely "human" in the first place, starting with the school system and rolling right out into the corporate world.

We have to embrace, rather than suppress, our humanity if our species is to survive, and factually suppression doesn't work - the harder you suppress it, the more warped the form in which it finally expresses itself, just as a tree root "expresses itself" to a sidewalk, right ?

That being why the most self-repressed become the most twisted when the truth of them is revealed, I cite the perversity of religious zealots as a classic example.

In fact it's that very thing, a conflict of messages between innate human instincts, and the behavior required for social acceptance, that creates a lot of aberrant behavior amongst schoolchildren, as the gap between the two has widened, the problems have increased and instead of understanding that we've turned to forced medication and detainment camps* to forcibly silence those human instincts.

You see, the bullshit that human nature is so evil is just a fiction spouted by folks offering to control it "for our own good", it always has been, for were it true - we'd not have ever created civilization in the first place.

By nature, humans cooperate, nurture, and love - only when external influences are present does that turn into a pattern of exploitation, avarice and hatred, and children ain't born that way, we do it TO them, make them dark and twisted copies of ourselves, as we were once twisted, a cycle which in the end will kill us eventually if not broken.

Imma Kropotkinist, see, and you might wanna look that up a bit, I daresay you'd find it of interest.

And I ain't a sociopath, mind you - I have a moral compass, I just lack the emotional attachments to other humans that provide all the colorful details, something you should never take for granted, believe me.

And the term dropout don't apply neither, I simply self-graduated two years early, and got the paper to prove it - why would anyone in their right mind willingly put themselves through two needless years of a system so emotionally destructive that it's only real-world comparison is the american penal system, eh ?

The townies know what they're getting, they asked ME, not the other way around, and have kept at it in spite of repeated refusals cause I've stood up to them quite successfully on many an occasion, up to and including running the top dog, that'd be Walter, and his secretary out of town on a rail due to graft and corruption.

One of the major issues behind my refusal is that I am NOT qualified for the job, my post-HS educational background is in history and pyschology, not economics and business, that's Fremgirls world, not mine.
(who won't take the job cause it don't pay shit..)

But roadblock their more insane ambitions ?

I can do that all day long, part of it is that there's no vote on their decisions unless...
A) - A member demands one.
B) - 33% or more of the townies petition for one.

And the townies are getting sick of the endless petitions to stem the tide of really corrupt ideas and projects that would never see a vote if the council had their way.

As you can imagine, I don't hold with NOT having a vote, and alas that we supposedly need these bastards to run the city, cause all the qualified applicants we've interviewed took one look at that pack of jackals and headed for the hills.

So there it is, in a nutshell - they want a roadblock, then they came to the right place.

Quote:
So Fred, do you have business cards, or are they all just Jokers from a special deck?

Never needed either one, given that I can repair small engines, appliances, computers and the occasional car that ain't too bad off, and can do it for a hell of a lot less than a shop, often preferring barter, would gets around a small town, you know - I got one kid that gets a carb clean, fuel flush and basic maintainence on his scoot for mowing my lawn, a good deal all around.

-Frem
*Yes, there really are camps, and you've no clue how awful.
http://www.caica.org/

Kropotkins Mutual Aid Theorem.
http://dwardmac.pitzer.edu/Anarchist_archives/kropotkin/mutaidcontents
.html

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Tuesday, August 26, 2008 10:48 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by Wulfenstar:
Great....a sociopathic, cab-driving, anarchistic, high-school drop-out...

You know, it's funny the stigma GED's have, even to this day. I still don't see why you have to be viewed as a ignorant slacker for getting one. I guess it was wasting my potential to bypass my shitty high school experience, and opt to start college a little early instead. Huh.

****************************************************

"This is my timey-wimey detector. It goes ding when there's stuff. Also, it can boil an egg at 30 paces, whether you want it to or not, actually, so I've learned to stay away from hens. It's not pretty when they blow."

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Tuesday, August 26, 2008 3:16 PM

Quote:

You know, it's funny the stigma GED's have, even to this day. I still don't see why you have to be viewed as a ignorant slacker for getting one.

Exactly. I quit a year early myself, and went down the same day and got my GED. At the time, getting a GED in Texas consisted of passing five tests, each with about 50 questions; out of the five, I missed a total of two questions. The lady grading the tests was shocked - she said she'd been doing this for 20 years and never saw anyone test like that. "Why on Earth would you drop out?" she asked. My reply? I pointed at the score on my tests and said, "Because I can do THAT."

I stayed out of school for 7 years, working at least two jobs, sometimes three, and always reading, reading, and more reading. When I felt I was ready, and felt that I needed to learn in a more structured environment, I took my ACT for college entrance. And scored the highest of the group of 140 people taking the test. :)

Mike

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Tuesday, August 26, 2008 3:29 PM

Quote:

Never needed either one, given that I can repair small engines, appliances, computers and the occasional car that ain't too bad off, and can do it for a hell of a lot less than a shop, often preferring barter, would gets around a small town, you know - I got one kid that gets a carb clean, fuel flush and basic maintainence on his scoot for mowing my lawn, a good deal all around.

I'm kind of the same way, but with Honda automobiles. I've got so many people who want me to diagnose their cars. "Won't start. I think the timing belt must be busted." Ummm.... yeah. It happens, but let's look at the SIMPLE stuff first. Internal combustion engines are pretty simple, really - you need fuel, air, spark, and timing, and it'll run. Usually pretty easy to narrow it down. Often as not, it's a twenty cent piece of old plastic that has crumbled, and won't allow the clutch interlock switch to work properly, meaning "car no starty."

Later on, I got into more of the really fun stuff - tearing down transmissions and rebuilding them, manufacturing "hybrid" transmissions using close-ratio gearing from Japanese-market Hondas combined with lower-revving 5th gear sets from certain American models, all mated through a more-aggressive final drive and differential, all resulting in my li'l CRX that does 0-60 in 7.1 seconds (a stock Si model was considered quick in '91 by doing it in 8.5 seconds) and returns 46mpg on the highway.

Ah, the stuff you can learn OUT OF school... when no one's telling you you can't do that! :)

Mike

"I supported Bush in 2000 and 2004 and intellegence[sic] had very little to do with that decision." - Hero, Real World Event Discussions

I can't help the sinking feeling that my country is now being run by people who read "1984" not as a cautionary tale, but rather as an instruction manual. - Michael Mock

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Tuesday, August 26, 2008 8:37 PM

Seems a pattern, doesn't it ?

6 hour test, scored to 300.

Banged out a 287/300 in an hour forty five, including a half hour slacking off for lunch while hitting on the receptionist cause she was cute.

As for out of school learning - where I got into small engines...
Actually, come to think of it, this bit IS related.

When I initially went to vo-tech, the engines guy, he seemed to NOT want folk in his class, and made special point of telling me I was hopeless, no aptitude, distracting me and never giving me enough time to figure out what the hell I was doing, resulting in frustration and throwing in the towel on the concept.

Later, due to the catch 22 of jobs requiring a car, but paying so little it wouldn't even cover the insurance, not to mention inspection, emissions, taxes, title, tags and all the other little scams to keep those pesky peons from escaping the ghetto...

I once again found a weak point and exploited it, as Mopeds required naught more than a moped license which was $15 and good for three years, not to mention cheap on fuel.

Problem is, the old school jobbies, Tomos, Puch, Motobecane, Peugeot, the euro and french ones in particular, require a lot more maintainence than one would expect, and even the Honda and Suzukis are riddled with design issues that make them quite tempermental.

Labor costs $90/hour plus storage fees for up to a week, IF they can even fix it cause it became clear pretty quick these guys had no more idea than I did how to repair one.

So in desperation I took the thing apart, now, mind you, I had been taking stuff apart since I was about five, my mom brought home a bunch of broken phones from her workplace to amuse me soon after, and found one morning to her dismay that she couldn't call out - and why, cause her erstwhile son had plugged them in, and five of eight of them now worked.

Once I got it apart and realized how SIMPLE it was (simple for a mechanical savant, mind you) I got into fixing them, I got some pretty heavy rep under another name in the small engine communities.

And yet, according to the vo-tech instructor, I was a hopeless incompetent, right ?

I'm still a little pissed off about that.

Btw, you ever see the dollhouse I built ?
http://www.fireflyfans.net/mthread.asp?b=11&t=29685

-Frem

It cannot be said enough, those who do not learn from history, are doomed to endlessly repeat it

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Wednesday, August 27, 2008 2:35 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by Fremdfirma:
Btw, you ever see the dollhouse I built ?
http://www.fireflyfans.net/mthread.asp?b=11&t=29685.

Oh, the prettiness. Great work (I always wanted a dollhouse when I was a kid).

****************************************************

"This is my timey-wimey detector. It goes ding when there's stuff. Also, it can boil an egg at 30 paces, whether you want it to or not, actually, so I've learned to stay away from hens. It's not pretty when they blow."

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Wednesday, August 27, 2008 2:41 AM

6IXSTRINGJACK

I didn't learn anything in 12 years of public school that helped career wise in the real world except for a semester class in keyboarding (which ironically I got my only D in because I didn't feel like doing a typing test one day when the teacher was around and copied another guys work along with about 5 others and we all mysteriously had the same 9 errors).

I've always resented the fact that during those 12 years I could have been around people I related with, learning a trade or something that had real world value instead of a bullshit diploma that they give to any retard in a wheelchair for just showing up.

"A government is a body of people, usually notably ungoverned." http://www.myspace.com/6ixstringjack

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Wednesday, August 27, 2008 5:55 AM

Freedom is Important because People are Important

Hello,

How do you cheat on a typing test?

--Anthony

"Liberty must not be purchased at the cost of Humanity." --Captain Robert Henner

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Wednesday, August 27, 2008 8:13 AM

Quote:
(I always wanted a dollhouse when I was a kid).

Keep watching Fox - you're gonna get a Dollhouse in January! :)

Beautiful workmanship, Frem.

Mike

"I supported Bush in 2000 and 2004 and intellegence[sic] had very little to do with that decision." - Hero, Real World Event Discussions

I can't help the sinking feeling that my country is now being run by people who read "1984" not as a cautionary tale, but rather as an instruction manual. - Michael Mock

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Wednesday, August 27, 2008 8:18 AM

6ix: You know, typing is about one of the only classes that DID do me any real-world good. I took it in middle school and high school, whenever I could take it as an elective, just because I found it easy. :) Who knew computers would be so important? (Remmber, this was in the 70s, when we felt lucky to get an IBM Selectric to type on!) Now, my wife freaks out because I type 70wpm while she's talking to me, and I'm just rattling away on the keyboard like Stevie Wonder, all while looking at her and listening to her...

About the only other classes that did anything for me at all were the math classes - up through Analytic Geometry, anyway - and opting for tennis for my Phys Ed credits. I still play, some 30-odd years later.

English, "civics" (Government), History - all those I had to get into college before they became the least bit interesting.

Mike

"I supported Bush in 2000 and 2004 and intellegence[sic] had very little to do with that decision." - Hero, Real World Event Discussions

I can't help the sinking feeling that my country is now being run by people who read "1984" not as a cautionary tale, but rather as an instruction manual. - Michael Mock

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Wednesday, August 27, 2008 8:20 AM