Miraculous Coincidental Serendipity Does NOT Save Dave Ten Dollars

 

So it turns out that I DO have the powers of precognitive vocifery and psionic verbal manifestation because when Brady, Strachan, and I were out walking the other day, and we had to dodge a couple of snowplows, and I said: "We'd better be careful we don't get Jeremy Rennered" and then we got back to the school and I noticed that my ID was gone and I said: "I'll bet it got Jeremy Rennered" and it turns out that a college student found my ID on the side of the road while he was sledding and, looking at the state of it, the ID certainly got Jeremy Rennered . . . and, both because it looks to be irreparable and because I already called in the lost ID, I still had to go to the Board Office and pay ten dollars and pick up my new one.

Old Man, New Shit . . .

Not only did I lose my ID and scan-in card yesterday, which caused me difficulty getting in and out of the building and making photocopies (although it shouldn't have caused me so much difficulty making photocopies-- apparently I could have typed my school ID number into the copier, and it would have released and printed my files but I didn't learn this until I had walked back-and-forth from my classroom to the copy room several times) but I also dealt with a new disciplinary issue-- which is saying something because I thought I had dealt with it all-- but I have a student with long dreadlocks, which he likes to hang like a curtain in front of his face and eyes, Cousin It's style—and then sleep in class-- and after months of repeatedly waking him up, I finally got annoyed enough to write him up-- because he slept through a lockdown drill—and then we got into a debate about whether he was allowed to cover his eyes with his hair-- his perspective was "it's my hair," and my perspective was: I need to see your eyes to see if you're sleeping or not and that's why we have a no-hat rule and sometimes you have to deal with hair, such as in shop class you need to tie it back-- and though he complied yesterday and moved his hair out of his face but I have a feeling this is going to be contentious . . . we shall see.

Dave's School ID Does a Jeremy Renner

On "A" days, I usually walk outside during my off period with a couple of other English teachers, and though it was cold today, we decided to brave the elements and get some steps in-- we walked out the back gate and into the neighborhood and hiked through the icy and slushy suburban streets, avoiding several snowplows (we discussed Jeremy Renner's snowplow mishap while doing this) and then, once we made it back into the warmth of the school, I noticed that I lost my school ID and swipe card . . . it must have slipped off my body while we were walking, and I did NOT retrace my steps and try to find it (it probably met a similar fate to Jeremy Renner) so my reward for getting some fresh air is going to be a trip to the Board Office and a ten dollar fee.

Thanks! For Blowing People Up and Perpetuating the Human Race, So We Have More People to Blow Up!

I'm nearly finished with Patrick Ryan's small-town Ohio saga, Buckeye-- and the book features both harrowing tales from WWII and harrowing tales of pregnancy and child-rearing . . . so perhaps we should say "thank you for your service" to both soldiers and moms.

Hey Trump, We're Throwing the Red Flag

A sad and ironic state of affairs: when there is a questionable play during a professional football game, the NFL has a comprehensive Instant Replay Policy, with extensive protocols in place for various scenarios-- and this includes a replay Command Center in New York, with rules experts at the ready-- the goal being to be objective and make the correct call; but when ICE agents shot citizens in Minneapolis (e.g. Renee Good and Alex Pretti) and there was plenty of controversial footage damning the agents involved, the Trump administration refuses to acknowledge the possibility that the film needs review and instead prefers to create a subjective version of reality . . . football fans wouldn't stand for this kind of irrational behavior from a referee but when an FBI supervisor tried to investigate Renee Good's execution, she ended up resigning-- apparently, that film will never go to the Booth for review.

A Cold Day in Jersey is a Temperate Day in Minnesota

It's freezing cold here, and we got slammed with snow all day, but after three shoveling sessions, we have removed most of it-- the only problem is that now (because New Jersey sucks) it's sleeting or something and it's supposed to continue for hours, and it's 14 degrees-- so we're not going back to school for a couple days . . . but it's all relative: I'm drinking hot coffee, there's chili in the crockpot, we haven't lost power yet (fingers crossed) and there's football on TV, so it could be worse . . . I could be in Minneapolis, protesting in the freezing cold, because our government has become a dystopian shitshow.

Crokinole , Primetime

My wife and I were watching the wonderful Australian show Colin from Accounts, and Gordon and Gene were having some incomprehensible, awkward conversation that we couldn't quite parse because of the Aussie accent, but then we realized that they were saying "crokinole," the fantastic Canadian game that I bought our household for Christmas-- apparently, the game is growing more popular by the minute!

 

Little Girl With a Big Voice

 Last night's "battle of the bands' was very entertaining, but I did not realize that part of the responsibility of judging the contest was that I had to offer feedback to the bands after each song, American Idol style-- luckily, though there were three judges, I was the first to speak each time so I could grab the low hanging fruit and comment on it . . . and while all the bands were talented and fun, it wasn't really a contest, because the sophomore who was on The Voice had assembled an incredible band and she can REALLY sing, she just belted out her songs-- including Toto's "Hold the Line"-- very impressive, so much sound coming out of a little kid!

The Opera Isn't Over Until Dave Says a Bunch of Annoying Shit

I am judging a "battle of the bands" tonight at my high school, and apparently, there is a rubric to help us judge each band, but as the official English 12: Music and the Arts teacher, I feel it might be necessary to point out to whoever is running this event that musical taste is extremely subjective and depends upon how you perceive and value certain musical elements-- such as rhythm, melody, lyrics, authenticity, and timbre-- I'm all about timbre . . . but someone else might not value timbre the way I value timbre-- and then there's is how much novelty you can tolerate-- Ornette Coleman's free jazz isn't for everyone-- so in a sense it's almost impossible to judge music from a variety of genres-- you've got a better chance of making a qualified aesthetic assessment if you are only focusing on one particular genre: prog rock or hip-hop or boom-bap or UK trap . . . but I'm probably just going to keep my mouth shut and just check off the boxes.

Looming Precipative Dread

How can I concentrate on writing a sentence when an impending cataclysmic snowpocalypse is headed our way?-- especially when my wife's district budgeted ZERO snow days into the Edison school calendar (someone needs to tell her school board that the mandatory SEC warning applies for winter weather as well as stocks: past performance is not indicative of future results) and so she will most certainly lose days off her Spring Break-- and my district budgeted one measly snow day . . . I'll go out on a limb here (out on an icicle) and predict we will have three days off due to this storm . . . and it's not even February.

Headlines Fit for the Onion (If Only They Were Fictitious)

I don't know whether to laugh or cry lately when I read the Times . . . absurdity is hard to reckon with-- but I'm going to record a few actual updates and headlines for posterity:

Six Prosecutors Quit Over Push to Investigate ICE Shooting Victim's Widow

U.S. Stocks and Bonds Fall as Trump Ramps Up His Threats Over Greenland

Trump Wanted a Nobel, Now It's Greenland

and, of course, the only fitting place for our dickweed of a POTUS in Greenland . . . unemployed.

Winter Verse

It is cold (and growing colder) and I have a cold (which is growing bolder).

Teenagers, They're (Coco) Nuts

Last Tuesday night, just before bed-- after a long day of fitness: I played basketball in the morning and then went to PT for my hamstring in the afternoon-- I suffered something new, a hamstring cramp-- I've had calf cramps in the night, but never a hamstring cramp-- it was a painful and frightening two minutes-- and when I told my senior English this news, two bros, Frankie and Nico-- a wrestler and a weight-lifter-- insisted that I needed to drink Vita Coco coconut water because it contains lots of potassium and keeps you from cramping-- and I always like to take the advice of teenagers, more for the humor than the sagacity, so I bought a bottle and drank some today before playing pickleball and I am going to give those two students a firm talking-to because Vita Coco is disgusting in both consistency and flavor (and I love coconut) so I guess I'll have to stick to eating bananas (and this incident, as zman cleverly pointed out, is nearly a mirror image of a previous, rather awkward moment of Dave).

Picaresque Pairing

We finished a picaresque TV show last night-- The Lowdown-- which is about Lee Raybon, a rogue journalist (played in masterful Lebowski-esque fashion by Ethan Hawke) who tries to uncover the sordid truth about Tulsa . . . and I just finished a picaresque novel today-- Tim O'Brien's America Fantastica, which is also about a journalist, but a washed-up, ruined compulsive liar of a journalist, who travels through conspiratorial America, trying to make sense of nothing, O'Brien narrating the tale in the manner of Charles Portis, hurtling from one location to the next, one character to the next, in broadly derisive but always entertaining absurdist satire.

Hot and Cold

Saturday night, my son left the oven baking at 450 degrees all night-- he heated up some late-night pizza and then forgot to turn it off, so I awoke to a very warm kitchen (but luckily, the house did not burn down) and then two days ago, my wife came downstairs for breakfast, and it was freezing cold-- because my son left the sliding door open all night . . . perhaps his next mistake will make things just right.

Magical Micrographia

I have taught for a long time, and this is a record: the smallest legible handwriting I have ever seen (the student was creating Art History flashcards on 3 x 5 notecards).

We Exist in an Afterthought

Today, after we watched a TED Talk about how bad architecture has ruined American cities, suburbs, and public spaces, I took my students on a "field trip" the the English Office, the cramped, claustrophobic, cluttered, and windowless space designated for the twenty English and Special Ed teachers that live upstairs in our high school to eat, socialize, plan, and rest between teaching class-- it's truly a soulless and ugly space and the fact that some paid adult with an architectural degree actually designed this space as an office for teachers is mind-boggling and very sad.

Out of My Depth

After attending morning basketball for the first time in a few weeks (the steroid shot in my knee seems ot be working) I am covering a Senior Health class today-- a number of students and teachers are out of school because the service for the student that got shot and killed is in Paterson today-- and I'm not sure if I could actyually teach this class with a straight face:  there's a handout on the teacher's desk and the first words on it are "fetus" and "semen" and the kids are doing some project about contraception-- my only advice was that children are very expensive, especially if they drive a car or go to college.

Quite a Monday

Today was a long and emotionally taxing day at school—but there were emotional support dogs.

Ugly Monday Looming . . .

Not looking forward to going to school tomorrow: apparently, an East Brunswick senior was shot and killed yesterday by another teenager in Sayreville-- it's going to be a sad day, not sure how the seniors are going to react to this.

To Prepare, I Took a Long Nap

My friend is having a 60th birthday party tonight, and it starts at 8 PM . . . that's nearly past my bedtime, and I'm only 55!

Some Good TV

Some high-quality TV recommendations:

1) if you're looking for something dark and artsy (and filmed in Italy in beautifully rendered black and white) and you don't want a ton of unnecessarily loud special effects (e.g., Stranger Things), then check out Andrew Scott as Ripley;

2) if you're looking for a different kind of alien apocalypse and some phenomenal acting from Rhea Seehorn, check out Pluribus;

3) if you love The Big Lebowski, then check out Ethan Hawke playing a shambolic character loosely based on the Tulsa citizen journalist Lee Roy Chapman in The Lowdown.

GoldiDave

As I get older, I like the cold less and less-- I used to love it, but now it makes my knee ache and my body stiff-- but because it was unseasonably warm today and our school building's heating system is ancient and defective, the English Office was HOT . . . roasting hot, hot enough that we were sweating while eating lunch-- and thusly I remembered that I don't like the heat either . . . I'm only happy when the temperature is just right.

Poem of Dave

When I get old and pass away,

this is all I want them to say:

there was a guy named Dave

and he wrote a sentence every single fucking day.

Dave Mans Up in Front of the Ladies

I'm hoping that this doesn't become more frequent than an annual tradition, but I once again went to the sports medicine doctor-- Dr. Navia-- and (once again) she said that the best way to fix my knee was to stick a giant needle in it, full of some kind of steroid (cortisone? I didn't ask) and once again, she had an intern with her-- and while Dr. Navia is young, her intern appeared much younger-- childlike, a female Doogie Howser-- and, on a positive note, things were better than last winter, when my knee was full of fluid and also needed to be drained-- this time, I was more proactive-- and (once again) because it was two young ladies diagnosing me, I agreed to let them stick a large needle in my knee (I didn't want to look like a coward in front of them, but I think if it were a dude, I would have passed) and then Dr. Navia asked if it would be okay for the intern to administer the giant needle, and while my brain was saying "NO!" my mouth said, "sure," and then they talked some shop about where to stick this big needle-- I'm not sure if the intern ever did this before-- and my hands were sweating, as I gripped the examination table, and I looked at the wall instead of at the big needle-- but they numbed me up pretty good, so all I felt was a bunch of pressure-- not all that much shooting pain-- and then it was over and I limped back to the car and went home and fell asleep early and then woke up in the middle of the night, totally amped and hyper-- that's one of the side effects of getting a steroid injection-- but miraculously, today my knee feels great and I can run again and I'll be playing pickleball this Friday and basketball next week . . . so it looks like a I won't need gel shots for a couple of years, unless I really fuck it up.

Elite Summer Camp, Elite Apartment Building . . . Same Difference

Liz Moore's fantastic novel The God of the Woods is both an excellent thriller and a multi-generational family saga; it feels a bit like a Donna Tartt novel-- although not quite as expansive-- and has something in common with another book I read recently and loved: The Doorman by Chris Pavone-- in both there is the conflict and collaboration between social classes, especially the relationship between the uber-rich and the service industry class that often caters to these privileged rich folk . . . here's what Judy, a female state police investigator-- a real rarity in the 1970s—thinks about the dynamic between these two classes of people: 

What will she do now, wonders Judy, if the Hewitts lose the camp? If the Van Laars cut them out entirely, as they’ll no doubt do, snapping the thin thread that has stretched for decades between the Hewitts and Peter the First? And she answers her question herself: They’ll be fine. The Hewitts—like Judy, like Louise Donnadieu, like Denny Hayes, even—don’t need to rely on anyone but themselves. It’s the Van Laars, and families like them, who have always depended on others.

anyway, The Doorman and The God of the Woods are the two best novels I've read in quite a while, chekc them out . . . I've got to head to the sports medicine doctor to get my knee checked out.

But He Deserved It . . .

Yesterday, in the YMCA locker room, an older guy next to me was whistling Billy Joel's "We Didn't Start the Fire"-- the chorus AND the verse-- and I'm proud to say that I did not punch him in the face.

Do Dogs Understand Phase Transition?

Yesterday, in an attempt to get some vitamin D and dispel the cold and dark winter blues, my wife and I tried to take a hike at the Rutgers Ecological Preserve-- but the trail was coated in a layer of ice covered by a dusting of snow: it was way too slippery to traverse hills and navigate cliffs-- and so we changed plans and drove over to the Raritan Canal Path, which runs between the river and tow road; we figured even if it was icy, at least the trail is flat-- but there is a small hill at the start of the trail, which leads down to where the first lock used to be-- now it's a stone dam-- and the hill was a sheet of ice, so I let Lola off her leash so she wouldn't pull me over and further destroy my bad knee and she hurtled down the hill and onto the thin ice covering the canal and promptly fell through the ice-- but luckily she managed to get her front paws on the stone of the dam and I quickly skated and slid my way down the hill and pulled her out of the freezing water before she fell all the way in . . . though it all happened very quickly, it was a hairy couple of moments where we thought she might plunge under the ice, never to be seen again-- but she was lucky and hopefully learned her lesson about thin ice (though I did keep her on the leash for the rest of the walk).

Capitalism Undone . . . by Mutants

To kick off 2026, I finished yet another Clifford D. Simak classic sci-fi novel, Ring Around the Sun, and this one is full of big ideas: pristine parallel earths; mutant humans--who may or may not know they are mutants; telepathy with alien races; corporeal temporal stasis; consciousness transfers-- it's too much for one book (from 1952!) but it is mainly a story of scarcity and abundance and how to break our capitalist, materialist consumer society with "forever" products engineered by mutant humans and imported from various parallel earths, to break the supply-and-demand system and allow humans to progress to something transcendent-- but at what cost, at what cost?

There's More to Life Than Table Tennis, Right?

My wife and I rang in the New Year with a trip to the Rutgers Cinema to see Marty Supreme, which was a highly entertaining way to start 2026-- the film is packed with fast-paced dialogue, chaotic action scenes, and plenty of scams and hustles, plus a concatenation of Safdie-style bad decisions . . . and as a bonus, the table tennis feels authentic (although not as authentic as this clip of the actual Marty Reisman defeating Victor Barna in 1949) and though most of the movie is a wild and messy ride, the story has a lovely resolution and moral: there's more to life than table tennis.