Moms and Dads: Are your children idiots?

There is a distinct possibility. Better check your paperwork from school, see if there’s any warning notes in there.

Here’s the thing. For some reason, over the last week, I’ve been the unwitting recipient of mis-dialed text messages from giddy tweens. In each case there was a series of indecipherable messages that I ignored for a while. Eventually, in each case, I finally sent back a text saying “U have the wrong number.” In each case the child did not understand the meaning of that phrase and proceeded to explain how they have the correct number, the number is (such and such) and why don’t I add them to the speed dial, etc. etc.

So in each case, not being sure what I was dealing with, and thinking that maybe it was me who was wrong about this being a wrong number, I sent a text that said “Who are you?” …. and in each case I got a text back saying the person’s name, the town they live in, and the school they go to. It was like a POW giving name, rank, and serial number; “My name is Johnny and I live in Springfield and I go to the John Glenn Elementary School” or whatever.

OMG. I happen to not be a child predator, but if I was, I’d be on to something with these gullible kids! What I did, instead of requesting more information so that I could easily find them and use the old “my puppy is lost” trick to lure them into the conversion van or whatever, was to text them back a message saying “I don’t know you, you don’t know me, don’t text me again.”

The first kid texted me back with “ooops, sorry” and the second kid just stopped texting. I hope they both realize that they should not have given me their names and how to find them. All I wanted was a first name so I could check with my daughter to see if she knew them, or in the case of the second kid, who seemed to think initialy that I was “Johnny” and then that he was Johnny, I just needed to establish a baseline in reality of some sort.

Parents and guardians: Give your kids the basics. Tell them what to not tell other people, what information to not give to web sites, what to not text to those they don’t know as well as those they know. And tell them about the puppy trick, just in case.

Because, even if your particular kid is not an idiot (and I’m sure your kid is a perfect genius) any kid can be an idiot any time. Temporary idiocy can strike without warning.

Louisiana Senate Bill SB 70 would have repealed Louisiana Revised Statutes 17:285.1, which in turn imposed the inappropriately named Louisiana Science Education Act which, as Barbara Forrest recently noted “was promoted only by creationists. Neither parents, nor science teachers, nor scientists requested it. No one wanted it except the Louisiana Family Forum (LFF), a religious organization that lobbies aggressively for its regressive agenda, and the Discovery Institute (DI), a creationist think tank in Seattle, Washington, that couldn’t care less about Louisiana children.”

Continue reading Louisiana Repeal Effort SB 70 Fails in Committee →

Zack Kopplin, the high school senior who led the fight to repeal the creationist Louisiana Science Education Act (LSEA) on MSNBC:

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This much:
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This is funny. Have you noticed that lately there has been some interesting synchronization between ads on Scienceblogs.com and our blog posts? Just now, DrugMonkey wrote a blog post concerning discussions in the professional community of scientists who use animals in research. Here is a screen shot of the blog post showing the banner ad that appeared above it:

Continue reading DrugMonkey + ActualMonkeys + Google = →

Using robotics, laser rangefinders, GPS and smart feedback tools, Dennis Hong is building a car for drivers who are blind. It’s not a “self-driving” car, he’s careful to note, but a car in which a non-sighted driver can determine speed, proximity and route — and drive independently.

Continue reading Dennis Hong: Making a car for blind drivers →

I see the brown streaks and spots and blotches all across your lawn, every brown area exactly like every other in its tone and hue, because all were caused by a single event, that being your misapplication of high-nitrogen fertilizer, as part of your misguided effort to make your lawn look like a golf course, which I assure you is an entirely futile expenditure of energy. Everyone in the neighborhood does this: They put fertilizer, weed killer, fungicide, grub-killer, and who knows what else all over their lawns. On this sandy plain, most of the chemicals are washed instantly into the ground-water. That ground water is then collected by the city and cleaned up, and pumped into water towers like the one that casts a shadow on your so-called lawn. That is the water we drink, provide to our children, and bathe in. I assume the city has done a good job cleaning your chemical wastes out of the water. But, I also know that they had to work harder and spend more of our money to do so because you put so much fertilizer (souped up with weed killer and grubicide, no doubt) on your lawn that it killed half your grass. So not only are you an idiot because you are shitting, essentially, in your own water bowl, but we all KNOW you are an idiot because you have left incontrovertible evidence of your inability to read and follow directions in the form of giant brown hieroglyphs splayed across what was once a greenish lawn in front of your ugly house, but is now a billboard announcing your selfish suburban sense of privilege.

I am grateful that in observing how foolish you look, neighbor, my own staunch commitment to not add one drop of fertilizer, weed killer, fungicide or grub killer to my lawn is reaffirmed. Which means, since someone else mows my lawn, that I’m done with yard work for the day, and can now refocus my efforts on replacing that leaking water heater.

Back in my days wandering around in Harvard Square, I used to look at the beautiful churches and think ….
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It happens on June 25th. This is going to be a little like the Rapture but it’s not the end of the world and it really will happen ….
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Wake up early on Sunday and catch “”Choice In Dying,” Eric MacDonald on Atheists Talk #117″
Continue reading “Choice In Dying,” Eric MacDonald on Atheists Talk #117 →

Wow. And no keyboards!

OK, gotta go. You wouldn’t believe how many messages I have to deal with on my electronics correspondence machine thingie.

What really happened …
Continue reading Ladies, the guys didn’t get their jet packs, but you’all got your electronic catalogs! →

Scott-Heron was born in Chicago in 1949. He spent his early years in Jackson, Tenn., attended high school in The Bronx, and spent time at Pennsylvania’s Lincoln University before settling in Manhattan. His recording career began in 1970 with the album Small Talk at 125th and Lenox, which featured the first version of “The Revolution Will Not Be Televised.” The track has since been referenced and parodied extensively in pop culture.

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