God Knows?

Once again, I would have to say I am concerned, but not surprised.  Apparently in Tennessee it is a bad idea to say "bless you" after someone sneezes.  You may be suspended.

What?

The assistant principal of the school, Dyer County High School, says the incident had been blown out of proportion on social media.  He is quoted as saying: "In this case, this was not a religious issue at all, but more of an issue the teacher felt was a distraction in her class," he said.

Unfortunately, the situation was blown out of proportion when the teacher decided a student needed to be removed from the class for saying bless you.  The comment is hardly threatening and given the dangers that rock many school campus today, this should have been a welcome comment.

Since there are multiple students who say the teacher is the one with the problem...with faith, perhaps that is the real distraction and perhaps school administrators should focus on that issue.

Holiday Hate

So I write this blog and I write in a few other venues.  I get feedback sometimes.  Often it is great, but sometimes…well, wow.  A piece I recently read got a quiet comment “This is really nice” from a tough critic.  Not a bad critic, but the type who when you get a compliment like this means the world.

Meanwhile, the same article had someone telling me not to think I’m special.  Good news.  I don’t. 

I try to answer the bell that gets rung.  I try to do it better than others do and I don’t apologize for that.  What got me the most was the clear unhappiness in the e-mail. 

I am pretty comfortable I didn’t do anything to this person, but I wonder what goes on in people’s head that they want to carry this unhappiness with me.  How deep seated is the depression for people to react with words of anger towards a stranger?  I don’t know, but it reminds me of a recent homily from my parish priest that it is okay to smile AND be angry. 

His argument was that it is okay to be angry with situations that are clearly not right, but you can smile and explain that you are angry while carrying a smile so that you can carry your Christian cross of charity towards all. 

While neither the article, nor the e-mail or the homily for that matter, had any connection to Christmas, perhaps it would be useful to now go back to the homily and remember that Advent offers us each the opportunity to smile as we express our displeasure in shopping lines, at physician appointments, or even within office politics. 

We will see, but in the meantime, send in your comments…gently please.

 

Stats

Don't worry about your individual numbers. Worry about the team. If the team is successful, each of you will be successful, too. – Branch Rickey

Any guesses as who had the highest batting average this past year? Home runs or RBI? Who topped in wins, ERA, or strikeouts. Well the answers are below, but my question is who cares? Stats celebrate the individual. Okay, granted they can show strength and weakness, but stats fundamentally are fundamentally about did I get enough home runs to deserve a contract extension for more money? Did I improve my trade value so it will be easier or harder for me to go from my current assignment? We all love the home run or the perfect game, but fundamentally do they matter?

All the stat leaders listed below for the categories above don’t matter. Yes, I just said Miguel Cabrera’s .348 batting average doesn’t matter any more than Chris Davis’ 53 bombs or 138 RBI. Clayton Kershaw was ridiculous this year and I tried to catch at many of his games as I could on TV. His ERA of 1.83 showed his dominance of hitters across baseball and Yu Darvish was filthy with 277 strike outs, though he did get to face Houston a ridiculous number of times. Still…doesn’t matter.

Moneyball, but if you don’t win the last game of the year, it doesn’t matter. I have the same message, even for little guys learning the game and playing at a competitive level. It doesn’t matter if YOU record a strike out or not, did your team win?  It doesn’t matter if YOU get a home run, how did the team do?
I just laid out why they do I guess; we celebrate that success, but in none of those cases did the individual stat leader’s team win the ring. I hate to agree with Billy Beane from the movie

The same issue comes up in business and even EMS where I see people willing to cut their “team mates” neck – almost literally – to protect their own paycheck. And they do so at the expense of the team, their character being exposed, and usually whatever rah rah they claim to have for their organization. I remember a teacher way back in the day who remarked she would be out the next several days and she knew that we would comport ourselves with the substitute like we would if she were there. It says a lot to see how a team reacts when the boss isn’t there and something shows up to challenge you.

Do you run to your own stats or do you support the team and keep it going towards the World Series? Play safe and play nice in your sandbox. Your stats might get you noticed by a scout, but your me first attitude gets you noticed by your team mates too and there might come a time when you need us too. You might find one day that the stat that matters is not how many IVs you have accomplished or runs completed, but who is your team and who wants you on their team.

Bad Behavior

 Back to school parties can be bad, especially when high school age kids mix alcohol, drugs, and who knows what else.  The Albany Times Union reported that several teens got the great idea that they would break into an ex-NFL players home and use it as a personal party pad for the weekend.  The problem, other than breaking in and using it for a personal party pad, was that they decided to post pictures and other evidence on Facebook and Twitter because when committing a crime, there is nothing better than self-disclosure.

Personally, I am happy they did it because now we can skip the mea culpas about "not my fault" and I didn’t mean to when they really mean, they didn’t mean to get caught BS.  This type of behavior is exactly what Brian Holloway called it: "a migrating mass of absurd ideas and entitlement."  That's right, this behavior happened, not because it is okay, but because the kids feel entitled and parents are more likely to lash out at the person trying to correct their child's behavior than they are at their kid who they apparently have skipped parenting for the past sixteen to eighteen years.

Instead of parents showing up with their child to help clean up the property, Holloway has reported multiple parents have threatened to press charges against him, sue him, or firebomb he and his family after he reported what their children had already reported via Facebook, Twitter, etc.  Is this a joke?

Your kid breaks into someone else's house.  They are obviously underage, yet still probably engaged in drugs, alcohol, and potentially date rape when you read some tweets about roofies and being unable to wake up young women.  Your kid tweets about all of the above and you are mad that someone says, you shouldn't out my kid?  Really?!?

Hey, better idea...raise your kids to have a clue.  Help them learn a little respect for not only their over inflated egos, but for other people's property.  Instead, you are worried your kid won't make it into college now.  Maybe college and being around more drugs and alcohol isn't quite the right place for your temperamental child whose value system is pretty poor anyway.

While the students' behavior was bad, in general, it is the defensiveness of these moronic parents that is worse.  How can we grow as a society when parents defend the actions of these wannabe parasites who think the world will just show up and deliver to them?  For those parents who think this is okay, you should be glad Mr. Holloway is trying to help get them on the straight and narrow.  Some folks wouldn't go the route of education and helping them like Holloway is with his Help Me Save 300 Initiative.  Some folks would use force - deadly force - to stop this.  Whose side is the law on when it comes to defending yourself and your property.  What happens if it isn't Holloway's home, but that of George Zimmerman?

Since some of these parents are so eager to go to court to save their precious Johnny's reputation, I hope Mr. Holloway follows suit and not only presses criminal charges, but engages in his own civil suit against these parents who think this type of behavior is acceptable.  I would love to be on THAT jury.  It isn't often that the defendant puts the evidence against himself or herself out there for all to see, but in this case, how much easier could the case be?

In the meantime, instead of expressing gratitude and appreciation, your anger is funny.  Now that you are ready to play mamma and papa bear to your little wayward cub, you want everyone to be nice to your little bear cub.  I am guessing you are the same mamma and papa bear who were busy yelling at teachers to let Johnny retake his chem test because he was caught cheating, but you thought that was okay....a youthful mistake because instead of teaching valuing ethics and integrity, you taught how important 401(k) and BMWs were.  I am guessing you were the same parent yelling at coaches and referees when Johnny couldn't catch the ball as if it were their fault, Johnny thought he could just do those moves like they do on the Wii football game.

You clearly went into CYA mode when you decided that it was a good idea to delete that evidence against little Johnny, despite the fact it had already been posted and screenshots had been nabbed.  Much more important to deny, deny, deny than take Mr. Holloway up on his offer to help clean up his place.  Smooth move Ex Lax!  I realize your poor little one shouldn't be exposed to the idea of cleaning up urine soaked carpets, but maybe they shouldn't have been exposed to urine soaked carpets to begin with.

You should be glad Holloway is trying to parent your child since you gave up on the task so long ago, but my real question is, who is going to parent you?