Mere Musings

posted on 6.20.12

This Is All Kinds Of Wrong of the Day [UPDATED]:

UPDATE: Online donations to send Karen Huff Klein on “the vacation of a lifetime” just surpassed $16,000. Click here to contribute. (Also — looks legit. The kid who started the fundraiser says he is working on transferring control of the donations to Klein.)

Read this and weep — Karen Huff Klein, a 68-year-old bus monitor for the Greece Central School District in Rochester, NY, recently was harassed to tears by a group of teens, who captured their abuse on video and gleefully shared it on Facebook.

Their bullying is tough to stomach, but here are a few choice excerpts:

“You f**kin’ fat-ass, look at all this flab right here.”

“What size bra are you? Triple sag?”

“She’s gonna pick out which kid she’s gonna rape next.”

“You touched her arm flab. It’s all stinky and smelly.”

“She probably eats deodorant because she can’t afford real food.”

No one deserves to be driven to tears by juvenile delinquents with big mouths and no shame. Help send these kids to prison here (though this link contains some offensive content, itself).

(Not Safe For Work — teenage a**holes.)

[hypervocal]

It strikes me that middle-schoolers can be particularly vile bullies because they have reached an age where they know a whole lot of “bad words” and ways to be mean to people, but they aren’t quite mature enough to understand just how hurtful those words can be.

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posted on 6.14.12

thedailywhat:

In Case You Missed It of the Day: Conan’s broadcasting this week from Chicago, so naturally he and guitarist Jimmy Vivino visited a local elementary school to introduce some first-graders to the blues.

The whole clip is terrific — just what you’d expect when Conan is combined with little kids and a guitar.

[uproxx]

Awesome.

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posted on 5.11.12

thedailywhat:

Sad ‘Cause It’s True of the Day: It’s Teacher Appreciation Week, and Jimmy Kimmel’s gift to educators across the country was an opportunity to give their students’ parents a piece of their minds.

[jimmykimmel]

My mom teaches kindergarten, and I am continually amazed by the amount of shit she has to put up with.

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posted on 5.12.11

world-shaker:

A thought I had earlier this morning.

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posted on 5.11.11

brianfeldman:

Serious business: I am biking 50 miles for charity.

On May 21st, I’m going to be participating in “Coast the Coast,” a charity bike ride to benefit the National Multiple Sclerosis Society. I’ll be riding with a team from members of my hometown, The Park Pedalers, and if memory serves, this will be my 12th consecutive year riding in the event. And it is now dawning on me that that is more than half of my life, which just makes me feel old.

This is a cause that hits particularly close to home for me. Watching a family member struggle with and adapt to the symptoms of MS is never easy. Funds earned by the ride go towards research for finding a cure, as well as towards providing care for those already afflicted.

Anyhow, I don’t really know most of the people who read this braindump Tumblr of mine, but I figured that since ~400 of you are still following me on here (for reasons unknown even to you, I’m sure), I wanted to invite you to contribute. There’s no minimum donation, and it would really mean a lot to me. You could donate 500 dollars, you could donate 5 pennies; anything is appreciated. If you have a wad of cash burning a hole in your pocket, this is definitely a good thing to use it on. The link to contribute is right here.

So, to recap:

Doing something exhausting for charity

Donations are greatly appreciate

Additionally, there is a little box on that donation page where you can opt to have your name displayed as a donor. I just want to preemptively say: I appreciate your contribution, Dr. Fartenstein McButtpants.

My music teacher back in grade school, Mrs. Strecker, had MS, and she passed away a number of years ago. We were often badly behaved students — granted, we were pre-teen kids who didn’t really know any better, but still — and I’ll always regret our collective assholery (whether to her face in class, or behind her back).

I donated to Brian’s cause. You should, too.

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posted on 5.3.11 If you’re smart, you’ll stay in school — it really does pay off!

Last night, I went back to Hofstra (after graduating in December) for the induction ceremony for Phi Alpha Theta, a national honor society for history students. I figured I was just going to get a certificate, and that’d be that.

I did, indeed, get a nice certificate. But what I didn’t know was that I would also be receiving an award from the History Department: the Robert L. Payton Endowed Prize for Best Seminar Paper.

I was further unaware that the prize consisted of a check for $1,000. That’s pretty well endowed, all right.

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posted on 4.17.11

the9th:

Introitus - Requiem aeternam [Requiem Mass] - Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

True story: sang this (i.e., the entirety of Mozart’s Requiem) with a massive five-school choir when I was a senior in high school — it was a special concert at the C.W. Post campus of Long Island University.

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posted on 4.12.11 Burden of College Loans on Graduates Grows

Here are some choice quotes from this depressing piece:

“In the coming years, a lot of people will still be paying off their student loans when it’s time for their kids to go to college,” said Mark Kantrowitz, the publisher of FinAid.org and Fastweb.com, who has compiled the estimates of student debt, including federal and private loans.

***

The mountain of debt is likely to grow more quickly with the coming round of budget-slashing. Pell grants for low-income students are expected to be cut and tuition at public universities will probably increase as states with pinched budgets cut back on the money they give to colleges.

***

“If you have a lot of people finishing or leaving school with a lot of debt, their choices may be very different than the generation before them,” said Lauren Asher, president of the Institute for Student Access and Success. “Things like buying a home, starting a family, starting a business, saving for their own kids’ education may not be options for people who are paying off a lot of student debt.”

In some circles, student debt is known as the anti-dowry. As the transition from adolescence to adulthood is being delayed, with young people taking longer to marry, buy a home and have children, large student loans can slow the process further.

***

Unlike most other debt, student loans generally cannot be discharged in bankruptcy, and the government can garnish wages or take tax refunds or Social Security payments to recover the money owed.

Lovely!

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posted on 3.20.11

thedailywhat:

Must-Watch Interview of the Day: As promised, Nine Network’s A Current Affair sits down with bullying victim Casey Heynes, who became a hero to many after standing up to his tormentor in dramatic fashion.

[caseyheynes.]

MY HERO

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I’m Samit Sarkar, a 26-year-old reporter for Polygon. You may also know me from my four-plus years as an associate editor at Destructoid.

I’m a stickler for proper English — grammar, punctuation, spelling, etc. — so if you see any mistakes in my writing, let me know. And if you see mistakes elsewhere, let me know, because I’ll want to point them out here and laugh (à la English Fail Blog). I might even put some on The Grammar Nazi, a Tumblr that I contribute to.

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