Oh Darn

Going going gone:

Did you know schools are going to stop teaching cursive writing? The reason they give is that in this world of computers we no longer need to know how to write long hand.

OK, now we have stopped teaching spelling because of spell check on computers, and we have stopped teaching arithmetic because of the calculator.

No one can fail a grade any longer. The new rule is "Don't Push Them, Pass Them."

So with no teaching only baby-sitting taking place in our schools now they attack all that is sacred.





Don't let kids be kids:

Not It! Elementary School Bans Tag

ATTLEBORO, Mass. - Tag, you're out!

Officials at an elementary school south of Boston have banned kids from playing tag, touch football and any other unsupervised chase game during recess for fear they'll get hurt and hold the school liable.

Recess is "a time when accidents can happen," said Willett Elementary School Principal Gaylene Heppe, who approved the ban.

While there is no districtwide ban on contact sports during recess, local rules have been cropping up. Several school administrators around Attleboro, a city of about 45,000 residents, took aim at dodgeball a few years ago, saying it was exclusionary and dangerous.

Elementary schools in Cheyenne, Wyo., and Spokane, Wash., also recently banned tag during recess. A suburban Charleston, S.C., school outlawed all unsupervised contact sports.

"I think that it's unfortunate that kids' lives are micromanaged and there are social skills they'll never develop on their own," said Debbie Laferriere, who has two children at Willett, about 40 miles south of Boston. "Playing tag is just part of being a kid."

Another Willett parent, Celeste D'Elia, said her son feels safer because of the rule. "I've witnessed enough near collisions," she said.

Give me a break - this D'elia chick thinks tag is a contact sport!! Will her son be able to avoid near collisions the rest of his life?

You can spot her kid. He is the one talking in the movies, yelling in the restaurant, and running amuck because heaven forbid she should scold or, perish the thought, spank him.

How did the babyboomers survive?






Kazakh central bank misspells ‘bank’ on money

Country used Russian during Soviet era, but now increasingly using Kazakh

ALMATY, Kazakhstan - The Kazakhstan central bank has misspelled the word “bank” on its new notes, officials said Wednesday.

The bank plans to put the misprinted notes — worth 2,000 tenge ($15) and 5,000-tenge — into circulation in November and then gradually withdraw them to correct the spelling.

The move has drawn the ire of the Central Asian state’s politicians who urged the bank to abandon the notes altogether.

“The mistake ... is not just a spelling problem — it has political undertones,” a letter from members of parliament to President Nursultan Nazarbayev said.

“We urge you to tell the National Bank not to put out the notes with a mistake in the Kazakh language.”

Language is a contentious issue in Kazakhstan.

Kazakhs were encouraged to speak Russian, which is written in Cyrillic script, during Soviet times but since independence in 1991, the country has seen the Kazakh language as a national symbol.

The Kazakh word for bank is the Cyrillic form of “bank.” On the new note, the word was written with an alternate Kazakh form of the letter K, which has a slightly different pronunciation.

They stopped teaching spelling in their schools as well and look what happened!!







Plucky Boy Gets Miss Universe Dream Date

SYDNEY - A plucky Australian schoolboy who asked a former Miss Universe to his school dance, only to be rebuffed, has finally had his dream date over lunch.

Daniel Dibley, 17, needed a partner for the school dance in the Australian country town of Bathurst, west of Sydney, and he decided to aim high.

He wrote to Australia's best-known beauty queen, Jennifer Hawkins, to ask her to the dance, and was stunned when the 2004 Miss Universe accepted.

But in a decision that would break a schoolboy's heart, Hawkins later pulled out of the date because the overwhelming publicity had overshadowed plans for the end-of-year dance, which is for students in their final year of high school.

Instead, the Seven television network said Hawkins visited Dibley's Bathurst High School on Tuesday for a private lunch date with Daniel, and to speak to the school assembly, where she apologized for all the fuss.

"I didn't want you guys to think I didn't want to come to Bathurst, or I didn't want to come to the formal (dance)," Hawkins, now a television presenter, told the school assembly.

"I did. It just became too big. I just wanted a low-key thing."

Leave it to the news media to spoil a good thing!!!






A new bear story:

Bear cubs trapped in bear-proof Dumpster

Cubs were found after agitated mother was seen patrolling Dumpsters

A pair of black bear cubs got more than they bargained for when they went digging for food inside a dumpster at a Nevada campground.

The Dumpster's bear-proof lid, which someone had left open, closed on the cubs after they climbed inside.



The cubs were discovered after their agitated mother and a third cub were seen patrolling various dumpsters on the site and calls were made to scientists at the Wildlife Conservation Society and Nevada Division of Wildlife.

Previous studies by the agencies showed that black bears with access to human leftovers will readily become "couch potatoes" that neglect foraging for their natural foods, which include grasses, berries and pine nuts. To avoid potential conflicts between human and bears, legislation was passed that required human trash be deposited in bear-resistant containers.

"Obviously, when the lids are left open, the dumpsters won't keep the bears out," said Jon Beckmann of WCS. The Zephyr Cove Campground in Lake Tahoe, Nevada, where the cubs were discovered, will be cited for having other dumpsters on site that were not bear-proofed.

The entire bear family was tranquilized and released together in a mountain region near the campsite. Scientists fitted the mother bear with a radio collar so they could track her movements.

I remember a story about Goldie Locks and the three bears. In that story Goldie ate the bears' porridge so those bears didn't eat grasses, berries and pine nuts, so why should these?

A bear that's a couch potato, huh?

It's good they gave them a radio collar so they can catch up on the latest tunes as well as the news.



Just another Tuesday. If you liked it, good. If you didn't, you probably didn't. Come back for more of the same right here tomorrow.