Today’s post comes from perennial sophomore Bubby Spamden of Wendell Wilkie High School.

Hey Mr. C.,

Well, we’re back. It’s been a couple of weeks already and I’m feeling a little down because it’s all so familiar now. Being a sophomore is the pits – you don’t feel that freshman level of excitement and you’re still a long way from having any of the senior class coolness factor. I come to school every day with a dark cloud hanging over my head. I feel invisible, so I act out in class and get sent to the office. Ho hum, it’s all so familiar and NOT scary. When you’re a sophomore, you know the routine and you’re nothing is new – this must be what it’s like to have the same job for, like, 30 years. Blah.

Not like I know how it really feels to hold a job. I guess I just wasn’t born at the right time for that.

Mr. Boozenporn says there’s a huge demographic shift coming, though, when all the baby boomers will retire and suddenly the jobs will open up and (he says) we’ll find out that we’re not trained for the many good paying openings that will be available because we’ve been too busy just farting around in his class.

But from what my dad tells me, just farting around is a real description of the actual responsibilities of an honest-to-goodness job, and his boss has it.

is that true? Can you get away with stuff once you’re on the payroll?

Everything I see on TV says pretty much the opposite – that people are getting fired left and right all the time for no reason at all, especially if they work for Donald Trump.

Anyway, I’m kind of excited about all the cool jobs that will pop up when you and your old friends finally go into the nursing home and get out of our way. And just think – when all those good paying jobs get claimed by the brightest minds of my generation, who’s going to be left to do the crummy, low paying work of fluffing pillows and changing bedpans for the likes of you?

I’ll tell you who – it’ll be the kids who farted around in class. So tell Mr. Boozenporn to let me and my friends goof off! It may seem like we’re just being jackasses, but actually we’re practicing to be your caretakers!

Sincerely,
Your friend,
Bubby Spamden.

I find it hard to argue with Bubby’s logic, strange as it is. His poor scholarship and inability to resist peer pressure may be the only thing things left in this world that bode well for my comfortable retirement. But first they have to let him graduate.

What’s the lowest paying job you ever had?

Today is the 11th anniversary of the attacks in 2001 that killed more than three thousand people in New York, Washington DC and Pennsylvania. Though we are now past the pivotal 10th anniversary, the annual observance remains painful.

People cope in their own way. Many attend memorial services. Some go to concerts featuring patriotic music and proud statements honoring brave first responders. Others perform acts of community service. Some try not to think about it too much.

I think of all these responses as human and legitimate.

My eye was caught the other day by MSNBC’s special “9-11 As it Happened,” where the cable network re-runs NBC’s coverage of the attacks minute-by-minute just as events unfolded. I saw only a portion, but was surprised at its power. Shocked and disheartened all over again, I wondered why anyone would sit there and intentionally re-live the experience. Especially since we all know the terrible ending.

Adding to the eeriness of the scene was the fact that I saw this play out while walking on a treadmill at an athletic club. MSNBC was displayed on just one of a series of screens. Right next to 9-11, the Green Bay Packers were struggling in the early going against the San Francisco 49’ers. I shifted my gaze back and forth from massive deadly violence against unsuspecting civilians to violence-for-fun-and-profit between rich men in costumes. Which channel to watch? It wasn’t a hard decision to make, but it was a tough choice to keep.

Had I been at home I would have changed the channel or turned off the TV. Committed to the treadmill for another 20 minutes, I told my eyes to behave. I had decided to live in the present moment, but the 9-11 replay was impossible to ignore. My gaze kept shifting back to it even though the I was trying to care that the Packers couldn’t mount a running game. Football never seemed more trivial.

We like to say we will never forget, and I’m sure for many that is absolutely true. But feeling what it was like to REALLY remember that day by seeing it play out in front of me again, I realized how much of it I have, out of necessity, pushed aside and watered down. In a society where so many of our games and entertainments depend on our blithe acceptance of scripted or controlled mayhem, it’s instructive to be reminded of how it drains the heart and wounds the soul to truly witness a genuine tragedy.

What do you do with 9-11? Observe it or avoid it?

Todays post comes from Trail Baboon’s living and loving correspondent, a man who is a bottomless well of wellness, B. Marty Barry.

I was scandalized … SCANDALIZED! … to read this NY Times article about the for-pay book review business. It turns out there are people who will say nice things about books in online reviews without really reading those books!

They do this as part of a financial arrangement to “legitimize” the writer in the eyes of potential readers. This is one of the few places left in the world where journalists can make a little money – inventing the kind of promotional blurbs they used to disdain! Oh how far we have fallen!

Normally I’m all in favor of praise, but I think this is a very dangerous trend for everyone who might venture into the unregulated internet looking for a little validation. And we are all seeking some of that – the sweet nectar of positive comments! As one of the “experts” in the Times article said, “Nearly all human beings have unrealistically positive self-regard.” But it is fragile and needs constant support.

Before long, it won’t be just book reviews. It will be personal remarks of all kinds that are for sale. Such as:

“Clyde is a perceptive man – a genius and a scholar who is under-appreciated by those who could most benefit from his wisdom – the indifferent mob that cannot see greatness when it is in their midst.”

And …

“Barbara may physically be in Robbinsdale, but her intellect knows no bounds and her influence ought to be valued by the famous and the mighty. There is nothing beyond her understanding, and no problem that would not yield to her commonsense analysis.”

I say these things from the heart, but a person with very little writing talent could invent such compliments in minutes, and you the reader would be none the wiser.

I feel personally and professionally threatened by this. As a therapist, I have to help my clients see themselves clearly by guiding them through a discussion of their good qualities and some of their habits that are, quite frankly, rotten. But why would anyone seeking self-knowledge come to me for the brutal truth when they could just as easily go to a professional flatterer for a comfortable lie?

Of course the truth is much more useful than empty praise in the long run, just as brussel sprouts are better for you than potato chips, but guess which has the most shelf space at your local supermarket? And for that matter, how can I even believe the positive things I hear about brussel sprouts? Maybe someone is building them up for a financial reward.

I’m afraid this all may lead to a global outbreak of Midwesterner’s Syndrome – an infectious condition where the brain cannot accept a compliment, but must always, ALWAYS give credence to the most negative available assessment because it feels true.

Imagine it. Lutheran farmers, everywhere.

I’m not feeling very optimistic at the moment. But please don’t try to cheer me. I want to believe you, though I’m pretty sure I can’t.

Can you give us a few kind words for the dust jacket?

Concern over the possible spread of swine flu and the Minnesota State Fair led to this eye-opener from Deputy State Epidemiologist Richard Danila, quoted by MPR.

“There probably have been 50 million, 80 million visitors at county and state fairs this last few months, with many countless human-pig interactions,” Danila said. “Yet, to date, there have only been 230 human cases of this new virus. And most of those have been mild illness, most of them have been children, and most of them have been in people with prolonged swine contact.”

In all the times I have been to the State Fair and visited the animal barns, I did not once consider that I was in the process of creating a “human-pig interaction”. And engaging in “prolonged swine contact” sounds like a bad idea even when there’s not a virus in the mix. But some people need to be reminded to only engage in appropriate relationships, so here’s a dumb little poem to keep your behavior in line.

The State Fair livestock do not mind
you visiting their digs
But when you go you’ll surely find
you must not kiss the pigs.

Their bristles are so dry and tough.
Their snouts are wet with slop.
But if you kiss the pigs enough
You may not want to stop.

So what is an appropriate kind of human-pig relationship apart from the diner-dinner interaction we’re most accustomed to? A group of game developers at the Utrecht School of the Arts and Wageningen University in the Netherlands have come up with a concept called “Pig Chase”. Apparently in the Netherlands there’s a law that pig farmers have to provide the animals with some entertainment while their in their pens, fattening up. But you can only show them the movie “Babe” so many times before they’re mouthing all the lines along with the actors and rolling their eyes when the farmer says “That’ll do, pig” at the end.

They need something more interactive. Take a look.

The idea is still in development, but this would be a popular attraction at the Minnesota State Fair, don’t you think? And safer for both parties than resorting to the usual pig kissing and pork chops.

Have you ever played a game with an animal?