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No pizza on Sweetest Day

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sfaJack

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So sfaJill and I were in Target last night walking up towards the registers when I noticed a display of 'funny' Halloween cards featuring our Presidential candidates. There was one with the Obamessiah on it that read something to the effect of "this man might be our next President--and you thought Halloween was scary" (cue laugh track).

 

I briefly thought about buying it and sending it to my dad, but decided against it because he'd probably 1) think I've turned gay because I sent him a card in the mail and/or 2) lecture me about "wasting 43 cents to tell me something I already know."

 

Then I noticed a display for greeting cards for "Happy Sweetest Day!" This conversation occurred. Guess who is who:

 

"What the fuck is 'Sweetest Day?'"

 

"I don't know. What are you talking about?"

 

*picks up a 'Sweetest Day' card* "This. What is this for?"

 

*looks at card and then display* "I guess it's kind of another Valentine's Day!"

 

"Great! Another day to waste $80 on flowers that will be dead in 72 hours!"

 

 

After some checking of the world's leading information source, it appears Sweetest Day is some midwest Yankee tradition that started innocently enough but has since evolved into another Hallmark holiday that's now starting to spread overpriced candy and unfunny cards to our neck of the woods down here. When will this crap ever stop?

 

Though I must admit I'm shocked that it took this long for it to reach Texas. I guess George W. must have spent some of his time laying off some people in the Hallmark marketing department and they're just now catching up on the workload.

 

I told sfaJill not to expect anything for Sweetest Day. She seemed fine with that.

 

----------------------------------------------

 

The party's over for kids who pass Texas's high school standardized test.

 

AUSTIN — The state's education boss is warning school superintendents that pizza parties, field trips and other rewards for students who pass the Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills may violate education privacy laws by inadvertently outing students who fail.

I remember taking this test, then called 'TAAS', in 10th grade. I also remember all of us getting to go to Pizza Hut to celebrate passing this very basic test of academic skill (you know it's basic skill level when my dumb ass misses only 4 of the multiple choice answers ON THE ENTIRE TEST). I do not remember not seeing the kids who failed the test not being at this wonderful celebration but I didn't think anything of it. Of course, it was nearly 15 years ago now.

 

This is my favorite part of the article though:

 

At most schools, the vast majority of students pass the test. Honoring them, by process of elimination, makes it easy to identify students who fail, Texas Education Commissioner Robert Scott wrote in a letter released Thursday to superintendents.

Note to Robert Scott: it is also pretty easy to identify which students failed this test when, on state-mandated "Re-test Day", they are 'absent' from class because they are in the library retaking said test. No, that's not obvious at all. Nope. No way.

 

Scott said he recognized that motivational efforts are intended to encourage better performances on the test. But he said they have a negative effect on those who are not rewarded.

So if I decide to NOT meet the basic requirements of my job, my boss should not give raises to everyone else so that I don't feel too bad about myself?

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1) Sweetest day is bullshit. For years Mrs. kkk has been harping about why I do nothing for this day. I bring up the "it's just another day for Hallmark" defense. I win each year, but then again I just tune her out.

 

2) I'm sure you could figure out on your own which of your fellow students didn't pass said Texas test. I know I could during my time in school.

 

So if I decide to NOT meet the basic requirements of my job, my boss should not give raises to everyone else so that I don't feel too bad about myself?

 

Don't tell you boss that -- he/she will probably use that as an excuse not to award raises. Well, that and the damn Bush economy.

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The company sent out an e-mail the other day stating that our annual "salary adjustment" will take effect January 1 instead of the usual date of April 1. This was meant to boost our morale I'm sure, but all it did was fuel cynical speculation such as "we get it three months earlier--does that mean we're getting 3% less this year?"

 

But yeah, I'm keeping my damn fool mouth shut. I'll just fill in the self-evaluation form with the usual bullshit about how I actually work all the days I'm supposed to and always finish my work on time and let the powers that be fill in their form with all the ways I've failed them. Then I'll wait to see what the o'l paycheck looks like come January.

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In Washington it's the WASL. But when I took it, it wasn't required to pass to graduate (as is the case now) so they didn't even bother giving you your score until Junior year. (Took it Sophmore year.) Weak. And we certainly didn't get pizza or anything (although I did pass, go me!) but I do remember the week we had to take the stupid thing after we took the test we got starbursts and soda in one section, and after another we walked down to the IMAX to watch a film about the rainforest.

 

There was one upside to the WASL, all the sophmore's disappeared that week, so if you had classes with sophmores in them and weren't a sophmore you either had an fairly empty class where it was likely you didn't have to do anything but watch movies, or you were Smues who got FUCKED BY THE SYSTEM and was a junior in an all sophmore alegbra class (I will make a post about that bullshit someday) and they were using that class as a testing room so for that period all week I got a free pass basically to do what I wanted. That was nice.

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