Here’s a line from an editorial in our local paper on the lax enforcement of student dress codes:
It’s unfortunate that a student dress code must include the sentence, “underwear shall not be visible,” but these are the times we live in.
Fuddy duddies. There’s also tut-tutting about kids showing up in pajama bottoms and house slippers and a plug for school uniforms. I’ve actually noticed the pajama-bottoms-in-public trend.
Maybe everyone would be happier in pajamas — the world could be one giant pajama party, with geopolitical conflicts sorted out by pillow fights. You may say I’m a dreamer, but I’m not the only one…
Anyhoo, I’m mildly disgruntled because it’s the weekend and I have to work all day. Here’s hoping YOU have better plans.
Randy P
Packing up for a semi-aimless vacation (my favorite kind) in the NYC area, where we have many ties and favorite spots. Have reservations at the beginning and end of the week, and a family thing at the end. But don’t even know what state we’ll be in midweek.
I’m debating the Connecticut shore (e.g. Mystic) vs the Adirondacks (e.g. Lake George). Boston probably too far for a quick trip, we’re not into long drives.
Keith G
When I (fresh out of OSU, from a very blue part of Ohio) took my first teaching job, it was in a Texas public school where boys were expected tucked in, etc. That was 1982.
So glad that later in my career, they stopped that nonsense and let me worry about more important stuff.
Schlemazel
I read the Tronald Dump has hired staff in Iowa for his campaign. This tells me that the babbling baboon is actually serious about running & not just on an ego enriching goof. While it is still too early to know if, or how, the rest of the goopers will unite to stop him I find this news a bit chilling.
Here in Minnesota we had Jessie THE BOOBIE Ventura run for governor as a joke candidate and the morons crawled out of the swamp to vote for the first time in their lives so that he won a three-way race & actually pretended to be governor for 4 years. They were a disaster that made him richer & the state poorer. I do not see any humor in these clowns
ThresherK
Since it’s summer, a.k.a. “cami season” in my house, what say ye collected about the “new” thing* of having womens’, um, straps visible on the shoulder alongside tops with a cami or racerback treatment?
(*As in “I don’t pay attention to young women, so I don’t know how long this has been a style”.)
psychobroad
Betty, my daughter played volleyball for her public school for 6 years–when they had early away games all the girls would show up for the bus in their pj bottoms & slippers–was a thing way back when! (She graduated HS in 2012)
Geeno
Nope- Huge project due at the end of the month – everyone on the team is stuck with weekends and long weekdays until then.
Schlemazel
@Keith G:
In 1968 we had a bitterly cold winter. One day several girls wore pants to school instead of dresses because pants were warmer. They were sent home for violating the dress code. The next, equally cold, day many of them wore “granny dresses” which were popular at the time. They were sent home as this also somehow violated the dress code.
While I find many things I see kids wearing to school tasteless and offensive I do think administrators need to try to be sensible and not waste time fighting pointless battles.
Iowa Old Lady
@ThresherK: Been a style for a while. Not to worry.
We’ve already been out doing yard work. Not our strong point so our bushes are way overgrown.
dmsilev
Sadly, I’m in your boat. Operation Move-the-lab is at T-12 days and counting, and the to-do list seems to get longer rather than shorter.
Schlemazel
@ThresherK:
Would you rather they didn’t wear a bra? Bra straps don’t seem like a big deal to me but I could stand to see a lot fewer underpants. My fault I suppose
Emma
Flu. Fever, chills, congestion, cough, the lot. Dammit.
esc
They are policing girls wearing tank tops mostly with that rule. Apparently enforcing the finger tip rule for shorts (your shorts must extend past where your fingers hit your legs when standing up straight) is very in right now as well. Having a long torso and short arms means most of my mom shorts don’t pass that test. It’s pretty ridiculous.
gf120581
@Schlemazel: I’d have thought it was obvious that Trump was serious this time when he lost all that business over the “Mexico is sending rapists” comments and he didn’t care. He’s the frontrunner now and after cowing Fox News post debate, he must think he’s invincible.
It gives you a chill. I think it’s marvelous. Still not going to say he’ll be the nominee or anything, but the possiblity of him going third party and nuking the GOP’s chances is too delicious.
OzarkHillbilly
@Schlemazel:
The Donald has lots of money to spend on his latest sporting endeavor. The only people who should be worried at this point are Republicans. Not because he could win, but because he could cause them to lose.
“This is your brain. This is your brain on GOP.”
Big ole hound
@Schlemazel: Running for office has become the grifters and con mens scam of choice. Build that war chest and live off it for four years. Repeat.
Malaclypse
It is unfortunate than an actual editor doesn’t know to write: “These are the times in which we live.”
Fallen times, indeed.
gelfling545
My granddaughter, going into her junior year, has been somewhat of an activist at her high school regarding dress code (among other things). I mean, it’s the Arts Academy for sweet christ’s sake. Knee length dresses & skirts? No leggings even under long tops? When she mentioned in one of many fora about it that if the boys found the girl’s dress distracting the boys should learn to deal with it as it wasn’t the girl’s problem, none of the lesbian girls reported being distracted and welcome to the real world she became a bit notorious. Still, they’ve eased up on the dress code nonsense somewhat with most teachers at least pretending not to notice.
beltane
@gf120581: Trump is no scarier than the rest of the GOP candidates, just louder. The thought of any one of them winning the presidency is chilling.
Schlemazel
I wish I was as confident the the Dump could never get the nomination and if he did could never get elected. They said that about Ventura also. We have not really plumbed the depths of stupid yet.
Woodrowfan
every generation wears something the previous generation finds scandalous and the following ones find ridiculous. I think some of the things my students wear look dumb, but I had a polyester leisure suit back in the day, and wore a gold chain with an ankh on it for several years back in the Disco Era, so I keep my mouth shut. It’s not my job to shame my student’s fashion choices. That’s the job of THEIR kids in the future when they look at pics of Mom and Dad. (You wore that!?!?!?)
scav
@Schlemazel: My mother’s sorority in Macomb seems to have discovered some sort of acceptable modus vivendi involving simultaneous dresses, pants, rolling and certain levels of mercury. Possibly nylons as well, because, well, decorum. Standards. All seemed rather convoluted.
beltane
I’m really not a big fan of anyone over the age of sixteen wearing pajama bottoms in public. It has sent the signal that it’s OK for fat, unshaven, middle-aged men to shop for beer at the supermarket in their pajamas and slippers, at least where I live.
Betty Cracker
@gelfling545: Sounds like she was raised right. Good for her!
@beltane: Where I live, PJs would be an improvement. Imagine those same men shopping in Speedos and you’d be wishing for PJs.
beltane
@Schlemazel: Was Jesse Ventura worse for Minnesota than Scott Walker has been for Wisconsin?
MobiusKlein
@Schlemazel: California had the governator. We are not interested in a sequel.
Brown has been so much more competent, it’s stunning.
FlyingToaster
Wow, how effing throwback-50s these dress codes are.
My grade school was one of “slacks for boys, dresses for girls” and we left our snowpants in the cloakroom (this was 1966-71).
When we moved, our new district was ‘way more sensible:
No tank tops outside of gym.
no cut-offs. no midriffs. no backless anything.
no offensive screenprints (I learned about this when one of our neighborhood kids showed up with a “makin’ bacon” shirt featuring two mating pigs with police caps, which got his parents called in for a conference and replacement shirt)
Thank goodness WarriorGirl’s school is very similar — wear what you like, just understand that you could end up with tempera paint all over it so perhaps don’t wear your fashion gear :) And sneakers are preferred over sandals.
beltane
@Woodrowfan: The 1980s era permed-mullet, rat-on-head hairstyle was ugly then, ugly now (lots of women my age still wear it), and ugly forever.
OzarkHillbilly
@beltane: The Dude abides.
Schlemazel
@beltane:
Perhaps not but if that is the bar you set who has been worse?
@MobiusKlein:
Yeah, we got Timmy Pawlenty so that just made it worse. He tried to be Walker but we had more Dems in the legislature so he failed being as bad.
raven
OK, since we have all kinds of cat people here, check out this cat door with an individualized stairway!
raven
When I left in 66 they had all the restrictions people have noted. They had a smoking area for students in my hs in the 70’s!
rikyrah
Kay posted the link to this wretched woman’s story first, I think. Here is a reply to that piece of garbage.
………………..
OP-ED FRI AUG 14 2015
Why Wishing for a Hurricane Katrina in Chicago is Racist
By Dave Stieber
Last night I read an article in the Chicago Tribune in which the columnist and editorial board member Kirsten McQueary “metaphorically” wished a Hurricane Katrina would wipe out Chicago. I wish I were making this up, please read this piece. Even while I and many others were tweeting her about how offensive her column is, she sent out the following tweet:
Kristen McQueary @StatehouseChick
“Chicago is so good at hiding its rot.” My Friday column. Wishing for a #HurricaneKatrina #RahmEmanuel #CPS fw.to/GjgqVsH
4:20 PM – 13 Aug 2015
Chicago Tribune
Chicago, New Orleans, and rebirth
Envy isn’t a rational response to the upcoming 10-year anniversary of Hurricane Katrina .
What Hurricane Katrina did was kill nearly 2,000 people and displace and relocate 1 million people throughout the Gulf Coast. In New Orleans the population of the city fell by half due to loss of homes and displacement. Fifty percent of the city’s residents’ homes were uninhabitable or lost, and multiple generations of New Orleanians were forced to move. Historical and proudly black communities were wiped out.
Now some people like McQueary will likely say, but New Orleans is back! Who is New Orleans back for? For people who look like me (i.e. white people). Not the people who lived in those predominantly black precincts.
By wishing for a Katrina here in Chicago she is basically saying to get to rid of the black people and let the whites move in wherever they want. It would be like white flight in reverse, coming back from the ‘burbs to the city. We (white people) could proudly colonize, I mean move into Englewood and then joke on our porches while sipping tea about what life used to be like on the corner of 63rd and Racine, while we watch that new yoga studio go in. We would colonize Woodlawn, Roseland, and Austin, too, and the best part is we (white people) would get that land for cheap thanks to Katrina part II and Disaster Capitalism.
Arne Duncan (one of our fellow white brethren) said it best when he said, “Hurricane Katrina was the best thing for New Orleans Schools.” I mean to actually fix the schools for the kids who live there, that is preposterous and besides, that would be too much work. What is great is getting to have new (wealthier and/or whiter) kids move in, then rebuild the schools and boom, schools are “great” now.
gapersblock.com/mechanics/2015/08/14/why-wishing-for-a-hurricane-katrina-in-chicago-is-racist/
OzarkHillbilly
See it: Man sends angry Facebook conservatives into a full-blown rage by posing as Target
Too funny.
FlyingToaster
@Randy P:
Stay out of Greater Boston; it’s all roadwork (repairing the damage after 110.6 inches of snow) and roofers and tree-chippers (repairing the damage after the hailstorm).
[Grouchy from two weeks of trenching my street for a new gas line; the equipment broke the road next to my storm sewer grate so we have an undermining hole that they can’t patch until the trenching is done. And everywhere I go there’s a detour.]
beltane
@Schlemazel: I’m just saying we’ve reached a point where any Right winger=Disaster. It does not matter if the Republican or right-leaning independent in question is an egotistical celebrity like Ventura or Schwarzenegger or a non-entity like Walker or Paul LePage in Maine. They are all equally horrible.
OzarkHillbilly
@raven: All kinds of debauchery was performed in the smoking areas at my HS. It was the best place for drug busts.
scav
Oh dear dear Kristen McQueary.
Chicago may indeed be so good at hiding its rot but the the Chicago Tribune has alway paraded its rot front and center.
raven
@OzarkHillbilly: Yea, I was long gone but I heard about it.
rikyrah
uh huh
uh huh
Kevin Powell @kevin_powell
Janelle Monàe was cut off on “Today” when she started speaking about police brutality m.huffpost.com/us/entry/55cdff7fe4b07addcb42acdb … via @blackvoices
ThresherK
@Schlemazel: Nah, as I said I don’t prefer one way or the other. That comes from being married to an ex-hippie chick, and she’s the one who basically noticed it to me. The particular thing she pointed out to me is where the bra straps and the top’s straps are inches apart.
(I don’t have the fashion vocabulary to describe it any better. I guess this is what I get for not reading enough Vogue at the doctor’s office, or skipping the fashion shoots in Vanity Fair to read the articles.)
And I, too, could stand to see less males’ underpant tops. I am aware of all
internetprison traditions.Gex
Aargh. What I hate most about the saggy pants thing is this: It used to be all the rage with fat white men in America and we called it plumber’s crack. No one proposed laws. No one ranted and raved about it. And those guys didn’t have the decency to cover their ass with underwear when they sagged their pants, pretending their 54″ waist is 38″ by cinching their belt around their upper thighs.
But when poor black kids make a fashion statement out of getting baggy hand-me-downs there’s a goddamn moral panic about it.
gbear
@Schlemazel:
Jesse only pretended to be Governor for two years, then he got bored and crabby about it. I had just started working in state government a month before he got elected. By the third year of his term, he’d pissed off the legislature so badly that they cut a ton of funding for the admin department and I would up being laid off with about 50 other people in my building. He actually had a case of the humbles for the first couple months of his governorship. He knew it was a big job and he wanted to do well.
I saw the picture of Jesse glad-handing Trump and he looks like a fool. I didn’t think he was that stupid.
Schlemazel
@beltane:
I sort of agree but loudmouth losers like Trump & Ventura are a lot harder to take. I can’t imagine that type in the White House and believe it would be worse than at least half of the other goopers running.
Howard Beale IV
@Schlemazel: As a somewhat recent import (2008) to the land of 10,000 lakes the only bad thing I’ve heard about Ventura’s time was that the press were more vicious against Ventura then had he’d been a DFL or R.
There was also the rather surprising story about how after he was sworn in that he was taken into the basement of the State House and was interrogated by a circle of CIA agents, with them asking how could this have happened.
Hey-if a former wrestler could win a Governor’s seat, who the fuck couldn’t say that Trump couldn’t win the US Presidency?
Schlemazel
@gbear:
Wasn’t the XFL thing during that last 2 years? I just figured he had drained all the money he could get for himself out of it in the first 2. I knew that the House quit working with him after those messy compromises (ugly tax cuts for the GOP, school spending for the Dems & snowmobile/boat license fee reductions for Jesse) and things just stopped working. I point that out to people when they suggest it would be cool to have a President that is neither R or D, “So instead of one party trying to screw the President over you want both to do it at the same time?”
OzarkHillbilly
@raven: I had too much fun.
Schlemazel
@Howard Beale IV:
I was still getting the local paper then & didn’t see him being treated unfairly. In fact when a bunch of supporters showed up demanding some of the surplus be used to reduce higher ed costs (they foolishly believed Ventura supported that idea because he was a blank canvas lots of groups projected their beliefs on) he came out and made an ass of himself but the TV and Mpls paper interpreted that as him being strong against the rabble as I recall.
As for that story, why would the CIA care? Sounds more like the BS Jesse spews to make himself important. He was never a SEAL but he still tells that lie.
redshirt
Most of society’s problems would be cured if everyone wore identical genderless jumpsuits, with nametags. No more fashion shaming, and no more wondering who that dude is in the mail room.
scav
@redshirt: You’re forgetting the meltdown over mixed gender toyshopping.
gbear
@Schlemazel: Oh God I’d completely forgotten about the XFL thing. That was embarassing. I don’t remember where that was time-wise, but I know he was sick of being governor by then.
Didn’t he referee a wrestling match as governor too?
ang
Ah, the school dress code wars. We had just moved to the area and had had uniforms in the past. The written policy was extremely vague but I had seen kids in every type of outfit from short shorts and low-cut tank tops to Insane Clown Posse when we had went in to enroll our kids.When my daughter was reprimanded for pajama pants in high school I went in to ask what the problem was. I was told in a very patronizing tone that they required “appropriate dress to prepare for a professional career”. I was so startled I blurted out “What profession? – The oldest? Or gang-banger?” They didn’t complain again.
Now I look back and suspect that the real problem may have been that my petite blond white all-American cheerleader looking girl was hanging with the urban rapper outfitted black kids. Many of those girls wore pajama pants as well. The school looked very diverse on paper when I had been checking out its’ enrollment statistics but the administration seemed quite happy to encourage social segregation.
D58826
Well this is reassuring –
Problem is we are to familiar with the results of the ‘details’ of his foreign policy and what a Bush world looks like. In fact Hillary referred to him as George later in the day. Easy to see why she got confused.
All of the GOOPRS are talking about re-asserting American leadership in the Middle East. However from what keep reading the Middle East has had more than enough of American leadership and wishes we would just go away.
Eric S.
I’m typing on my brand new, shiny laptop with Windows 10. I’ve got no real opinion on the OS yet. My previous laptop is very much on its last legs.
My softball team has a our summer season championship game at 12PM. It’s supposed to be extremely hot and we will be getting buzzed by military jets from the Chicago Air and Water show.
gbear
@Howard Beale IV: I’ll agree with Schlemazel and add that Jesse was an arrogant dick to the press and constituents. He had a presser where was trying to put some single moms in their place by telling him that maybe they shouldn’t have had the kid. One of the moms shot back that ‘sometimes the dads make other plans’ (other than fathering). I always remember that clip because it wasn’t edited out. That seemed rare at the time.
You could always tell when he was losing it because his head would start to bobble just like the bobble head dolls.
Gindy51
@esc: I have a short torso and very long arms so my fingers extend well beyond most mom shorts. I would think a long torso and shorter arms would be safer….
Kay
They put in uniforms by referendum in some Ohio urban systems in the 1990’s (when it was fashionable) but the problem was mandates on the public bring duties to accommodate those members of the public who can’t comply. They had to provide subsidies and do elaborate due process analysis on how far they could go in imposing sanctions because obviously public school kids have a right to attend school and they aren’t responsible for the actions or inaction of their parents on purchasing clothing. Most of the public systems moved to dress codes- barring certain items or styles rather than mandating specific items.
I just think you always have to keep in mind that public schools aren’t private schools, nor are they INTENDED to be private schools. Public schools have a much broader duty and actual, enforceable due process that goes along with a “rights” frame. With every mandate on a public school comes a duty to try to accommodate everyone. There are no free rides :)
bemused
When extremeIy Iow rise pants came on the scene, the owner of an area hair styIe business commented to me that it’s gone too far when a young customer’s jeans rise was so skimpy, pubic hair was showing.
NotMax
@Hoard Beale IV
Can’t speak to the veracity of them, but recall stories at the time attributing his win (essentially, although in different words) to election by flash mob, Minnesota having long had same day voter registration.
Botsplainer
My high school had a smoking pad for students in the late 70s. The best of us could be found there, making weed deals.
As to dress codes, youngest Botspawn made a point of being deliberately out of dress code in a subtle way on a daily basis her final two years. A new assistant principal made the critical error of calling her out on it – she launched into him, asking why he was so into staring at her body, and saying how uncomfortable his scrutiny made her feel. Asshole backed off stammering, and never said another word about her clothing.
Amir Khalid
In Malaysia there are no finicky questions about whether a student’s clothes are dress-code compliant or not. There are school uniforms. Olive-green trousers and a white shirt for boys, knee-length turquoise skirt and a white blouse (or a white-and-turquoise baju kurung) for girls. (Headscarf if appropriate.) Boring, but at least no Malaysian rock star has ever worn his green pants and white shirt onstage into his sixties.
shell
Flu in August? Damn!
EriktheRed
Nope. I do NOT have better plans. I also have to come in and work a whole 8-hour day on a Saturday. I could have gotten out of it, but then I’d have fewer opportunities to get out of future involuntary Saturdays, so I’m biting the bullet.
And it pisses me.
gbear
@gbear: Gah. …telling him… should be …telling them…
Howard Beale IV
@gbear: I actually ran across Ventura once as a traveler at the White Plains County Airport in 1993 – He was heading back to Minneapolis, I was heading back to Detroit.
NotMax
@Amir Khalid
Imagine (and please correct me if I’m off base) there would be quite the uproar were a transgender student to show up wearing the uniform of his or her own gender identification.
RepubAnon
I think school dress codes are intended to prepare students for the workplace dress codes they’ll face after graduation. However, most schools think that the modern workplace still has restrictive dress codes as the norm, rather than the exception.
As to boys being “distracted” by what the girls are wearing, I’d suggest that this gives the schools an opportunity to teach those boys not to engage in sexual harassment – another valuable workplace skill, and one far more relevant to the modern workplace than an archaic dress code.
Amir Khalid
@NotMax:
Transgendered people are not uncommon around here. I’d have no problem with schools accommodating them, but I doubt the Ministry of Education would do it. I think they wait to come out until they’re out of the school system.
gogol's wife
@raven:
That’s sweet!
gogol's wife
@Gex:
Well said! LOL!
Schlemazel
@NotMax:
I knew a bunch of people who voted for the clown. When I would talk to them before the election they were all sure he believed exactly what they believed. It was the first time I had ever encountered that level of self-delusion about a candidate. When I would ask what he said or did that made them think he believed whatever they thought of it always just boiled down to either “he is not a D or an R” or “he just has too!”
If you have ever been on the Haunted House ride at WDW they have these blank white forms they project human images on – that is Ventura.
g
I confess – I LIVE in a pair of cotton pajama bottoms all summer long.
sacrablue
@raven: That’s awesome, but my four idiot felines (I love them anyway) would never figure out how to use it. The cat the passed away last October was the only one who figured out how to open the sliding screen door. Everybody else just sits at the door and whines.
Gvg
alachua county has had a dress code uniform for about 10 years. I hate the concept but it’s not going away. Apparently the poorer parents like it because it reduces fashion wars and social stigma of being too poor for the latest wastes of money. code was solid color pants (or skirt or leggings for girls) and solid colored shirt with collar. Basically polo’s which became very cheap as soon as the retailers had time to adjust. last year they loosened up and allowed color patterns like stripes or plaid. probably gradually get eroded as these things often do but I am surprised people didn’t stay mad about it. they got used to it and ignore it now. I do think it ended up making school shopping cheaper which surprised me. Before, polo’s used to cost more.
this year he is in a private school where the rules are use some sense and no violent sayings. More real world IMO. After school you have to learn to use judgement always. some people don’t have it. Nor taste that matches mine but that’s life.I have always seen dress choices that make me gag. To bad so sad, learn to live with it. Oh and pay attention. I found out some of the teens that deliberately dressed to be ugly tended to have some self esteem issues, often related to family. Not always I suppose, but a few I dealt with.
OzarkHillbilly
@RepubAnon:
As a formerly oversexed hormone filled teen age boy who went to a public school with oversexed hormone filled scantily clad teen age girls in the 70s, I can say without reservation that you aren’t going to teach either the girls or the boys a damn thing. You will however develop their imaginative daydreams to XXX ratings that no theatre could ever legally show to them.
raven
@sacrablue: Maybe if you put food on each step?
stinger
@raven: That is so great!
raven
@stinger: I guess it needs a handrail!
OzarkHillbilly
@raven: That would be a pawrail.
raven
@OzarkHillbilly: meow
sacrablue
@raven: Nah, they’d eat the food and go back down. Idiots, I tell ya!
scav
@OzarkHillbilly: I’m not entirely sure crimolines, corsets and however many yards of fabric involved ever really slowed down the determined in practice or imagination. All the buttons and lacings, maybe physically a bit, but if there ever was exactly a period for the imagination to run riot in . . . .
ETA they’re not exactly ostriches.
shell
The news just said that today will be the most politically active at the Iowa State Fair. Be prepared for slightly disturbing photos of pols chowing down on corn dogs and other midway fare.
MattF
A bunch of computer stuff. Update Mac OS and iPhone OS, update apps on iPhone, do backups of everything. Then finish this month’s Harper’s variety cryptic puzzle (a relatively tough one).
OzarkHillbilly
@scav: True enuf, it took a lot more imagination to ascertain what was underneath all that stuff, where as in my day we could go straight to the hard core porn. We didn’t even pretend we were studying our books in study hall.
sharl
@rikyrah: The editorial board of the New Orleans Times-Picayune responded to that racist idiot’s Chicago Tribune editorial: New Orleans to clueless outsiders: We wouldn’t wish Katrina on anyone
Patrick ii
I graduated from an Indiana high school in 1966 . The dress code was pretty strict . One guy got kicked out of school for wearing plaid pants — it was too distracting . And of course the O’Hara brothers got kicked out of school on St. Patrick’s Day for dying your their hair green .
Josie
My youngest was bullied by an assistant principal who didn’t like his long sideburns. After he was made to dry shave at one point, I told him to give the man my name and phone number and request that he call to discuss the problem with me. Having carefully read the dress code and seen multiple violations – dyed red mohawks, piercings, etc., I was loaded for bear. Unfortunately, he did not seem to be interested in discussing it with me, since he never called and never spoke to my son again. To me, dress codes are sometimes an excuse to show students “who is boss.” When I was teaching, I never paid much attention to how they were dressed or what their hair looked like.
SiubhanDuinne
@raven:
Then it would magically become a raccoon door.
MattF
@rikyrah: People have apparently forgotten how awful it was. All that death and destruction. And a President who clearly didn’t give a shit.
MomSense
Had to work this morning and am now home to take care of the dog and do chores. Then back to work.
No rest for the weary.
feebog
Hyper extended my left knee yesterday. I could barely get to my car at the end of the day. Advil and ice have helped, but there will be no golf, no yardwork and no dog walks this weekend.
MomSense
@rikyrah:
They can’t handle the truth. Way to go Today Show.
Gian
@gbear:
If only he’d tried that with a war widow. sometimes dad’s die. car accidents, or like John Ritter just fucking drop dead from some medical issue previously undiscovered.
WereBear
A common misconception. Lake George. like Malone, is only along the border of the Park.
Cacti
If kids weren’t dressing in a way that offended their parents, they wouldn’t be kids.
Debbie
@efgoldman:
Ha! Practically everyhorizontal surface had burns along the edges.
PaulW
I cannot focus on anything this weekend.
Feel moody.
catpal
Cat question – is there a safe cat repellant to keep cats away outdoors? Friends’ neighbors cats think the flower beds are a great big litter box. Anything to do? Thanks.
Schlemazel
@efgoldman:
Thats the truth! Its almost as if a lack of a sense of proportion is a job requirement.
Splitting Image
There are a couple of fashion trends that I would be happy to see the end of (ultra-low-rise jeans and pants worn below the hips, mainly), but I’ve never seen school uniforms and dress codes used for anything other than bullying students. At my sister’s school they enforced a rule that if you wore the winter uniform in the morning, you couldn’t swap your tights for socks if it warmed up during the day. The only reason anybody would enforce such a rule is sadism.
Reminds me of the George Will column from a few years back lamenting that people wear blue jeans these days and their companies don’t fire them for it.
Iowa Old Lady
@Cacti: Yeah, that’s pretty much the point.
WaterGirl
@raven: That’s pretty cool, and I like that they designed it so it fits perfectly with the style of the house.
dmsilev
@Cacti: Snort. After a meeting I had yesterday, one of the attendees was complaining about the crowd of kids on the train after the Lollapalooza music festival a couple weeks back, and I pointed out to him that his parents probably said the same thing about him and his music ~30 years ago. To his credit, he readily agreed.
dmsilev
@Splitting Image:
He thought Apple should have fired Steve Jobs? That’s …special.
WaterGirl
Gotta love the way some of you guys are raising your kids. (Or kids of BJ are raising their kids.)
Iowa Old Lady
When people lament kids-these-days, I think of Zsa Zsa Gabor. Someone moaned that with the long haired boys, he couldn’t tell the boys and the girls, and she said, “Dahling, they can tell, and that’s what matters.”
MattF
@dmsilev: Georgie takes assholery to level A triple prime. His column on Trump is a line-by-line summary of every annoying… Oh, forget it..
Fred
@Cacti: If kids aren’t dressing in a way that offends their parents they will change what they are wearing until they succeed.
Our poor kid had to grow up with real hippies of old. There was nothing he could do to bother us on the fashion front. He tried but finally resigned to the sad truth.
different-church-lady
So I’m guessing the “I see London, I see France…” taunt doesn’t work with today’s yute?
schrodinger's cat
I had to wear a uniform in grade school and it was a girls school. We still managed to piss off the nuns by wearing our uniforms too short by their standards (uniform had to touch the knees). We used to rebel by having the uniforms barely the top of the knee.
Jasmine Bleach
@redshirt:
Well, it has nothing to do with schools or gender, but I found out about the Suitsy recently. It’s a onesie suit for men that zips up (feet to neck). Feels like pajamas, they say. Men could probably exercise in it.
Not sure how to feel about such a thing . . .
different-church-lady
@dmsilev:
Well, they kinda did at one point.
Joel
Jesus, these guys should be celebrating the demise of JNCO.
schrodinger's cat
I mostly don’t care what students wear to class but I did find a guy who used to come to my 8am Algebra Class wearing blue pajamas with little yellow duckies a tad distracting.
Shakti
@rikyrah:
That doesn’t make any sense since Hell You Talmbout is [Black victim of police violence], Say their name!” What did the anchor think she was going to accomplish by talking over her at the end of the song?
different-church-lady
@sacrablue: You do realize they do that not because they’re too stupid, but because it gives them pleasure, yes?
different-church-lady
I’m so old I can remember when bringing guns to school was the big problem.
Ruckus
@dmsilev:
George probably wants us to go back to the late 1800s or so. Men wore suits, women wore dresses. They must have, look at all the pictures. It was so, what’s the word, conservative, everyone fitting in to just their little round hole. Conservatives have no idea what to do with all the square pegs in life, they want to file off all the edges and stuff them into conforming holes. They want the world to make sense, to be uniform, to be as they see it, no deviation. It will be peaceful and tranquil, ordered and bland. They think it used to be this way, Once Upon A Time.
sacrablue
@different-church-lady: yes, I am their slave.
PurpleGirl
@Schlemazel: A friend who lived in CA was shocked — shocked, I tell you — to learn that Schwartznegger was for gun control. I asked why he thought otherwise; answer: because of the guns in his movies. I told friend, “Schwartznegger was born and raised in Austria, where there is gun control. It’s what he knows and is used to.” (I’m not sure being married to a Kennedy had role in it.)
Esme's Mom
@ThresherK: Yeah, I think that’s about the only way to wear those things unless you’re a size none. I like this reality based fashion trend.
Betty Cracker
I think clothing and shoes that significantly restrict the wearer’s movements are inherently stupid. So I don’t wear stuff like that. If others want to, that’s their look-out, as long as they don’t expect me to give them a piggyback ride if a fire breaks out.
schrodinger's cat
Speaking of cats, my boss cat has taken to nipping me if I am tardy about giving him food the first thing in the morning.
Cain
I suppose I’m a bit old fashioned, but I tend to get irritated when people come in wearing sleepwear to shop at the local supermarket. For me, it isn’t that is some kind of fashion choice, but you’re lazy enough to not even bother to dress when going outside. For everything else, yeah it’s today’s fashion. I’m not one to complain, in college in the 90s, we wore the same stuff. Hell, our generation is the progenitor of all the funny stuff today – body art, piercings, gangsta wear, etc all became mainstream cuz of my generation. For some reason, its the pajamas that gets me, because that hasn’t changed much over the years. In the old days, people used to criticize us for wearing sweats. Maybe it is just like that. I can get used to anything. After all the only thing we can depend on is change.
Pie Happens (opiejeanne)
@psychobroad: Pj bottoms were a thing way back in 1993. A bunch of girls showed up for dance class dressed that way and the instructor went nuts.
Schlemazel
@PurpleGirl:
My guess is the Kennedys got blamed for many of the things Anrie said/did when it did not conform to the projected opinion. With Jesse it was “He’s changed, man. He sold us out.” No dipshit, he is what he always was a two-bit hustling phony, you were just too gullible and unaware.
After Rove had Wellstone murdered I made some calls trying to get the party to nominate State Supreme Court Justice Alan Page to take his ballot position. He has a record that is decent enough (meaning the goopers would have come after him) but I bet a lot of folks here would have been eager to vote for an NFL Hall of Famer. I like Walter Mondale well enough but it seemed obvious to me he would not excite anyone & ensure Norm Coleman the win. I’m not above running a blank slate if I think they have the makings of a good rep.
Matt McIrvin
@redshirt: They’d just shame people in racist and other ways over the names on the tags. “Shaniqua, what kind of name is that?”
scav
@Cain: Honestly, I’m not entirely sure one can even assume they slept in the pjs, but rather just grabbed and put them on as they headed for the exterior. Whereas I could probably leave the house in stuff I’d slept in and there’d usually not be much of a visible clue.
gelfling545
@efgoldman: A guy I taught with felt that the best way to deal with petty dictator principals was to mandate that administrators recycle back into the classroom every 5 years to keep them grounded in reality.
Randy P
I guess the main thing that bugs me these days is really short evening dresses. Not sure why. Just something in me that says above the knee counters elegant. Yeah I know, I’m a curmudgeon and I wear it proudly.
WereBear
@catpal: Orange peels, mulching with large bulky bark chips, and a motion activated water sprinkler all work. Especially the last.
Cain
@scav:
Oh, I don’t assume that. I think they went home afterwards and then slept without changing. :) In which case, eww… god knows what you picked up while driving/walking/whatever to the store and then putting it on your bed.
Cain
@Randy P:
Dunno, summer is a great time to show those. I roll my eyes at the 12 – 15 year old girls who wear those super short pants. It just looks funny with adolescent legs. I suppose they are going for attention grabber, but I suppose the attention given differs based on age group. :-) That said, rock on the skinny jeans! Not that I’ll wear one, that’s for the hipster guys.
Woodrowfan
@beltane: @Woodrowfan: The 1980s era permed-mullet, rat-on-head hairstyle was ugly then, ugly now (lots of women my age still wear it), and ugly forever.
no argument there! I was a bit too old for that then, thank God..
JPS
Re: dress codes.
I heard a story a long time ago, from the time that women were starting to wear pants suits. The storyteller, a famous woman in entertainment (I’m thinking Phyllis Diller, but probably not her) showed up at a fancy restaurant in a pants suit that featured a long tunic top.
The maître d’ told her “ma’am, we don’t allow women wearing pants”.
She excused herself, went to the restroom, and returned carrying the pants. The long tunic top now served as a mini-dress. She was allowed in the restaurant.
Mnemosyne (tablet)
@JPS:
I was watching an old episode of “Star Trek” the other night and I had forgotten just how short those 1960s miniskirts were. If they came one inch below the butt, I would be surprised. And yet that was going to be the professional officewear — nay, the military uniform — of the future.
knittingbull
@catpal:
mothballs spread around the garden.
A guy
I’ve got mixed emotions about the dress code thing. Every time is see a kid with his pants down around his thighs with his underwear showing I simultaneous think theres one person my kids won’t have trouble competing with in life but I’m gonna wind up paying for them to be non competititive.
RobNYNY1957
@Malaclypse:
It wasn’t pretentiously hypercorrective enough for you?
James E Powell
@Schlemazel:
I recall back in 2000 Ventura appearing on Bill Maher with Ralph Nader to promote the idea of voting for Nader because No Difference!
I’ve despised all three of them ever since.
James E Powell
I’ve taught at schools with varying degrees of dress codes. Uniforms in Los Angeles means khaki pants, shorts, skirt, etc., with specific colored polo shirts. If these policies have any effect on discipline or learning, it is not apparent to me.
Nutella
The only good school dress code I’ve ever seen is documented with a diagram of a torso showing the areas that must be covered. It was colored solid from shoulders to not far above the knees, with broad shoulder straps and a moderate scoop neckline.
This specified what everybody, boys, girls, students, parents, staff, vendors, and visitors must cover with clothing while on the school grounds.
It was fair, it was reasonable, and it never had to be adjusted for new fashions.
Pajama pants are perfectly acceptable with this method because they provide adequate coverage. Sounds reasonable to me.
low-tech cyclist
Well, having to go back to Maryland after a wonderful week on Anna Maria Island wasn’t a great plan, but the plan certainly beat the reality of getting caught up in the Great East Coast Air Traffic Control Fail, having our flight back to BWI cancelled, and finding every flight back to the DC area booked solid for the next few days.
Fortunately, we’ve got a place to stay in central Florida. Unfortunately, it’s in Plant City, not on Anna Maria Island.
JoJo
I wish there had been uniforms in my schools. It would have saved me a lot of grief and ostracism over not having the ‘right’ clothes.