My NFL Orientation Speech

Friday, 28 June 2013

Last night I went out for a friend's birthday and drank margaritas.
Margaritas on a school night... not my brightest idea ever. Especially when you drink 3, eat tacos, and your entire bill only totals $10. I should really be chalking that up to a win but I have a feeling it's going to be biting me in the ass here in a couple hours. Stay tuned.


Today I'm about to make my friend Sarah feel real proud because today I've got to talk about football a little bit. Don't go running for the hills, those of you who aren't into the sports thing, this shouldn't be difficult to follow.

Here's the deal, there's a idiot football player by the name of Aaron Hernandez who's super talented at what he does, got drafted to the Patriots right out of college, just resigned a big, fat contract with said Patriots and, oh, he's also currently residing in a 5x5 prison cell and being accused of 1st degree murder.

Did I mention that homeboy is a Florida Gator? Yeah, obviously that explains a lot.
PS. Go Noles.

Anywho, as I'm watching this story unfold, I can't help but to think there should be some sort of orientation when you get drafted in the NFL. You know, like when you go away to college and you have to go sit in a room full of other scared freshman and listen to a bunch of teachers and older students chat about how to survive college.


So, I've decided I'm going to give my speech to the NFL newbies right here, right now. Because I'm positive the NFL is totally going to pick up this post and hire me as their new NFL orientation speaker. Duh.


Hey guys. How's it going? Pretty good, I assume, you all just signed some pretty awesome pieces of paper and I bet you're all feeling pretty damn good right about now, and not just because you're now guaranteed to get laid pretty much whenever any of you please. 

You guys are about to make money, lots and lots, and lots more, of money. You're going to be able to do just about anything, and anyone, you want to do and that's just spectacular. We're all so very happy for you and excited for you all to embark on this fun filled new journey. Really, we are. 

Let's all just remember that sometimes, there's some things that even Peyton Manning's bank account can't bail you out of. Like murder, for instance. Guys, you're going to have some strange seeds coming out of the woodworks who want to be part of your posse and those strange seeds are probably going to have some pretty stupid ideas. Don't give in to those stupid ideas, your futures are brighter than the yellow in the Oregon jerseys. 

If you so feel the need to "be strapped", how about we just stick to maybe one hand gun and a few bullets? We really, really don't need automatic weapons or any other heavy duty assault weapons. It just isn't necessary, unless you're up to no good... which none of you are going to be. Right? RIGHT. 

Which reminds me, let's all say the following 3 times in a row: Hugs not drugs. Hugs not drugs. Hugs not drugs.

Because remember, you can get all of the strange ass you want now. You're going to be beating them away with a stick... but please don't actually beat them, that's also not good for anyone's reputation. 

Don't let me down guys, you've got this. Congrats to you all again.
Hugs not drugs! Smooches and toodles to all of ya. 



And to end this, let's #backthatazzup.

It's #backthatazzup Friday!

The purpose: To start our weekend with some fantastic jams.

The station that inspired it: "Back That Azz Up" on Pandora Radio.

The rules: Link your jams up and have a jam sesh with all of us!

Happy Friday!
Grab a button, pick your jam, link up and let's get this weekend started off on the right foot!

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Oh oh. PS I just realized I can link up with SARAH this week!!

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"Calibration"

Thursday, 27 June 2013

"Calibration"

If I needed a quick fix,
I wouldn't be here right now.
Fight now.
Pull rank after you drank
Much more than you could handle.
Handle pans with shaky hands
And be sure to praise the same God
That you will curse for your condition.
Affliction self imposed.
Stairwells and curled toes.
The industry is your excuse
And funding your only motive.
So fundamental.
Elementary, my dear.
Tears dried upon request
After clutching the broad chest
Of a bevy of clientele.
Buying what you sell,
they make steady rotation
of what some say runs the nation.
Patron behind the scenes
With souvenir stained jeans.
Blotches where stone washed
But never washed away.

At least not today.

If I had the time,
I'd spend a few dimes.
Short change simple and plain
For a tighter set of chains.
Passed on the chance to gain
To make room for the pain.
Never heard a safe word;
So here you go again.
Rinsed under the rain
Then ran away from the sun;
Acting as if it was fun
Until gunned down.
Spun around to fade away.
Way too many jump shots
Will ensure the foul is flagrant
And that's charity plus possession.
Nine tenths in court
And you'll get no support.
No need to argue the call
When you turn over the ball.

And now you start to bawl.

If it really never mattered,
My opinion would be shattered.
What one shapes would be splattered;
Smeared across from your indifference
Upon the first blink
and the next breath.
The next step would involve resolve;
But that's above expectation:
The one thing you truly covet
But never seem to reach the summit on.
Dawn will expose
Every time you smite your nose.
Before dusk, you'll chase
Every iota of grace granted in pity.
Privy to objection
But more at home with complacency,
Casualty of what the latent see
As a means of satiation.
Until commencement of cremation
Or the pallbearers and coffin,
quite often
You will frequent this destination.
Circumstance will have his slave.
You will enlist yourself as knave
And cry out to be saved
When you are bound to misbehave.

Save face for the gullible faction.
Your traction and turbulence is earned.
From what you have learned,
gravity will test you often;
Bogged down with a frown,
plastic crown and messy face.
Shining beacon of taste
With so much promise misplaced.
Sulked in despair, choices line your hair
With an intricate display:
Clusters of dismay intertwined
like vines in disarray,
The haphazard hodgepodge lodged
Deep within strands that meet the chin
And a slight grin to pull it all together.
Ties severed you keep in your lap
To overlap the missing gap
Just to remain in contention
But you can't conceal suspension.
Life holds unlimited retention
But only you can break the straps. †

Written By: Devin Joseph Metz

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Tired of Labels

Your child is born with an extra chromosome and receives a diagnosis of Down syndrome, or Trisomy 21.

You enter the school system, and usually around the ripe old age of 5 years, the school wants to do testing and evaluation on your child. This testing includes an I.Q. test. At 5 years old. Yet kids with no disabilities, or special needs, or risk of a developmental delay enter Kindergarten without having their I.Q. tested and being labeled.

Your child is given an I.Q. score and labeled with mental r*tardation (MR) and further labeled within the mild, moderate, or severe range.

Times change and the label of MR changes to mental or intellectual disability, but there are still ranges to attach to that label, to give more of a label.

Then you might live in a state where the school districts place your child in one of three - what they term - programs. (i.e. self-contained classrooms.)

But it can't be labeled just a plain old self-contained, or special education classroom. No, the classroom has to be broken down with labels, too.

The 3 types of programs are based on where your child's I.Q. score falls. The classrooms are called Educable Mentally Delayed (EMD), Trainable Mentally Delayed (TMD), and Profound Mentally Delayed (PMD). If the classrooms are labeled as such what does it say for the students inside those classrooms? Can you imagine your child being labeled as "trainable"? Aren't animals considered trainable? And why "educable"? Why aren't the general education classrooms labeled as "educable"? Aren't all students "educable"? Isn't that why we send our children to schools - to get an education?

At some level, maybe state, they have changed the labels of these classrooms to be "Mild, Moderate, and Severe". Yet everyone still refers to them as "EMD, TMD, PMD" rooms.

If your child doesn't have enough labels yet, society wants to label them on their level of functioning.

They will ask if your child is "high-functioning." I think "High-Functioning Autism" is a diagnosis now. If not official it is at least an acceptable label as I've seen "HFA" in articles.

I've heard mention of high-functioning and low-functioning, but I've never heard of anyone say someone is middle-functioning. Why not? Can't you be in the middle of high- and low-functioning? Why do you have to be either one or the other?

How come people without disabilities or special needs aren't labeled as high- or low-functioning? Isn't there a range of skills amongst that population as well?

Who determines what is high- and low-functioning anyway? What if you're in a wheelchair but have average intelligence? What level of functioning are you then if you have low mobility?

What if you have below-average intelligence but are physically capable of so much, or are gifted in some area of the arts? What level of functioning are you?

What if you have above-average intelligence but have no common sense or people skills? What level of functioning are you?
 
In this blog post I mentioned how the reporter said, "Garrett (a young man) is very highly functioning for someone with Down syndrome. He reads at the 3rd grade level and has the cognitive ability of an 8 or 9 year old."

"Very highly functioning for someone with Down syndrome." Really? What makes him so high-functioning if he has the cognitive ability of an 8 or 9 year old? What made the reporter say that? And what relevance did it have to the story? What if there are plenty of young adults with Down syndrome who have a cognitive ability older than an 8 or 9 year old? What if his same-age peers with Down syndrome have accomplished more than he has in terms of schooling or independence ... does it make them very, very highly-functioning? Did this reporter have such a low expectations or preconceived notions about people with Down syndrome that he came away with his interactions with Garrett so impressed that he felt the need to label him 'very highly-functioning'?

I've been asked in the past, or had comments made to me, about Kayla being 'high-functioning.' I don't know if she is or not. Based on what? Her I.Q. score? Compared to what? Compared to her typical same-age peers? She does a lot of things they do, but there are a lot of things she doesn't do. Compared to same-age peers who have Down syndrome? Again, she can do things that other kids with Down syndrome her age can't do, and they are able to do things she can't do. There is a wide variety of skills and abilities amongst the Down syndrome population just as there is in the typical population.

Kayla isn't high- or low-functioning. She functions period. She does what she is capable and able to do; sometimes with supports, accommodations and modifications, and sometimes without any supports.

Why do people with disabilities have to continuously be labeled and have label upon label stacked upon their shoulders? Can't they just be? Can't they just exist as is without having to fit in to boxes and labels?

 

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Stored forever in the depths of the interwebz.

Holy bananers, it's already Thursday... and I usually never feel that way but can I get an amen? Amen.

Today I've got to talk about something that sort of came up over a little G-chatting with one of my favorite sarcastic, blunt, bitches, Brin, who enjoys going through my old entries and mocking my baby posts from when I wasn't quite comfy with this whole thing. It's cool though, if anyone is going to mock me, I'll take it from her.

So, last night I went out on a date.
First one I've been on in a hot, hot minute. Probably since, oh, December? To say I'm rusty would be a vast understatement. Luckily, I didn't fall on my face or die from awkward silence. And that's all I'll report here on that...


Anyways, the point of today's post is to chat a little about some things you should probably try and leave out of your blog. Mainly, men.

Single ladies, ladies in new relationships, etc. etc. etc... take my word for this, leave your possible prospects out of le blog. Unless that shit is real serious, or unless you don't mind taking a trip down failed memory lane, you gotta leave the dudes out of your posts.

I didn't listen to such advice back when I started this blog and now I get the pleasure of seeing my ex's mug here on occasion, as well as anyone (um, Brin) who decides to get click happy around here. There's nothing fun about that, nothing at all. And it's not like I can just go back and delete eleventy posts, that would make for a sad unicorn. Though I wont act like I haven't considered going back and changing whatever it was that I was calling him in any given post to something like "douchelord" or "assface". I figured that would probably confuse new readers though, so I refrained.

I mean, we already know how I feel about telling people in the real world about this interwebz hangout, but what happens if/when I do start seeing someone and what if it gets all cereal serious and stuff, and I'm forced to reveal my double life? "Oh hey, check out all of these posts talking about things I did with my ex." Can I get an awkward?!

That's the thing about being a blogger, other people just have stories in their heads and maybe a few photo albums on Facebook that can easily be deleted or hidden. Us bloggers have all of our stories out there, written in ink, stored forever in the depths of the interwebz. We can easily be found if someone searches hard enough and with one click our lives and stories are revealed for anyone to read. Obviously this is something we choose to do, we enjoy doing it, I just think it's pretty easy to forget exactly how permanent it can be.

I guess my point is, don't let those giddy, new emotions fog your brain.
Well, unless you don't care about seeing his face pop up under the "you may also like:" section of your blog for months and years after you decided to end things. Personally, I'm not much of a fan. Maybe that's just me though.


I'm off to find the best #backthatazzup jam for tomorrow. You should too.
"I totally regret linking up for #backthatazzup Friday", said no one ever.

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It's All in the Stars

Wednesday, 26 June 2013

Shit's about to get weird here today. 

Real weird.

Actually, I almost tweeted this yesterday and then I realized that I'm really freaking insane and if I was going to put such a thing out there, it needed to be here and it needed to be explained in way more than 140 characters so that I have a slim chance at looking maybe, possibly, just slightly a little less insane. 

(Proof reading this post right now... nope, no way does this even attempt to make me look less insane. I'm never going to get a date again, basically.)

Here's the thing, blog. I have a little obsession with horoscopes, and by little I mean that I check my horoscope on multiple websites every single morning and pretty much relate much of my life to the stars. And I'm not talking about the kind that walk on a red carpet.

Oh, I'm a leo, by the way. Here's what the stars have to say about me:

Dead on, by the way. I'm by far the epitome of a leo, as far as characteristics and traits go.

Typically my daily horoscope is dead on as well, in addition to just about anything I've ever read and researched about my star sign.

I'm procrastinating from my confession, by the way. You know, the one I mentioned I wanted to tweet? Yeah, alright, here it goes...

A lot of my friends turn to Google when they meet a guy, to dig up the dirt on them and find any and all incriminating photos of their potential new love interest. Me? Well, I turn to the stars. Once I get that Facebook friend request, I instantly click that "about" tab and find the birthday of said guy, then I run my happy ass to my favorite horoscope pages and research all I can to decipher what I could possibly be getting myself into. 

Bat shit cray, I know. 

Hear me out though, I've done the star sign research on a couple of guys I've dated in the past and, basically, if I would have done said research before I put in the time with them I would have understood why they are the way they are much earlier in the game. Obviously it's not always accurate for everyone, I've had a few strange seeds in my past that don't really fit the bill on many characteristics, but I chalk that up to them just being strange seeds. 

So, yeah, basically you all can just go ahead and slap the crazy sticker on my back today. It's cool, I know I'm slightly a freak. Or really a freak. I think we all already knew that though. 

I should probably go now before I get too deep into this and make myself look even more nutty.

See ya on the flip side.

Spay and neuter your pets.

Go check your horoscope.

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