Student E-mail

Received this from a student today:

"I want to thank you for having faith in me. Most teachers think that students cant change, but as for me today was a BIG wakeup call. Taking my work serouisly in life is really important, especially the fact that i want to go to a good college. Today afterschool as i worked on my Dr. Horrible packet i thought about alot, I see the struggles my family and others have to face because of not finishing school or not completing their assignments and i honestly dont want to end up like them. Thank you for helping me with my essay. I completed it and feel strongly proud of my work, Yes last minute but its done and now i can look back at this day as a lesson learned. Your truley a great teacher who i will look up too. Thank you again for your help and the faith. (: i really do appreciate."

Sometimes the struggle pays off. Stay strong friends.

What can Government Accountants do with my Money?

“I got a good life man, pounds and pence
Nuff dollars make sense, while you ride the bench
Catch me swinging for the fence
Dead Presidents, ya know” – Jay-Z, “Dead Presidents II

My accountant called me after E-filing my income tax return and informed me that because of the extra income I had this year I actually have to pay the government $1,500. He tried to convince me to let him increase my charitable contributions and work expenses so I wouldn’t have to pay as much. The problem with his solution, however, is that if the government decides to look into my $4,000 of charitable donations they’d find that $3,800 worth of pudding snacks, kitkats, and snickerdoodle cookies does not count towards helping Haiti in any way. I told Sam to just send me the bill and let me pay up because there’s no sense in getting upset about this kind of thing. In this same spirit I can’t really get angry with the government. I have to pay, simply because I wouldn’t know who to argue with. Who can one really argue with about owing taxes? The head of the IRS? President Obama? Ted Dibiase and Irwin R. Scheister? (If you know you those men are you need to stop watching old wrestling.) Instead I decided that it would be more fun to write up a list of possibilities on what government accountants can do with my money.

Possibility 1: Spread the Love

Current Population of the United States: 307,006,550
Each citizen could receive .0000049 of a cent of my money. I know it doesn’t sound like much. However, with the rate of inflation in the next 2,000 years that would mean a dime for everyone! Of course, to get that dime you’d have to survive 12/21/12 and have children. Then your children and their descendants would have to survive World War III, the second coming of Jesus, the return of Chuck Norris, the third coming of Jesus, the invasion of hell lead by Charles Bronson, and the rise of Magneto. However difficult the perseverance of some would guarantee that dime. Only the strongest survive, right?

Possibility 2: Office Party

Government accountants, I imagine, are bland little men with big glasses, gray suits, combovers, and an unhealthy obsession with exotic women. It’s rare that they get out and it’s even rarer that they have fun. So the way I figure it, they could use my check for $1,500 a kick-ass office party! The following is a list of expenses:

• $1,500 – One really, really, really good Philippina Masseuse, YOU KNOW…

Seriously, that’s it, what else do they need? I’m sure they have families, PS3s, and other stuff at home. They’re accountants, not shut-ins.

Possibility 3: Educate the Less Fortunate

My $1,500 can be used as a prize for an essay contest for young, Latino college hopefuls. The essay topic would be:

“How has your life as a young Latino in the United States been influenced by Mun2, reggaeton, Spanglish (because you can’t really speak either language), or reading “The House on Mango Street” every year since 7th grade because you can relate to it?”

The winner would be Frederico Rivas of San Diego, CA. He would use the $1500 to attend Flagler College in Boca Raton, Florida and to buy books for his three Latino studies classes. He would then use the pages of these books to keep him warm later in life when he finds that none of his classes teach “The House on Mango Street.”

Eventually the Romero Latino Scholarship Essay Competition would be exposed as a fraudulent contest when the press learns that the committee reading the essays is actually composed of a spider money, a really cute bunny rabbit, and Paris Hilton as opposed to Daniel Romero and his friends Rhodes (roll the “R”) and Scholar (pronounced with a Spanish “o” because it’s a Latino essay contest).

Possibility 4: Stimulus for Business

Our country’s corporations and big-wigs have fallen on dire straights. Where once a CEO could earn $10 million plus, now they can only earn a measly $1 million. These CEOs are suffering and so are our companies. Because CEOs can’t make the same money a lot of people are losing their jobs. So I say why not use my money to help these poor unfortunate pioneers and innovators of industry.
Things corporate CEOs could buy with my $1,500:

• A box of finely rolled Cuban cigars and use the remaining change to light the cigars
• Half a sandalwood desk from the finest Chinese craftsman in Southern Nigeria
• Trip to Jamaica for a business conference with his secretary
• PHEASANT HUNT!
• One night with a Czechoslovakian call-girl named Svetla
• Leather pants for Jake, his mister-ess (Is this what a male mistress is called?)
• One pair of glasses carved from the feet of the rare, blind albino rhino; this type of rhino is only found in the darkest parts of the deepest caves in Central Australia
• Laser eye surgery, to save a blind albino rhino
• Set of dishes made from materials so rare that only rich people know what they’re called (No, I could not think of a funny word for the rare material, creativity is hard!)
  

Possibility 5: Sponsor Children in Foreign Countries

People don’t really like to share their income tax information with each other because it’s personal and stuff. So, knowing this information, President Obama decided to hatch a brilliant evil scheme. Maybe, just maybe, President Obama had one of the Democrats in Congress attach a rider to the 900 Zillion Dollar stimulus bill. This rider guaranteed that 2/3s of Americans pay back the government this year, instead of getting refunds. This wasn’t an underhanded ploy by Obama to steal our money or to cheat the American people. Rather, this was a diplomatic and kind-hearted, underhanded ploy by Obama to take from the rich and give it to starving children in other countries.

Think about it. President Obama promised us change and we haven’t really seen it yet. It’s because Obama is secretly changing the world, one income tax return at a time. Imagine if the $700 you paid back went to help little Abdi in Somalia and little Maria in Ecuador. This way change would happen eventually. Someday little Abdi, little Maria, and all the rest of the little children he helps will grow up to join Obama’s band of merry campaigners and supporters. This in turn would guarantee that Obama’s second term in office, which finally comes to pass in 2024, can actually bring change to the world. I’m warning my readers now that I will someday return to this post-apocalytpic 2024 where Obama returns from the land of shadows to bring justice to a desolate future. Obama, shot-gun in one hand and machete in the other, sets out across post-apocalyptic America in search of Denzel Washington’s mummified remains and a better tomorrow.

To think this is all possible thanks to the fact that I made a little too much money this year.

Leave comments, suggestions, ideas, and general love. Thanks!

Precious Pandora’s Box

Precious Pandora’s Box

“Breathe the air we give, the life we live…” - Rise Against

Human beings were meant to be outside. Why are you not outside right now? Why are you reading this blog? It’s because your computer has become your best friend and your best access to the outside world.

You don’t realize it, but your computer is closer to you than your boyfriend or girlfriend; closer to you than your best friend. You spend your time speaking to these people through this box. If the box links you to those people then are you not technically the box’s friend? I once heard from a college professor who did way too many drugs when he was younger that there are four stages in the history of man. I’ve tried to subsequently research these four stages, however, I’ve been unable to find his exact rendition of it, so I’ll just say that this is my expanded interpretation of his interpretation of a Hindu myth while he was high. In the beginning men spoke with gods, as the gods disappeared men spoke with other men, as men began to hate other men men spoke with the animals, and as men destroyed the animals men were left with nothing to speak to but the rocks. Is this machine little more than a fancy, somewhat magical, modern marvel that has taken rocks and made them do amazing things? My interpretation of rocks in this case includes metals as well, though I am aware that scientifically they are very different. For the sake of argument you are communicating with an innovative rock. Sure, your best friend does so much more than a rock, but at a surface level both do about the same amount of movement and thinking on their own.

This box though is so much more precious than a stone. Do you not ask this box for advice? Is it not your guru? Google has replaced spiritual leaders. While once people went to another person for advice we now ask Google! “Why does my head spin when I get up too fast?” “How do I know if someone is cheating on me?” “How do I make General Tso’s Generally Awesome Chicken?” “How do I say hello in the ancient language of Jesus?” “Why does God hate me?” “How did we win World War II?” Go ask your doctor, your friend, your local Chinese Restaurateur, the nearest Aramaic scholar, a priest of some kind (ANY KIND, most have a God), and finally your uncle, your real uncle, not the one who comes over and makes you sit on his lap though you’re already 25. These actually all sound like awesome stories to tell if you actually went out and inquired into them! This empty box with a flashing | straight | line | is stealing your life experiences from you. The | flashing | line | waits | to | enlighten | you | | | |. Why search the world and see it at the same time when you can just click away? Why communicate with anyone when your box has all the answers contained somewhere in it? This box runs deep indeed, because it’s answers and suggestions are nearly endless.

In some cases this box is not just a friend and a spiritual guide, but a substitute lover. There is an insidious underbelly lurking behind every Google query. Just type in the word “junk” and see what comes up. Hell, type in the word “nun” and see how holy your search can really become if you don’t have a search filter on. Let’s be honest. How many of you seek companionship through this box? Facebook gives us plenty of people to look at. We peer at their lives, we comment on their photos, and we secretly harbor affections for them. Look at Myspace, which has become Yourspace really, because my actual space becomes invaded once a you from out there decides to send an oddly worded and somehow explicit link to my otherwise chill my-message-box. The fun doesn’t stop there either. How many of you pollute your minds with pornography that degrades women and promotes surgically enhanced and airbrushed standards of beauty? I for one am among the guilty. I once filled my head with unrealistic fantasies that objectified the other half of my species. I understand we are sensual beings, but at what cost? It took a strong, opinionated woman to help me see how wrong it could really be; to see how one innocent video cost somebody their dignity, or influenced someone else to exploit him or herself. I am not criticizing those of you that indulge in this world or work in this world, but I will say that there is a hidden cost to it. Just like any other thing we indulge in, like this box.

You’ve been reading for about five to ten minutes now. Is your box heating up? Is your box making that whirring noise it makes? Have you clicked away from this urgent message to read someone else’s urgent message? Are you communicating with your box or me right now? I’d like to believe I’m communicating with you, whoever you are in the Whoville of life within this box. However, the truth is nobody might ever get a chance to read this because Pandora’s Box runs deep and is filled with endless horrors. So, in essence, I’ve just spent an hour of my life communicating with my box. Perhaps the metaphor of Pandora’s Box bears more weight than I’m currently giving it, simply because in the myth there is something besides horror in the box, there is hope. I hope you in Whoville have read this message. I hope you in Whoville realize that this box, as cool as it is sometimes, is stopping us from breathing the air of our lives. Take a deep breath and a step back through the stages. Commune with animal, then commune with man, then commune with the gods, whoever they may be for you. Your rock is a dead weight hanging from a chain over your left shoulder.