Right now the baby has piled all of her stuffed friends on top of Nugget, who has essentially just given in to the abuse, and the cat is pathetically whimpering as Av makes a hard, plastic horse dance on her fat, furry, lumpy back. Nugget's back fat is so prominent that the other day Av pointed to it and said 'Nunnie boobs?" Yes, the baby knows what boobs are, sort of. This is not because of me.
We are all very excited about seeing Av go nuts on the first Christmas that she is going to be able to understand and as the day grows closer she has become increasingly exited by lights and flamboyant lawn decorations. That said, there is not much going on that is blog worthy, unless you want to hear a little bit more about kid's shows, and I'm willing to bet you don't. So, today I'll dig in to the archives and pull out another story from my life as a roving community newspaper reporter.
One of the more challenging things about being a newspaper reporter is trying to explain to people the difference between something that is newsworthy and something that is simply just happening. It seemed like every time that I would cover something for a local organization or school I would inevitably spend the next three months hearing about every little thing that they did or were doing, even if it was something as simple as 'we had a few kids go out in to the school yard today to pick up trash, you should come take some pictures.' No, no I shouldn't. They are kids picking up trash, probably their own trash, that isn't exactly news. Most of the time I didn't mind the emails because they worked in helping me fill out the days that I didn't have anything to do and every few weeks I was able to get some good stories out of them. Problems only arose when the people on the other end of the emails began to get upset with me when I would turn them down, thinking that it was their right to have me at the ready to cover any and everything that was happening that particular day.
One such organization was KIPP Academy Lynn, a local charter school that literally, by the end, had become the bane of my existence. KIPP (Knowledge Is Power Program) is part of a national charter school chain and is extremely controversial as most charter schools are. The majority of their student body consists of children with behavioral problems, immigrants or kids who just didn't do well in school. They take the kids and enter them in to their 10-hour-a-day curriculum and essentially make them do well with discipline and incentives. All of that is fine, except for the part where, since most of these kids were poor, non English speaking or dealing with issues at home, the school seemed to think that it was really, really important every time any of them did anything remotely related to school. Like the time they wanted me to write about a math program that teaches the kids life skills like counting money and paying bills. Oh, so you guys are a school? Neat. I'll get right on that.
So, I don't think that I was out of line when I deleted an email from KIPP asking me to attend a program in the gymnasium two days before Christmas a few years ago. Knowing the school's annoying reputation for forcing me to watch stupid kids do every day things I simply skimmed the email, saw nothing of note and deleted it. Screw you, KIPP, I get three days off starting tomorrow. Later that afternoon my phone rang- which is rarely a good thing when you aren't expecting a phone call, and sure enough, it was Nancy from KIPP.
"Are you coming up tomorrow??! Dan, I think you should. It is a great program. There is going to be a Celtics player there!'
Now you have piqued my interest. Among things in the world that I love, the Boston Celtics are near the top of the list. Right after beer and right before my TV. Surely whatever mundane, idiotic pre holiday assembly you're holding will be made more tolerable if I am able to interview a Celtics player.
"Cool, who is it?" I asked.
"It is a surprise." She said.
Intrigued I decided that this time I would go. By no means did I expect to see Paul Pierce or anyone else from the current team, but maybe it was some recently retired player who I can at least get some amusement out of meeting. Whatever the case, it was going to be better than meeting some half retarded kid from Africa who just passed in his science project like usual.
To be perfectly honest, I have no recollection of what the event was actually for, but I was handed a pamphlet when I walked in the door. On the front was a picture of this old-ass looking dude with a whistle around his neck and a Providence College jersey on. His name was Ernie DiGregorio. I said the same thing you are thinking right now. Who the hell is Ernie DiGregorio? Well, at the time I was not exactly at liberty to look it up, but you can be sure that I did when I got back to the office. A Rhode Island native, DiGregorio was the 1975 NBA Rookie of the Year with the Buffalo Braves. He had a mediocre to terrible career, which ended with the Celtics in 1978, for whom he played exactly 27 games. It is tough to imagine a less relevant "Celtics player." Thanks, Nancy, I should have known.
Like I said, I have no idea what the purpose of the event was, I think it was like, do your homework or something, it doesn't really matter. The point is that the humble looking old man above is some sort of raging lunatic, and his actions that December afternoon salvaged what I thought was going to be a miserable afternoon, and gave me a great story to tell in the process.Almost immediately it became apparent that DiGregorio's ego could barely fit in the old church basement that the school used for an auditorium. The man who played just four years in the NBA, mostly with the Buffalo Braves, was dressed head to toe in Celtics gear, and constantly spun a basketball on his finger like a Harlem Globetrotter the entire time that he spoke. His young, attractive assistant was very outwardly 'picked on' in that way that old men pick on women that they want to have creepy old man sex with. Most importantly, at no point during his entire speech did he mention why he was there, or anything about the program that he was supposed to be promoting for the school. No, he simply told the story of his stupid, short NBA career, bragged about being rookie of the year and setting the record for most assists in a game by a rookie. Then he made some excuses for why his career was so short and it was over.
The speech sucked. But that isn't the good part. Afterward Ernie decided that
he would indulge the kids in a game of basketball on a tiny, eight-foot hoop that happened to be in the room, probably for some foreign kid lunchtime team building. The premise of the game was a 3-on-1 contest to see how many points middle school kids could score on a former NBA player. Apparently Ernie forgot that he was an NBA player 35 years ago because these little kids were schooling him. He did OK against the girls and uncoordinated kids who suck at sports, but about every third kid was an athletic middle school boy who would just run past his old ass and score. This began to piss old Ernie off.
If I remember correctly, there was some sort of lame prize for the team that won and there was one particular kid that was running circles around everyone else. He had scored on Ernie every time he went to the hoop. Now, it is important to mention that Ernie was not trying so hard, considering he was playing against kids on a tiny hoop, but the kids were getting a lot of confidence, especially this one guy who kept scoring. I was standing next to the photographer the next time the kid came up and he leaned in and said ' I think this guy is getting pissed.' Sure enough, the kid went to the basket and scored on Ernie again, this time celebrating wildly with his friends. So, the adult, former basketball player who was supposed to be there to be a positive influence on the students walked over to the kid and handed him the ball. "Try again." he said.
The kid, boasting a smile, went at Ernie like he had four times before, only this time instead of letting him score, Ernie blocked his shot. Tossed it Shaq style across the room with anger and authority. The room went silent, the teachers all looked at each other and the kid put his head down in shame. Then Ernie said something about how it was harder to score when someone is playing defense. It was at this point that the assembly ended and the principal awkwardly thanked Ernie and sent him on his way. Then he came up to me, apologized, and asked that I please not mention how angry Ernie was in my article. I obliged.
So maybe that story wasn't as good as it was to actually watch, but I hope that the vision of an old man talking trash to a 12-year-old brought you some joy today.
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