| A VIOLENT
BEGINNING
I am very pleased to present the first dynamic,
action-packed and uncharacteristically short (in the 'challenged-of-height'
sense) installment of the current webcomic series, Violence Man in... "Scarred
Straight." Fear not, the next two panels are taller.
As I write this, it's August 29th, and school's
in for nearly all of the poor, downtrodden studentry of North America, myself
included. If I might make a request for any of my school-age readers in this
particular region of the world -- be sure, before this year's out, that you
can find the United States on a world map, all right? According to new research,
20% of American students haven't mastered that particular skill, and while
it might not be the most practical ability to have, it's still good P.R.,
so, you know, make an effort this year. If it's too daunting, start by trying
to find the United States on a U.S. map, and then work your way out.
If this works out, next year, we'll look for
Canada. Which might be the same country as Greenland; I'll have
to do some research.
So, my classes -- English Composition 2, English
Literature, Speech Communications, and Business Law. We're just starting
the second week of each, and I still can't tell if any of these are going
to be ridiculously easy, or ridiculously hard. Not a lot of gray area, this
time around, and I think I attribute that viewpoint to my bein' out in the
world, so to speak, for the last nine years. You learn a lot of stuff when
you're out, just livin', but you also tend to take whatever knowledge you
gain while doing so and basically cement it in place so it doesn't start
rattling around in there when you hit a bump.
English Composition, for instance. Now, I been
writing for as long as I can remember, and in terms of peer comparison, I'm
pretty good at it -- even managed to get some out in the public sector from
time to time. But it's none of it what we'd consider COLLEGE English, and
while here I can write such charming, folksy phrasings as "I been writing"
instead of "I've been writing," the chances of my new professor appreciating
my subtle wink-and-nod at our beloved language without comment or censure
are slim, especially given the fact that any number of my new classmates,
from a cursory glance, would sincerely consider "I been writing" to be a
sterling example of the Queen's English.
English Literature -- well, no big problems,
there, except that a third of it's poetry, and, Lord help me, there's little
I find more tedious than poetry. Except, of course, for people APPRECIATING
poetry, which is basically what the class is all about, so my biggest hurdle,
there, is going to be a constant struggle to keep my mouth shut. Stupid poetry.
Speech is, well, I understand it involves preparing
and giving speeches. Only had one class in it, thus far -- I'll report back
later.
Business Law is proving to be the most-interesting
and, unfortunately, most-challenging of the classes. There's always a catch.
Lots of potentially-useful information, but also lots of memorization of
near-identical concepts and terms. The class is headed by an older, Jewish
lawyer who has an endearingly-corny sense of humor that is tempered, most
unfortunately, by a poor memory, leading to double helpings of such gems
as, "Old lawyers never die, they just lose their appeal."
Anyways, that's the first update from Good
Ol' College Norm -- watch this space, (probably early-ish next week -- still
trying to get up to normal production here) for the next installment of "Scarred
Straight."
| Norm's Link-o-th'-Moment: |
| Drew's Script-O-Rama |
| Home of the original, better
"Day of the Dead" script! |
|
