Tuesday Top Ten! Special Edition

The original plan was a list of Pros vs. Cons, five each, of going home to attend my high school reunion.  I've scrapped this plan for two reasons:  1.  It's just not a big enough deal to stage an internal battle in my brain about it, and 2. I've already made the decision to go, so let's just focus on the positive! (Sounds like me, right??)

And so I present... Top Ten Things I Miss From High School**

1.  Snack Bar.  For those of you who didn't go to my school, "Snack Bar" was a privilege that we got if we were passing all of our classes and had a study hall 1st through 4th periods.  If you didn't have a snack bar period (or if you were failing a class...dummy), then you were super left out.  Your only other chance to get down to the cafeteria while Pat was still cooking up her delicious poptarts ("POPTARTS!!!!") was if you had French in the morning... cause that class wasn't monitored at all - you could leave at your will and go get some breakfast, or go outside and kick rocks, or go into the boiler room and makeout with Jordan Catalano... whatever.  Anyways - Snack Bar is where it all went down.  Basically, it was just hanging out with your friends and the lunch ladies down in lunch lady land.  A lot of the time in snack bar was spent copying Abbis Cadabbis' homework... but, a lot of important conversations, plans, bold moves, and otherwise funny things that became good memories also took place during snack bar. 

2.  Meeting my friends in the bathroom every morning.  Seriously, like seven girls met up every single morning in 10th grade, in the downstairs bathroom with the green walls - the one across from the library - and put on concealer and mascara and whatever else we thought would make us look poppin' fresh.  It was like our version of tailgating for the big game... except the game was just a day at school and it was restroom instead of a parking lot.... and we usually didn't have hotdogs or brewskis.  I have a picture that we pulled someone in to take of us on the last day of school that year... we're gathered in one of the stalls...if I can find it, I am totally scanning it in.  My hair was so luxurious back then... Anyways, this was clearly when we still cared about how we looked and before some of us started-

3.  Dressing like semi-homeless people and not giving a care.  There is a picture in my senior yearbook where I am literally wearing pajamas.  One year, I never took my coat off during the day for like four months (seriously... I was some sort of Kenny).  I think fly track pants were the biggest fashion statement amongst my friends, other than $130 Nikes, which did NOT fly in my house (which is another reason I was a total Kenny- omg, did I smell like sour milk??... whatever, we all looked like the children of lesbian couples who might be living in poverty.)  Unfortunately, somewhere along the line I actually did start giving a care, and I am so horrified when I think of how often I was dressed like a sporty hobo (especially since I have zero athletic skills... how embarrassing).  I still can't bring myself to put on makeup everyday, though.

4.  Teachers from the insane asylum.  Don't get me wrong - my BHS classmates and I were pretty well educated.  I know this now, because in the ten years since I've graduated I've met very, VERY (just SHOCKINGLY) few people who are as literate as even my dumbest high school friends.  But, the people who provided this education were about 85% bat shit.  I'll save the examples for the inevitable hours of reminiscing I'll be participating in this weekend, but if these examples would make any sense to you, then you already know who I'm talking about, anyways.   

5.  Library! I know I said that it all went down in Snack Bar, but a considerable amount also went down in the library.  This was another area that was only entered as a privilege.  Strange, somewhat, that banishment from the library (of all places) was a punishment for failing classes, but not so strange considering how few books were in there and how little reading or studying of any sort when on in there.  Highlights from my times in the BHS library include:  making up excuses/forging passes to get into a conference room and watching the tv in there, doing jigsaw puzzles while debating validity of urban legends about our incredibly scandalous teachers, perfecting my Miss Graham impression, and, post-Graham, defining what it meant to be "on the team" and explaining it to Warner and accusing him every day of letting the boys get away with whatever because they were "on the team" and meanwhile he banished my homegirl from the library forever (and yeah, maybe that little fight they had was a bit out of control.... add Danae yelling "Get off of me!" to Warner to this list...hahahaha).

6.  Inventing Days.  You've already heard about "Cut and Paste Day," which is when my besties and I emptied our backpacks full of magazines out on any surface we had and... cut and pasted.  It was a lot more fun than it sounds.  Enough about that, though, because I need to take this space to clear up something:  I invented "Alan Alda Day."  Meeeeeeee.   I have witnesses and even what I consider tangible proof.  I knew at the time that it had caught on to other periods of Chemistry, and even then I was aware that I wasn't getting the credit I deserved - much like when I invented words, names, and phrases that later became part of the lexicon with absolutely no acknowledgment to their origin (aka my brain).  But, when I later found out (post graduation, even), that Kaple's Kids were still referring to the days when Captain Cankles showed Scientific American Frontiers (instead of berating her students as they stood at the chalkboard trying to answer the Cum Rev questions without developing ulcers) as "Alan Alda Day," I had two feelings:  First, I was aroused... and then, I was FURIOUS.  (tm Sue Sylvester).  Who in the hell else even knew who Alan Alda was, let alone could recognize his old ass in a scuba suit??  Is it really difficult to believe that this started with me?  How many 16 year old pop culture encyclopedias do you remember, people?  If I had P. Kaple's personal email address, I would be tempted to contact her and ask if she remembers the first appearance of an excited "It's Alan Alda Day!!!" declaration on one of those SAF questionnaires that we had to complete.  Because,  I know I got at least one other person to write that, and I know that P-Kap would notice something like that when grading papers.  Anycrap - there were lots of invented days over the years, starting with "St. Farmer's Day," which is the celebration of the cafeteria serving up nachos for lunch.  That day started in like, 5th grade.  Yeah, I don't get the name, either.  But, speaking of the cafeteria...

7.  Jizz in Potato Soup.  According to the menu board, our school served this one day.  And, I personally feel that this was one of the great moments in comedy history.

8.  The Notebook.  Forget about that sap-ass movie for a second, and the next thing that comes to your mind is probably pretty much exactly what this was.  My friends and I passed a notebook around, in which we wrote notes to each other under dumb aliases.  There were also illustrations, as my BFF is quite an accomplished ar-teest :)  I have this notebook in my possession, and I've recently read through it.  I can assure you that, were this thing confiscated from high school kids today, the content within would lead to some sort of expulsion and/or psychiatric evaluation of its authors.  Oddly enough, this very notebook WAS confiscated when "The Artist" (acutal code name...wonder which one of us that was) left in Kaple's room, but since this was the 90's and teachers weren't quite as scared of children back then, it was just held captive in the office until one of us saw it and stole it back. 

9.  Bonfires and Parents-are-out-of-Towners.  If you found yourself barfing against a fence, you were probably having the sort of Friday or Saturday night that would lead to some good memories.  Even if the memorable part is heavier than the good part.  (Of special note here is a particular weekend when Abbis' parents were in California... woah, nelly).

10. Spending all my time with my soulmates.  (But not often in a hot tub, Uncle Rico.)  It took about year after graduating to realize that I would never again find myself surrounded by so many people who understand my personality and sense of humor.  I can't claim that everyone I went to school with thought I was funny and didn't think I was just a cynical, and maybe kinda mean, bitchy bitch... I mean, I understand reality, I promise you.  But, I do think that even those people who didn't appreciate my intentions or enjoy my antics understood that the idea behind it was humor... and I swear, out here in the real world, it is not always so clear.  I honestly don't care so much if people don't think I'm funny - we live in a country where Larry the Cable guy out earns any other comedian by insane amounts, and the distant 2nd place is probably Dane F-ing Cook.... so, yeah, there is no accounting for taste, obviously, and I'm not going to get twisted up about that - but, I do care when the concept of hilariousness doesn't seem to exist.  It might appear lame to people with a different experience than I/we had that I am still super close with the same friends I've had since I was a kid, but seriously... no one else gets me.  I didn't realize back then that, when I entered the real world and encountered outsiders (and I'm talking about people who didn't grow up in the Lima/Bath bubble... not greasers, Ponyboy), I would pretty much either never be taken seriously OR be taken way too seriously.  It's an uphill battle, people.  I meet like, one person, every two years or so, who doesn't either speak down to me, because I'm just a silly clown, or refuse to speak to me at all, because I said something "insensitive" or whatever.  It's all good, though, because I like the friends I have, thank you very much, and I don't need your ass or your assface. 

**My apologies for my "Tuesday Top Ten" being posted on Wednesday night at 11pm.  I had an unexpected sitch arise last night, and I've been really sick for the last few days with migraines.  I know, I know... there is no rest for the wicked.  I'll quit crying now.  Ask Miss Alanny tomorrow.... See you then.