10 Things I have done

[giza]

This is a meme that is kinda cool and informative, so I'll play along.

10 Things I have done that you probably have not.

1. Got framed for pulling a fire alarm in the 7th grade [1]
2. Got punched in the face by Dr. Stanley Landis, who was Principal of Eyer Junior High School at the time [2]
3. Repeated the 7th grade due to failing too many classes [3]
4. Finished Business School at the top of my class
5. Lost 80 pounds by changing my diet and exercise habits
6. Got forge-subscribed to several dozen LISTSERV mailing lists by an angry spammer
7. Won tickets to see a play from a local radio station for calling in and telling them how many transistors are on a Pentium chip.
8. Beat Blaster Master with a single life, on my NES, without using an emulator or tools.
9. Bowled 8 strikes in a row during league play.
10. Got interviewed by WPVI-6 for a piece on spam which aired on the 11 O'Clock News a few weeks later.

[1] Yeah, that was fun. Some guy didn't want to go to class because he hadn't done his homework, so he pulled it. He then got several of his friends to each tell different teachers they saw me pull it. Next thing I know, I'm down in the Principal's office being called a liar and subjected to high-pressure tactics such as, "Just admit you did it!" The scary thing was that I was seriously thinking of admitting to it, just so he would stop yelling at me.

[2] Dr. Landis was the same model Principal from #1. When I was initially pulled out of wood shop by him and confronted, he didn't even ask whether I was innocent or not. He instead proceeded to ask "why did you pull the fire alarm?" When I responded with "there's no way in hell I did that", next thing I knew I had been struck in the face and was down on the ground. Yeah, what a way to run a school.

[3] During the same year as #1 and #2 happened. I think it's a safe bet to say that I was under high amounts of stress as a kid. I'm MUCH better now. :-)

Comments

[shenryyr.livejournal.com]

blaster master is the best NES game ever ;)

[giza.livejournal.com]

Ever go back to the first room in the game and use Wall 2 to walk on the ceiling? Somewhere up there you encounter a few enemies normally only seen on level 7.

[shenryyr.livejournal.com]

yupyup.  dude, that game owned my life for weeks.

School.

[lionman.livejournal.com]

2. Got punched in the face by Dr. Stanley Landis, who was Principal of Eyer Junior High School at the time

Dude, I'm a member of the local Board of Education. An administrator at our school like that would be out the door so fast, there'd be no chance he could get hit in the ass by the door. That's just not acceptable. Punching a student, even when I was a student, wasn't acceptable.

I did grow up in a small town where spankings were a viable option. Often you got your choice of that or something else. But, then again, my father always told me if I got punished at school, I should expect the same punishment at home.

Enh.

[shenryyr.livejournal.com]

my art class in high school included a teacher who hit a kid with a metal meterstick.

ah, the fun things school brings.

Unacceptable.

[lionman.livejournal.com]

That's -totally- unacceptable behavior, unless he was being attacked. Unless you went to school in the 40's...

Re: School.

[giza.livejournal.com]

Yeah... this happened back in like, 1989 or so. I was like, 13, and had no idea that I could have/should have told someone about it.

I'm not sure if there's any point in trying to do anything about it now, since he left the school the next year. But I figured I would include his real name here so that Google picks it up. Who knows, maybe it'll come back to haunt him some day.

Re: School.

[skippyfox.livejournal.com]

Wow...so this is why school shootings occur.

If you can prove he did it you might still be able to get something out of it. Who knows?

Re: School.

[lionman.livejournal.com]

Yeah, there's probably not much you can do about it now. '89 was the year after I graduated, but I suppose it would have depended on where your school was, but mostly that still wouldn't have been acceptable.

Re: School.

[pyesetz]

Google no longer shows text from blog hits: your journal on Google, so most people looking for info on Dr. Stanley will just click on by without seeing your text.  I'm thinking about copying my more search-worthy posts to Furtopia where at least they'll be seen.

Re: School.

[giza.livejournal.com]

Well then, I'll just have to mirror this post on my website (http://www.claws-and-paws.com/), yeah. :-)

[zorinlynx.livejournal.com]

The biggest trouble I ever got into at school was when I ignited a block of magnesium with a bunsen burner. My "station" was sort of obstructed from view of the teacher by some books, so I just held the block there in the flame for a bit until it suddenly ignited, burning bright white.

Of course, this startled me, so I dropped it on the bench and it burned a nice big hole in it and started a small fire that was thankfully easily put out.

Punishment? Suspended for a few days and my parents had to reimburse the school for damages. Worth it? In retrospect, hell yeah. I was way, WAYYY too much of a "goodie two-shoes" for my high school career, and this is one of the few things I have!

-Z

I love this game, and am a total geek on it.

[torrle.livejournal.com]

"8. Beat Blaster Master with a single life, on my NES, without using an emulator or tools."

Done this many times. 34 minutes.

I've made a Blaster Master t-shirt.
I've made lego models of Sophia the 3rd. While one is tiny, it can transform to 'hover' and other modes. The other one measures over a foot long, is to scale, can 'jump' and tilt back. I still have it.

more..

[torrle.livejournal.com]

Aside from the one-hit boss killing, there were some useless tricks/bugs in Blaster Master that had some interesting/amusing/useless effects.

- If you hit jump and eject just the right way, you'll launch Jason right out of the tank. Unless you're aiming for higher ground, Jason will take damage on landing.

- If you pause the game when you land/jump, Sophia will be stuck to the ground and be temporarily able to drive frictionless (won't stop after you let go.)

- Bases with solid tops (ie Level 2) produce this bizarre bug if you drive past them and eject at the right time. I found this out by accident. Jason will pop out, walk through some invisible door like he's walking between rooms, and be teleported across the map somewhere else. The timing is really touchy, and sometimes it'll just embed Jason in the brick instead, which you can't get out of.

- When Sophia takes that final blow and is about to explode, you can still move about through the room, you just have to keep jumping. You can also do that 'frictionless' trick and just drive on the ground, glowing until it wears off.

- (The best!) You can also eject Jason from Sophia just before it explodes, and the tank'll just sit there. This is very useless, yet can be endlessly amusing to pretend that Sophia's been rigged with a car bomb. The instant he hops back in, it explodes.

Re: I love this game, and am a total geek on it.

[giza.livejournal.com]

Wow. And I thought my time of 90 minutes was impressive. Then again, I played it safe, doing things like staying in the tank until I reached the bottom of level 5, etc. (why the pressure didn't crush Jason like an eggshell, I'll never know)

I got a new bug for you:

- Take damage while inside a maze, and you can briefly walk across water or level for the 2 seconds while you're flashing. The Blaster Master time attack that I've seen exploits this to take shortcuts in level 4 and level 7.

Re: I love this game, and am a total geek on it.

[torrle.livejournal.com]

Huh! That's right! In all my time of playing the game, that's happened to me all of once, and I thought that was a total fluke. Gonna have to try that...

[magnusdiridian.livejournal.com]

one life? heeee...those nes games were nice...i used to do that with the old mega man games. just try conta 1 life sometime...

Evil Mirror

[randomzen.livejournal.com]

In 7th grade, I pulled a fire alarm and framed someone else.

I also gained 80 lbs. by changing my diet and exercise habits.

;p

[unciaa.livejournal.com]

3. Repeated the 7th grade due to failing too many classes [3]
4. Finished Business School at the top of my class

Says a lot about Business School, doesn't it?

Re: ;p

[giza.livejournal.com]

Yes, it's far less FUCKED UP than our public school system is. Consider:

- All teachers were on contract. If they had poor performance, they got fired, regardless of how long they taught there.

- Students were expected to behave in a "professional manner". Lying to a teacher or cheating on a test was grounds for being put on academic probation or being expelled. (In public schools, it is very difficult to expel a student)

- Since we were paying to be there, a lot of the "losers" quickly dropped out. You'd be amazed at how low my stress got when I didn't have to be around those people.


Not being teased constantly by classmates also played a factor. People had matured enough by that age, I age.

[kutztowndragon.livejournal.com]

Did the teachers finally find out that it wasn't you that pulled the fire alarm? Did you get an apology from them? (not that it matters now)

[giza.livejournal.com]

Oh yeah, the guilty party was apparently tracked down later that day.

No apology was ever issued.

[zorinlynx.livejournal.com]

Of course. Teachers have that fragile ego to protect.

I've always hated that about teachers. They refuse to believe you didn't do something wrong, then when they find that you're innocent, don't even bother to apologize.

Aside from the magnesium incident mentioned above, I never really did anything that bad in high school. Folks tried to frame me a few times, and once almost succeeded, but the teachers never apologized for blaming me, even before the magnesium incident.

I think teachers are physically incapable of apologizing; it's just their nature. }:)

-Z

[music4fun.livejournal.com]

The things you learn by reading LJ. I never knew about #1 and #2. It explains a lot. And yes, you ae MUCH better now :-)