Allusions: A Scholarly Treatise

An allusion is a literary device used by an author to prove how much more he knows than you, and to mask the lack of true substance in his piece. I say “he” because it occurs most often in oldtimey works and was used as ammo in the great pissing contests of the elite- aka men with too much decorum and not enough body strength to wrestle their ways into positions of superiority over their peers.

As for women way back then, when they were allowed to read and write instead of sew and cook and whatever else occupied all their time (and I’m not sure there was much; contrary to popular belief, the majority of women neither dressed as men and fought in wars nor were princesses with seventeen gentlemen callers apiece [See? I just made an allusion you probably didn’t catch, proving that I know more than you do!]) had to imitate the men in order to best the men in their own pissing contests (it’s good these are metaphorical pissing contests, the kind that kills rhodendrons [Look! Another allusion! I know even more now, which was still more than you!] because if they were literal, the woman would have no chance) in order to get even a tiny bit of credit for their intelligence, so you really can’t blame them.

Anyways, this all resulted in long, rambling sentences with about a dozen different ideas each and words longer than most sentences a normal person would typically say. So when you get about halfway through one of those oldtimey works by one of those oldtimey authors, you have to go reread the beginning, because you lost track of what the hell it was about around sentence two (the first sentence is kind of normal in order to hook the reader like a gaping fish and draw it out of the water so it just dangles in midair, getting more and more disoriented with each obscure reference and mixed metaphor until it passes out. And dies). Then the author realizes how confusing it all is, and instead of going back and freaking fixing it, makes some weird conclusion that you really ought to understand if you’re smarter than the average prole (A third one! I’m just cranking them out. I deserve one of those kick-ass nicknames, like Scruffy or Bowser, except cooler and more “allusive”) and read- well, whatever it was.

Thus, allusions kill (A fourth one! I’ll be nice and explain this one to you- it’s a play on the phrase “Friends tell”, mirroring its combination simplicity in phrasing and gravity in message. Or something like that. The point is, I know more than you!).

Thought for the day: Make a decision. If it sucks, make another one.

Signed,

Two of Wands

Based on a True Story

Stand and Deliver. Freedom Writers. The Ron Clark Story.
What do these have in common?
They are the typical "inspirational teacher makes inner city kids love learning" based-on-a-true-story movies. They’re pretty good, actually, even though they all seem similar. There are a couple of problems, though.
The first one is minor: producers think they can get away with "inspirational teacher" not-based-on-a-true-story movies. This is not so. Example: Take the Lead, about a dance instructor teaching kids in detention. Kids in detention should not be learning to waltz; they should be cleaning gum off the undersides of desks. And companies should most certainly not finance an "inspirational teacher" movie that is not based on a true story. It bastardizes the subgenre and makes it cheaper, especially when it’s a bad movie in its own right.
The second problem, however, is much, much worse. It could threaten the world as we know it and change the way the future plays out.
It’s giving our teachers ideas.
Not on how to run the classroom, but that any teacher, in any classroom setting, can be the influential teacher who totally changes kids forced to go to school into kids with a desire to learn. Unfortunately, this isn’t so. These are all inner-city kids in the movies, even in the fake ones. They are not middle class suburban kids whose parents have college degrees and took them to Mommy and Me swim classes and coached their soccer teams.
Worse, it takes a truly slow teacher to think it is the G.T. kids (for teachers who teach G.T. classes are the only kind with whom I have much experience: gym teachers don’t count as much of anything) who need inspiring and saving from dangerous lives as gangsters or dead-end jobs flipping burgers. And if a teacher is that slow, he or she has no business teaching even regular kids, never mind inspiring under-achievers to reach for the top.
They also don’t look behind the scenes of those movies. Two hours is not enough time to cram all the actual teaching the inspirational teachers do, and therefore they can only catch some of the character development tricks they pull. Because those teachers actually do teach, and not only do they teach, they teach completely and don’t expect their students to be able to use telepathy. But more on extra-sensory perception and related topics later.
However, certain teachers do not seem to realize that actual teaching occurs, and seem to believe that their job is to teach kids to think about the world around them and to figure things out for themselves. It partially is a teacher’s job to do this, but there are some things a teacher should just tell students. There’s no need to reinvent the wheel, after all.
Take, for example, a certain teacher, whom we shall call Mr. Spock. Mr. Spock tries to sound inspiring, as though each little tidbit of information reveals the meaning of life. He tries to make us think, by giving a general overview on topics and then testing us on the specifics of topics mildly related to what he taught. When we all perform poorly on that test, he assumes we must not be taking notes well enough, and forces us to take notes in an awkward, too-regulated style, and then grades us on how well we adhere to a note-taking system that may or may not work for each individual student. Even if a parent attempts to complain about his lack-of-teaching methods, he explains that if we do not understand something, we can ask him questions for clarification. When we bombard him with questions on difficult subjects so we can try to understand the concepts involved, he dances around them, saying we should already know or we’ll get to it later (and then we never cover it, naturally) or simply asks the question back in another form, to get us to "think" as opposed to parroting, I’m sure. He may or may not have his subject mastered; we have no idea because he does not teach it. He does, however indicate that he has no basic command over the English language and attempts to provoke intelligent thoughts with ungrammatically-phrased questions. How anyone can take him seriously, I have no idea. I also have no one to ask, because no one has ever taken him seriously.
This half-formed teaching style frustrates students. We cannot learn the material, and therefore those of us who normally would have been gung-ho about the subject, possibly pursuing it as a career, end up disliking the subject and not ling up to our full potential. Getting us to live up to our full potential is, of course, Mr. Spock’s goal. I love irony, but I would love this case of it a lot more if I didn’t get full points for informing my wannabe-great teacher that getting hit by lightning gives you superpowers. Because even though he wants to be immortalized in a movie for getting a bunch of suburban kids to get all hyped up about learning, he doesn’t want to work for it. Those teachers in the movies, on the other hand, work five billion hours of overtime and go overboard to help their students. Letting us stay after school to take a missed test does not count as overboard.
Those inspirational movies should seriously come with a disclaimer along the lines of “This is a condensed version of the entire story. Please do further research on the featured teacher before attempting to emulate his or her methods.” It would save loads of us loads of frustration and would save loads of teachers loads of uselessness and general dislike in their direction. Those teachers who would have been inspiring anyway still will be, and we won’t be saddled with someone who says, “All objects accelerate due to gravity at the same rate, no matter what their masses,” as though announcing the date of the Second Coming. It’s a win-win situation.

Thought for the day: An apple a day keeps the doctor away. Especially if you have good aim.

Signed,
Two of Wands

For Better or for Worse

It's nearing time again. Yeah, there are still five or six weeks left, but it still seems like everything is drawing to a close. The sun is bright and hot, burning up these last few weeks quickly in what will be a barrage of projects and tests as our teachers try to cram in fifty more grades in before the quarter ends. And through it all, we'll have five million more important tests, like the AP exams this week, and the state exams (one of which I get to take twice). And finally, we'll have finals, and that last day... The most bittersweet day of the year, because when you're not trying to pull formulas and words and crap from the deepest crevices of your brain, you're remembering that nothing will ever be the same.
Because even though you'll see most of these people in a few months, they'll have changed, and you'll have changed. Things that could have happened when we were all how we are will never happen, and we'll continue through life, discarding the possibilities of who we are in favor of the possibilities of who we might be.
I know far better than some that change happens, for the better or for the worse, and usually I can accept it, embrace it, even. But the last day of school has always been the hardest change for me to take.
It makes no sense, because I've never seen the world through rose-colored glasses- I'm the cynical outsider who always unintentionally sees flaws. But somehow, on that last day, I look back on the past year, and all I remember is the fun I had, the people I got to know- and somehow I forget the times I wished wildly for the place to burn down, because the people in it were so crappy.
Perhaps it's the depressing music to which I'm currently listening, or the fear of boredom, but thinking of the coming summer grips my heart and squeezes, allowing the lesser stages of a panic attack enter.
How is it that every summer I forget how, last winter, I always longed for summer? For a time with no school projects, no overwrought schedules, no bone-deep cold driving me from the sun? How do I always forget past summers, and the friendships forged, and the new experiences which came my way? How can I forget the fun, and the warmth, and the pure exhilaration of being alive?
It's getting close to that time of the year when all I remember are the friends I've lost as the calendar flipped from June into July, when my soul yearns for days of laziness in the form of teacher-aided skipping, talking non-stop as my friends and I pack books or make paper clip chains in the library. When I remember our plans to stay in touch, and how they all fell through. Or even if we do still talk or see each other, however rarely, it's as people who barely know each other. Yet I can see, either in their matured faces or between the words of their brief emails, what used to be. But that's all gone now, because we've grown up some since then.
Yes, I know change is good. Change is necessary, and mostly I thrive on the though of it, because it means things can get better. But when I remember my missing friends as they were and compare them to the strangers of today, all I want to do is return to then, no matter how much then sucked in other ways, and freeze it, and live in it forever.
Maybe I'm justing getting emotional and girly- I'm allowed to do that occasionally, even though not everyone might think of me as a girl- but every word is truth. As I said, maybe it's really just the depressing music, but maybe it's just how things have to play out. For better or for worse.

Thought for the day: They say the best leader is someone who doesn't want to lead, which kind of makes elections a crappy way of getting a leader.

Signed,
Two of Wands

Atheism

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-5479410612081345878
This is one of the funniest things I’ve ever seen. Watch it, it’s hilarious. Don’t you love stupid people? I do too. They way they attempt to completely make up evidence… Talk about egotistical bigots.
I’ve never really believed in a god. Every night, my mother would read to me from The Children’s Bible, and the only reason I put up with it was because she’d follow up with part of Harry Potter. By the time I was ten, I could recite the Lord’s Prayer at super speed and use biblical passages to disprove their own theories.
Yes, theories. Think about it: what do we call the Greco-Roman religions (and other religions in which no one really believes any more)? Myths. A bunch of stories they made up to explain how the universe works, because they hadn’t the evidence to use cold hard fact.
So what is modern theism but myths? Science is based on fact. There are numbers and observations and proof and common sense. Where is that in religion? A guy parted a sea made red with the blood of killed firstborns- right. Because such an all-loving god would kill off innocent kids because one single guy wouldn’t do what he wanted. And do you have any idea how much blood it would take to dye the entire sea? A lot, that’s how much. Sure, it’s a great story (good triumphs over evil, etc.), but it’s completely different if you believe it is fact.
As long as people think of the stories of the Bible as moral guidelines, it’s okay. But believing it really happened is- dare I say it?- idiotic. And believing there really is an omnipresent, omniscient being running the show makes no sense either. After all, if there is one, why hasn’t He turned me into a pillar of salt or something like that? I’m a liar, a blasphemer, a downright sinner. I admit it and I’m proud of it, so why haven’t I been punished? Yes, I know, I’ll be sent to Hell, yadda, yadda, yadda, but in that case, I’ll hardly be alone. If everyone who sinned went to Hell, then there’s no point in even furnishing Heaven.
Religion is a set of beliefs about the metaphysical, about some higher power. A lot of the time, it’s taught to you from birth, so you get brainwashed during your most formative years and can believe in nothing else. It takes a strong, rational mind to break away from this dependence on something that you have no evidence of existing. I was lucky, because even though I was told there was a god by my mother, my dad’s a skeptic, and Mom’s church is Unitarian Universalist, which is essentially codename for “let’s all be nice to each other, no matter what we believe!” So my brainwashing was far from being nearly as complete as others’.
But back to what religion is.
It is what someone believes. If you believe every word in that little book you find in hotel room drawers in true, then that’s the foundation for your religion. (Note that I still mean beliefs about the metaphysical, and not about whether the Sox or the Yankees are a better baseball team. I am so not gonna get into that here.)
Atheism, therefore, is the belief that there is no higher power, that science can explain how the universe was created. And if you say, “Oh, but what are the odds that this universe would be created with exactly the necessary properties for us to exist?”, then let me tell you this: if the odds hadn’t worked out, then we wouldn’t exist and thus would not be having this debate, now would we? No, I didn’t think so.
I’m also not saying science is a religion. It’s not a set of beliefs, it’s a set of provable facts. People who think some of these facts (aka evolution) are wrong should probably get their brains checked out. We have the fossils. We win.
Atheism is not worship of science. Atheists do not worship, nor are we amoral or evil. We just don’t need a guy in a funny robe to tell us our morals. We have souls, we have hearts, we care. We just don’t think there’s any reason to kill our knees and waste time that could be spent doing something worthwhile to pray to something that we say isn’t even there.
And FYI- just because atheists can also be termed “secular humanists”- which is sort of the PC way of putting us- does not mean we worship humans or crap like that. We do not worship anything. No little sculptures of a dude on a cross, no invisible, nonexistent “presence”, nada.
As for agnostics- they are not people who do not know if there’s a god or not, contrary to banana boy’s statement. (Didn’t I tell you to follow the link?) They are people either too lazy to decide what they believe or people too wimpy to fess up that they follow a non-mainstream religion, such as atheism.
Honestly, I think religion is okay, as long as people don’t live their entire lives trying to “save” others. Take that bishop dude in Les Miserables: very religious, yes, but he didn’t tell Jean Valjean to repent and confess and all would be forgiven, he gave him a couple of candlesticks and told him to turn his life around. If people could just understand that it’s not how hard you worship but how you live your life that makes you a good or evil person, then religious differences would matter so much less. After all, the people who led the Inquisition killed innocents just because they were born into a different religion. Does murder, even in the name of God make you a good person? Not in my book, on my list of morals.
And I do have one, you know. There are certain givens for me, albeit plenty of room for debate. No one else told me what they are, nor do I use its name to commit amoral things.

1. Don’t steal crap from people. It’s a jerky thing to do.
2. Only sleep around if you want to get knocked up or father an unwanted child and/or get a bunch of STIs.
3. Sex before marriage isn’t some terrible sin. Just be careful about it.
4. Don’t lie and/or cheat when it matters. Ten point homework assignments don’t matter.
5. Never kill in cold blood (self-defense is another story).
6. Revenge might feel good, but sometimes it’s time to just move on.
7. There are better ways to feel good than getting high. Better things for your body, too.
8. Never drink and drive (more like common sense, really). In my case, I don’t get drunk because I have a fear that something will happen that I won’t be able to remember. But if you want to get drunk, have someone like me around to hold your hair back when you commune with the toilet.
9. Don’t cheat in relationships. Ever. I don’t mean don’t look at other people, just don’t do anything about any sexual thoughts you have about someone while in a relationship. Break it off first, if it’s too strong.
10. And of course, the Golden Rule. There’s a variation of it in every religion, so of course it’s in atheism: Don’t be a prat. It’s annoying.

Thought for the day: Maybe Bobby Henderson was right all along, and we really were created by a drunken Flying Spaghetti Monster and lack of pirates cause global warming. Hey, it makes a hell of a lot more sense than spontaneously combusting bushes.

Signed,
Two of Wands

Serenades

Possibly the most romantic thing a guy could do is, in my opinion, is serenade a girl. But the serenade is not to be taken lightly; certain rules must be obeyed for it to be considered sweet and heart-wrenching, as opposed to embarrassing for all parties involved.

Rule Number 1: Who Can Serenade:

• You must have a good voice, or else the girl will be totally turned off.
• You must be appropriately artsy and offbeat; no hardcore jocks or glow-in-the-dark video game nerds would be taken seriously.
• You must be serious about the girl: serenades are not for one-night stands, but for expressing interest in a long-term relationship with the girl.

Rule Number 2: How to Serenade:

• Her parents should not be home, nor should any stodgy old people be. The ideal situation would be when she is at a sleepover at another girl’s house, whose parents are not home. Another ideal, but more difficult, situation, would be if you were both counselors at a residential summer camp, and you were to serenade her outside her cabin. However, you would have to bring your entire cabin along with you, to witness your potential rejection.
• Don’t be drunk and/or high at the time. Brush your teeth first. Think about it.
• Consider accompaniment. If you can sing the song a cappella, go for it. Playing a background track is tacky, but if you can play the guitar, that would be optimal. In a rarer circumstance, bring a friend who can play the guitar with you, but have him stand behind you so you are the one noticed. I’m sure he’ll understand.
• Make sure you enunciate properly, or else it’ll just sound like, “Blah/ Your eyes/ Blahdity Blah/ I’m a fool”, which totally ruins the effect.
• Make sure the girl is at least a little bit interested; a girl who scorns the ground on which you walk is much more likely to file a restraining order against you than to respond positively.

Rule Number 3: Choosing the Song

• Don’t go for something you know she hates. You will automatically lose. At life.
  
• Funny can be nice, but if you’re normally a riot, take this one thing seriously and do a less comedic and more romantic song.
• Nothing sad or lonely. Acceptable tones include "feelings" (egad, what a loaded word), longing, hope, etc.
  
• Avoiding the L-Bomb might be a decent idea if either one of you is skeptical about young romance and “love at first sight”. If you do choose a song with that, mean it. Otherwise, stick with something that just implies you’re romantically attracted to her.
• Promising anything about forever is a bad idea too, unless you’re proposing. In that case, you’re not trying to get the girl, you’re trying to keep her, so use the L-Bomb as much as you like. (But mean it, dammit!) And have a ring, and maybe make sure there’s an audience, with at least one member armed with a video camera.
  
• Go for a song that has a special memory for the two of you, something positive in which neither of you act like fools, or at least you have fun acting like fools and don’t regret it.
• No duets. Her sticking her head out the window and singing along to “A Whole New World” would get five million hits on You Tube, but that would only happen if a) she’s self-confident enough to sing in public, b) she knows the words and tune, c) she’s convinced you’re serious before the end of the first verse, and d) there’s no screen on the window.
• Nothing that makes it sound like you’re trying to get into her pants. This post is on serenades, not booty calls.
• Some suggestions:

Ø “I’ll Be” by Edwin McCain- tried and true.

Ø “Can You Feel the Love Tonight?” by Elton John- not the one from The Lion King, but the single. Even though Sir Elton is gay, it can totally be song to a girl.

Ø “Fallin’” from They’re Playing Our Song- (or others) only if you’re both Broadway buffs. Otherwise, you’re an idiot.

Ø “Iris” by the Goo Goo Dolls- a choice dependent on personal preferences.

Ø “Hanging by a Moment” by Lifehouse- see note for “Iris”.

Ø “Fix You” by Coldplay- if she’s going through a bit of a rough time at the moment, or has weirdly low self-esteem, this could be a huge confidence-booster (and can boost your chances, too).

Ø “I Want to Hold Your Hand” by the Beatles- for something a little lighter and a bit funnier.

Ø “Bridge over Troubled Water” by Simon and Garfunkel- slow, sweet, and to the point.

Ø “Time after Time” by Cyndi Lauper- yes, it’s by a woman, and no, this post is not for girls to serenade guys (oh, they can, but I for one would much prefer to be serenaded than to do the actual serenading), but there’s nothing gender-specific in this romantic 80s ballad. Sing it an octave lower or change the key.

Ø “I Don’t Wanna Miss a Thing” by Aerosmith- for those with difficulty interpreting poetry, it's a good song that’s easy to understand.

So if you want to capture a girl’s heart, serenade! (As long as you follow my three basic, easy-to-figure-out rules.) Just plan it well, and hopefully you won’t die of rejection.

Thought for the day: Bergader: Is it Ber-GAY-der or Ber-GAH-der? Less importantly, how does it taste, and can you put it on a sandwich?

Signed,
Two of Wands (who is less sane than usual at the moment)

Superlatives

Every year, high schools and some middle schools have a list of superlatives: Best Dressed, Best Smile, Most Likely to Become President, etc. What I want to know is: what the hell? Have people been judging me every time I wore a sweatshirt or something?
Actually, no, unless you’re one of those popular girls who spend fifteen minutes a morning just on their eye makeup, as opposed to, say, their general appearance. Then again, if you’re one of those bitchy, catty, popular girls, a) you’re not reading this, so I don’t have to worry about offending you or you exacting revenge; and b) you, at least, might win one of those meaningless appearance-related superlatives.
What I want is a complete reformation of the superlative system. Each graduating class, instead of voting on a person for a specific superlative, instead nominates people for superlatives they make up, and the most accurate and creative ones go in the yearbook.
Benefits to this system: people have a laugh, superlatives are more likely to fit, and popularity contests are meaningless.
Disadvantages: those bitchy, catty, popular girls who have spent all this time preening might get upset they won’t be able to win Best Hair, which might make them cry, which will definitely (gasp!) make the makeup over which they toiled go to ruin.
Somehow that doesn’t seem like much of a disadvantage.
This is dependent, of course, on a reasonably creative student body and a school government made of people sick of popularity contests. (This may actually be less common then you might think, especially with officers: after all, no one elected them based on merit.)
But say you have these two factors. Who are you going to nominate for what? I can’t exactly help you with the whom, as it’s quite likely I don’t know what’s-his-face, but I can help you with the what.
My list of suggested superlatives (come on, you knew it was coming. Lists rock!):

• Most Likely to Get a Degree in Something Totally Useless and End Up Filthy Rich
• Most Likely to Try Really Hard to Succeed and Fail Miserably
• Most Likely to Win a Darwin Award by Age Thirty
• Most Attractive Left Ear
• Best Facial Hair (this one is also open to girls)
• Best Death Glare
• Most Able to Write a Fantastic Essay on Absolutely Nothing
• Most Likely to Get Away with Murder
• Most Likely to Become a Starving Artist and Self-Amputate an Appendage Just for the Hell of It… and Become Incredibly Famous After Death (a.k.a. the Vincent Van Gogh Award)
• Most Likely to Live Under a Bridge
• Most Interesting Schnozz
• Most Dexterous Eyebrows
• Most Likely to Succeed as a Prostitute/Hooker/Whore
• Most Likely to Assume Everything is about Him, When, in Fact, It’s Not

I don’t know if you’re on any class boards or whatever, or have power over them, or are reading this (by the way, responses from No. 2/ “Lord Perfor”- don’t ask me, because I sure as hell don’t know- do not count as evidence. He, by the way, won that final superlative.), or have a cousin whose best friend’s shift manager is in a student government, but it would rock if schools would stop with lame-ass “Best Hair” and “Most Studious” (winners of that one tend to be notorious for photographic memories and just not giving a shit about grades, for the irony of it).
Even if your class board doesn’t go for it, what about an anti-yearbook yearbook? Get someone who everyone knows, like that guy Bartleby in Accepted, and have him take a bunch of pictures all year, of crazy things too “scandalous” to put in the official school yearbook. Spread it via internet so people don’t have to pay for it, or print it so it looks like a magazine on the outside, so the school can’t get on you for it. Use pseudonyms for the credits, and tips for sleeping in class or passing physics without actually doing any work. And the crowning glory: the superlatives, as decided by the entire class.

Thought for the Day: “I fell asleep every time I tried to read A Tale of Two Cities.”
“Dude, I fell asleep every time I tried to read the Spark Notes for A Tale of Two Cities.”

Signed,
Two of Wands
“Most Likely to Become President”

Is Anybody Out There?

A few days ago I found out that people read this. A friend of mine, we’ll call her GIGO (not her real name. And she’ll probably either not get it or take serious offense at it, won’t you, GIGO?), told me she’s shown people this, and they’ve actually liked it.
So I’ve installed a hit counter to verify this little tidbit of knowledge, and sure enough, the little purple numbers at the bottom of the page keep going up. Apparently people do read this.
You could have fooled me.
When I tell people about this, I try to make it clear I’m just notifying them it exists, not trying to pressure them into telling me they like it. People so over-compliment these days, someone complimenting me makes me squirm. I’d honestly prefer a frank opinion, all the time, than try to guess someone’s true meaning. If it’s positive, that’s fantastic, but what sort of friendship is based solely on niceness? A crappy one, that’s what, but I’ve already ranted on this topic. Twice.
Point is, people are reading it, and I had no idea. I’ve had one comment on each on the first two posts, and they were both from the second person of the four I’ve told so far. (Ironically, I never actually told GIGO. No. 2 did)
Look, when I tell people I made this thing, I say, “Read and spread as you see fit.” People are reading and people are spreading, so perhaps I should create an addendum to my mantra: “Read , spread, and comment as you see fit.” Someone’s gotta see fit, right? Because I (gasp!) sincerely want to know what you really think, and, if I actually know you, know that you’re reading this, just for kicks. I’d also like the numbers and PINs of all your credit cards. (That last sentence was a joke. Feel free to burst into a crazy bout of laughter.)
I started this thing because a friend told me maybe I should, considering I have far more opinions than the average American and am sure as hell not afraid to voice them.
Fact of the matter is, people don’t want me to voice them. Apparently I’m not always quite PC, and they get offended. A lot. So I figure I won’t make people listen to all of them if they don’t want to. But if you do want to listen, perhaps you could respond?
I’ll cover whatever you want (if the subject inspires me), if you ask for it. I’ll take into account your suggestions, as long as they aren’t “Make this thing more PC.” And maybe if you ask real nice, I’ll reestablish my rekick page element to put your website on it. According to my sources, people might actually see it.
So, my dear little chicklings, care to have a go?

Thought for the day: Growing old is mandatory, but growing up is optional.

Signed,
Two of Wands