PennSilverTaco's "Perfect 5-Lug Regular Cab" Build, Aspergers, and General BS MegaThread!

June 19th, 2017:

 

@Plain Jane Taco
@HomerTaco
@Blackout14
@ABA180
@js312

This is called "Charlie's Asperger's Thread," and it's been long enough since I've written a full story, so I figured I'd do just that...

I tagged a few of my regular followers so you guys can read and tell me what you think...

Right now I'd like to talk to you all about standardized tests, from two points of view. The first, and primary, point of view is that of a "Navy Brat." Actually, I'll just say military brat. Regardless of what branch of the United States military your mom or dad (or both) was in the when you were a kid, your family probably moved every 2 or 3 years (Sometimes less, sometimes a more; The longest I ever stayed in one place was 6 years).

The second point of view is, you guessed it, that of someone with Asperger's. I was diagnosed with Asperger's in late 1998 (Specifically November, if I remember correctly), just two months or so into 4th grade. I don't believe I took my very first standardized test until 5th grade (may have been 4th grade; Don't remember). That said, Asperger's did not negatively my ability to take these tests, at least not in a big way. At most, it was written into my IEP (Individualized Education Plan) that I was allowed to have extra time on tests. Asperger's by itself did not cause an issue for me when taking these tests, but it did exacerbate the primary issue I had...

Like I said, we moved A LOT. Here's a timeline:

Parents met in college in 1981 after being introduced by their respective roommates who were also dating. The rest is history...
My mom graduated from college in 1981.
My dad graduated from college in 1982, and enlisted in the Navy on/around Labor Day of that year...
My dad was on deployment a lot before I was born, but his "home base" was Moffett Federal Airfield in Mountain View, California.
My parents lived in Northern California from about 1983 until 1990.
My parents bought their first house (in nearby Milpitas, CA) in 1987 or 1988 and were married in April 1988.
My parents wanted a kid, but didn't expect to conceive on the first try. Needless to say, my mom became pregnant with me right before the summer of 1988.
I was born at El Camino Hospital in Mountain View on March 14, 1989. I was delivered by C-section and weighed 10 pounds!

After I was born:

In the interest of spending more time with his new son, my dad was able to change his work schedule so he didn't have to go on 6-month deployments...
My dad was transferred to Willow Grove NAS and we moved East for the first time as a family in the summer of 1990.
My parents bought a brand new home in Montgomery Township and we moved in around November 1990.
I graduated from preschool in about May 1994.
I went to Kindergarten at a private school in 1994-1995.
I started going to public school for the first time when I started 1st grade, at General Francis Nash Elementary School in Harleysville. This was the 1995-1996 school year. My parents had no reason to believe we would be moving anytime soon, and as such neither did I.
Then, either right before or not long after my 7th birthday in March 1996, my dad found out he was being transferred back to Moffett Field.
We moved back to California in the summer of 1996 (June-July?).
I started 2nd grade in September 1996, at Edith Landels Elementary School in Mountain View, California (May have been Sunnyvale; Either way it was and still is a damn good school in my opinion).
I started 3rd grade in 1997, and by at least the beginning of 1998 my dad already knew he was being transferred to Norfolk NAS.
I finished 3rd grade in June 1998 and we moved back to the East Coast YET AGAIN, this time to Virginia Beach.
I started 4th grade in September 1998 and it was at some point during 4th grade that we started getting prepped for standardized tests (Called SOLs in the Commonwealth of Virginia).
Before I even completed 4th grade, my dad knew he was being transferred to NAS Whidbey Island in 2000.
I believe 5th grade (1999-2000) was the first time I took an actual standardized test (it may have been 4th grade).
We moved to Washington in the summer of 2000, and I started middle school (6th grade in Washington; 7th grade in many other states).
The Washington state test (called WASL) is every other year/grade or something, so I didn't have to take it in 6th grade (2000-2001). I did, however, have to take it in 7th grade...

Read my next post to see where I'm going with this...

 

@Plain Jane Taco
@HomerTaco
@Blackout14
@ABA180
@js312

So, in 7th grade I was forced to take a state-mandated test in state that I had no plans of ever returning to (or at least residing in; At least not that area). Even my 7th grade English teacher (an awesome older guy named Mr. Starring) who administered the test said that it was nothing but a way for the state of Washington to determine which school performed the best, right down to specific classes, so they could determine who got the most funding...

In 2002, we moved from Washington back to Virginia, though this time to the DC metro area (Northern VA). In the Commonwealth of Virginia, the standardized tests are called SOLs, and I know that students are not required to take the tests every year, but it was fairly often.

After we moved to NoVa, I remember taking SOLs in 8th grade, but in high school I forget whether I took them in 9th grade, 10th grade, or both. I failed the math SOL in 8th grade, and on two or three occasions in 9th and 10th grade they (FCPS bureaucrats) interrupted my normal class schedule to make me retake the 8th grade math SOL test (may have even been 7th grade). I did quite well on the English/Language Arts SOL, and I must have done okay on the history portion because I never had to retake that. It was only math, and later on in either 9th or 10th grade, science.

The kicker here is that I was passing all of my classes, including math! In 10th grade, I made the honor roll because my grades were so good! The reason I choked on the SOL test is because I wasn't allowed to have any help. In my 10th grade math class, I would raise my hand, the teacher would help me, and I would be able to do every problem like it on my own. Also, unlike driving a stick shift, algebra is not something I retain easily...

And, exacerbating the problem even more was the fact that I just wanted to be done with the damn test. I was in high school, and I saw this middle school math test as a waste of my time. I tried my hardest, but I couldn't do a lot of the problems and just guessed...

At some point, my parents talked to the staff (don't know exactly who, or how), and got them to just exempt me from the math test. My dad got an offer to leave the Pentagon and run a few squadrons from NAS Willow Grove in late 2004, and of course he jumped at that. Compared to flying on P3s and traveling the world, working behind a desk at the Pentagon was understandably boring.

Let me tell you something. I generally got decent grades in 9th and 10th grade, even in math! I signed up for a foreign language in high school (I forget which grade), but was talked out of it.

As I said before, English was my best subject without a doubt, in both grades. Auto shop and English were my best classes in 10th grade. I gained a reputation among my classmates in auto shop, and even the teacher himself (an ASE certified mechanic), for knowing more about cars than the teacher!

FUN FACT: I still exchange emails with my auto shop teacher, who still teaches at my old high school. He drives a 2007 Tacoma!

To be continued...

 

@Plain Jane Taco
@HomerTaco
@Blackout14
@ABA180
@js312

As I stated above, I failed the science SOL in either 9th or 10th grade. In order to "make up" for it, all students who failed had to go to afterschool classes run by a teacher who taught that specific subject (in my case, science/biology). I managed to do well enough in the afterschool classes that I got a passing grade, but looking back on it, to be honest I'm quite surprised...

I did show up and technically do the work, but most of my time in those afterschool classes was spent talking to a Korean girl named Mary, one grade ahead of me no less, who I had a bit of a crush on...

Mary had failed the science SOL too, and most of our time in that afterschool science class was spent chatting about random shit like our favorite movies. Mary deserves her own thread, so more on her later...

One of the points I am trying to make is that I was doing well enough in my normal classes that I was on the honor roll, but these goddamn standardized tests were holding me back and wasting my time.

My perceived inability to pass the math portion of the SOL became a non-issue when we moved to Pennsylvania for the second (and final) time in 2005. I started 11th grade at Central Bucks High School West in September of that year, and I'd say I was average to slightly above average at best. I started my senior year in September 2006 and graduated in 2007. Officially, I'm CB West Class of '07, but I technically did not officially graduate from high school until I was 21 (June 2010). Students who were classified as "Special Needs," even high-functioning individuals like myself who are borderline normal, had the option of staying in school until they turned 21. My parents and I mutually agreed that this would be the best option for me, and I have to say that Charlie at 18 and Charlie at 21 were two totally different people (also something that deserves it's own thread).

In the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the standardized tests are called "PSSA." I knew about PSSAs well before we moved back here for the second time because my cousin who spent the first 25 years of her life, not including college and grad school, in the Lehigh Valley area complained about them regularly. I honestly do not remember if took the PSSAs or not. I may have gotten lucky and started high school after a grade (I started at CB West in 11th grade; Perhaps final year PSSAs were required was 10th grade?) where I was required to take the PSSA, and was thus exempt.

 

@Plain Jane Taco
@HomerTaco
@Blackout14
@ABA180
@js312

So, finally, here's my primary point...

I believe that students in grades K-12 with one or both parents who are active-duty military (not reservist, as the family of someone in the reserves would be able to stay in one place while they deployed wherever they were needed) should be exempt from standardized testing, especially if they are only going to be living in a state for three years or less!

About 4 years ago, I got into a discussion with my dad and my uncle (my mom's older sister's husband; Related by marriage) during a drive home from a Nationals game. At the time, my aunt and uncle were still living in Fairfax County, and my uncle has been a huge DC sports fan all his life (Redskins, Nationals, etc).

Anyway, my dad was in the Navy from about September 1982 until October 2007. Since he completed four years of college, he joined as an officer (as opposed to enlisted) and retired as a Captain/Commander.

My uncle started at West Point right out of high school, and also officially joined the Army as an officer in the early 1970s. He was initially active-duty, and was stationed in Germany for most of the 1970s. He met my aunt in 1978, and they married in 1981. My aunt and uncle had the first of two sons in 1986 (second came in 1988). Sometime in the late 1980s or early 1990s, maybe earlier, my uncle switched from active-duty to reservist in the interest of spending more time with his family. He was actually deployed to the Middle East during Desert Storm, and I believe he enrolled in West Point in 1971. I'm pretty sure he went from active-duty to reservist after Desert Storm, which means he would have been in the Army for 20 years and thus eligible to receive full benefits. However, he remained in the Army as a reservist until 1996 while simultaneously working at the EPA. He retired from the Army in 1996, but continued working for the EPA for about another two decades. LONG STORY SHORT: I have some pretty freakin' awesome relatives!

The point here is that I was in the backseat of a Nissan Frontier, with an Army veteran driving and a Navy veteran in the shotgun seat. We had a roughly 20-30 minute drive home from DC if traffic cooperated. My dad my and my uncle have different political views, but political views are not important and WILL NOT be discussed here. What is important is that both my dad and my uncle are military veterans who served their country honorably, and aside from an annual friendly rivalry during the Army/Navy football game, they always saw eye-to-eye when it came anything having to do with military personnel and their families...

So, somehow the conversation turned to my grade school days and standardized tests...

My uncle basically said that he would support a bill or regulation that exempted military children from standardized tests. I immediately agreed, as did my dad...

But why...?

Standardized tests are a pain in the ass, there's no doubt...

But at least if a student spends the first 18 years of his or her life in the same school district, or even in the same state, the tests and the methods used to prepare the student for the test will remain the same. If the student has Asperger's or another high-functioning autism spectrum disorder (or any kind of learning disability for that matter), they will probably require a little bit of extra help. They will still be in the same state, with the same curriculum. Consistency is key here!

But what about people like me whose families move frequently? It is my opinion that children who stay in the same state/jurisdiction/school district from about 3rd or 4th grade through 12th grade will probably not have the problems I did, regardless of whether or not they're on the spectrum or have any kind of learning disability. I was born in March 1989. From 1990 to 1996 (ages 1-7 respectively), my parents and I lived about 20 minutes (maybe even less) from where we are currently living. From what I can tell, students are not subjected to state testing in Pennsylvania prior to 4th or 5th grade. California (at least Santa Clara County where we lived when I was in 2nd and 3rd grade) seemed to be the same way. I definitely did not take a standardized test in kindergarten or 1st grade (Pennsylvania), not do I remember taking any standardized tests in 2nd or 3rd grade (California). Like I said before, I remember taking a standardized test for the first time in 4th or 5th grade (Virginia; Specifically Virginia Beach).

The problem here is blindingly obvious! If a kid attends school in more than one state, or in my case SIX (6) different districts in FOUR (4) different states, they will be exposed to a different curriculum in each state. If the child is lucky enough to attend only the best schools in the best districts, or if they attend school in districts with similar lesson plans, there probably will not be any issue.

I am not counting California here because we lived there before I was old enough to take these tests, but in a state where public schools are known to be lackluster, Landels Elementary and the school district in which it was located stood out. The teachers there were awesome, and overall experience was very good. Of course, keep in mind that I was not diagnosed with Asperger's until at least 4-5 months after I finished 3rd grade. During the time I lived in California, I did receive additional out-of-class support during school hours, but according to my records I was pretty much normal.

This is only my opinion, but I think the Central Bucks School District is better than Fairfax County Public Schools for reasons too numerous to list in this particular thread. Central Bucks and Fairfax County are both ranked among the top school districts in the country, by the way, and they both have their strengths and weaknesses. If given a choice, I would choose Central Bucks though...

Virginia Beach was also very good. My only complaint about that school district was that they DID NOT HAVE A DAILY RECESS! More on that later...

If we'd moved from Virginia Beach to Fairfax County, I think I would have had a much smoother transition. The curriculum/lesson plan of Virginia Beach was probably different from that FCPS, but the standardized tests and thus the protocol for prepping students for the tests were more than likely the same. After all, both districts were in Virginia!

But, we didn't stay in Virginia. We moved to Washington. Here's the thing about the Island County School District...

It was not bad, and in fact public schools in some places (especially cities like Los Angeles, New York, and Philly) make Island County look damn good, but compared to every other district I went school in...

Island County SUCKED!

The fact that I attending middle school, without a doubt the most difficult part of grade school, made things even more difficult. If I'd still been in elementary school when we lived in Oak Harbor, it probably would have been a lot easier. I spent the first two years of junior high (6th and 7th grade) at Oak Harbor Middle School, and completed middle school in Virginia. 8th grade was just as miserable as 6th and 7th grade in terms of being picked on and bullied, but my educational experience there was far superior to what I got in Washington. After all, it was Fairfax County Public Schools.

Island County sucked in terms of learning/curriculum and the just way it was run in general, and a lot of the staff there were assholes, but there were quite a few teachers and staff who actually gave a damn...

Among them is Mr. Starring, my 7th grade English/Language Arts teacher I mentioned earlier in this multi-thread series. He was AWESOME. My parents and I both loved him. My 6th grade teacher, Mrs. Freeman, was pretty awesome too. She holds the distinction of being the first teacher I had a crush on. She was only 26 or so when I started 6th grade in 2000, which means she was born sometime in 1973-1974. She was younger then than I am now, but now she's 43-44! Damn! Time sure does fly!

It's also worth mentioning that I was only 11 and she was married (and her husband was in the Navy; so we had another thing in common to bond over), but whenever I listen to a certain Van Halen song in my Tacoma, I can't help but think of her...

Though the great teachers far outnumbered the ones who were assholes, and in my opinion all of the administrative staff were okay, there were plenty of asshole teachers. This is not about asshole teachers, though...

The point here is that the Island County School District was pretty lackluster to say the least, and the fact that one of my favorite teachers from that district described the Washington state standardized tests as a "popularity contest," should tell you everything you need to know!

I would also like to point out that one of my best friends, who was born in October 1989 and was thus one grade below me despite being born in the same year, repeated 5th grade at least twice. I had a bit of cerebral flatulence and thought he should have been going into 6th grade at the same time as me, but since he's 7 months younger than me it makes sense that he started 5th grade in September 2000. When I started 7th grade, however, he repeated 5th grade for I believe the first time. When we moved to Virginia in 2002 and I was about to start 8th grade, however, I seem to remember that he hadn't quite passed 5th grade yet again and was set to repeat it AGAIN.

My friend, who I reconnected with a couple years ago, had a very shitty childhood (Foster child; Need I say more?). As far as I know he did eventually complete all of middle school and some of high school, but I think he dropped out. His shitty childhood played a large role in his being held back, but my friend was not stupid by any means and I think the school system was at least partially to blame. By the way, he still lives in Washington, is doing okay for himself, and his daily driver is a 1984 or 1985 LC FJ60 with a factory 4-speed manual transmission and working A/C!

Back to me...
The fact that I have Asperger's Syndrome only exacerbated the issue of attending middle school in a district that was lackluster at best. A military kid who wasn't on the spectrum probably would have adapted much better, but still would have had some issues. I will tell the horror stories from my 7th grade math class later on...

In 2002, we moved back to Virginia, and when I started 8th grade, I was so behind in my math skills that I ended up in a 7th grade math class. My 8th grade math teacher, a 20-something woman named Ms. Morahan, was genuinely awesome and quite attractive though. And so began the vicious cycle of SOL failures...

So, basically, I think that children from military families should be exempted from standardized tests. What do you think?

 

That's a tough one to answer. There needs to be something to gauge how much a child knows/has learned.

Not sure what a good alternative would be, though

 

Sound argument for an alternative testing structure. Certainly depends on the individual circumstances.

 

@HomerTaco
@Plain Jane Taco


Part of another "multi-thread series"...

A lot of Asian couples immigrate to America and have children here. Mary was not only the daughter of Korean immigrants, but animmigrant herself. She was born in South Korea and moved here with parents sometime in the late 1990s if I remember correctly. Her real name was difficult for most Americans, including myself, to pronounce, so everyone called her Mary. For privacy reasons, I am not going to reveal Mary's real birth name, but I have no idea where she got "Mary" from, because her real name sounded nothing like it.

Mary was a year older than me, born in 1988, and thus starting 10th grade when I entered high school as a 9th grader in September 2003. I forget how exactly we met (99% sure it was in science class), and I don't know how we ended up spending so much time together because to quite honest she was kind of a bitch at times.

But I was a reclusive and socially awkward teenage boy with Asperger's and almost no friends. She was a girl who actually talked to me, ate lunch with me, and just in general hung out with me...

The key word there is girl...

She was no supermodel, but she didn't look bad either. In fact, I'd classify her as "cute." On top of that, she was Asian! I will admit that I have a bit of a "thing" for Asian women, but I don't consider it a fetish (better known as "Yellow Fever"). Looking back on every girl I've had feelings for going back to my first major crush on a classmate in 8th grade at the age of 13, I can tell you that most of the crushes I've had, have been on women of color. The aforementioned first crush at age 13 was a smoking hot Black/Dominican girl named Sydney who was in my grade and just 3 months younger than me. I have had crushes on white women, and if the women I end up marrying is white then that's just fine. When it comes to women, I care about what's on the inside. Skin color is not something that matters to me in the slightest, nor do things like religion and socioeconomic status. When it comes to looks, I just don't want my dream girl to be incredibly overweight or unhealthily thin.

"Yellow Fever" or "Asian Fetish" would mean I have a sexual preference for Asian girls, which is totally not the case. When I told my friend from Hong Kong (who I've never met) that I realized most of the women I'd had crushes on over the years were Asian or Black, he said it was because "I was wonderfully colorblind." This actually makes perfect sense...

Mary was just a reasonably pretty girl who actually paid attention to me, and happened to be Asian, just like Sydney was a downright hot girl who was nice to me and actually paid attention to me, and just happened to be black. Mary confided in me some of her deepest and darkest secrets, including one particularly disturbing one. We were walking down the stairs after class, and if I remember correctly she was upset about the way her parents were treating her. The part of that conversation I remember vividly is when Mary told me that she had considered killing herself. I'm 99% sure she was just looking for attention and was not seriously contemplating suicide, but hearing someone I considered a friend say something like that really shook me up. I told her that suicide was not the answer, and like I said I think she was just upset and in need of attention.

 

People often have a knee-jerk reaction to standardized testing. I don't teach, but I do work in K-12 education. I believe the data is important in order to identify our weaknesses as institutions and better serve kids. There should be a balance, of course.

Read up on PARCC. The intent of that was to base it on country wide standards rather than state-by-state. Reality was different, though, as not many states remain members. My own state (Massachusetts) went back to using new versions of their own tests, heavily borrowing from PARCC. I think Rhode Island has decided to use our test. Each state's standards have always been wildly different.

 

@Plain Jane Taco
@HomerTaco

I think Mary genuinely did have feelings for me, because she definitely did not have a boyfriend, and to be honest the only friend/fellow student she spent more time with than me was another Korean girl named Jane. Though Jane was born to Korean immigrants and could speak Korean fluently, she had either been brought to America at a very young age or had been born there. She spoke perfect Korean, but also spoke perfect English and did not have the usual Korean accent.

I did not like Jane very much, because even by high school standards, she was loud and inappropriate. On top of that, she was not the least bit attractive. There is a song called "Hate (I Really Don't Like You)" by The Plain White T's, and the lyrics of that song are correct...

"Hate is a strong word, but I really, really, really don't like you..."

Hate is a strong word, but I came pretty damn close to hating her after an incident in the cafeteria right before Christmas in 2003 (possibly 2004). Literally, it was the last day of school before winter break...

I forget what prompted the argument between Jane and myself, and I also forget what Jane did to me in the first place...

Either way, I became incredibly upset by something that Jane either did or said, and I believe I threw my recently-finished carton of chocolate milk at Jane. The carton itself did not hit Jane, but the residual drops of chocolate milk squirted out through the straw and splattered all over Jane's shirt. I may have just squeezed the carton/juicebox and not actually thrown it, but either way Jane was hit by drops of chocolate milk. Regardless of what I did, Jane WAYYY beyond overreacted.

Jane actually grabbed MY ice pack out of MY lunchbox and hurled it at my head. Being hit in the head point-blank with an ice pack hurts a lot more than you would think. My God, did that ever hurt...

Clutching my head in pain, I just glared at Jane and bellowed "What the fuck?!?!"

If a male student had done what Jane had done, I probably would have blindly, impulsively, and pure out of reflex, punched him in the face. Worst case scenario, he would have gotten a black eye or a bloody nose, and both of us probably would have been suspended. However, I am the type of guy with old-fashioned standards who just will not a hit a girl unless my life is in danger...

If I remember correctly, a teacher overheard me swear at Jane and came over to see what was going on. Believe it or not, if I remember correctly, the teacher was initially about to discipline me for swearing. Still clutching my head in pain, I explained exactly what had happened, play-by-play, even including the part where I'd tossed the carton at Jane and accidentally squirted her with chocolate milk. Needless to say, after the teacher got the full story, I probably could have called Jane the C-word and gotten away with it based on the teacher's reaction. The teacher just flat out told Jane she was suspended and escorted her out of the cafeteria. I did not get in any trouble whatsoever. Ironically, I was given another ice pack to put on the bump caused my own ice pack.

Now that I think about it, I'm pretty sure this was in 2003, which means I would have been in 9th grade, and Mary and Jane would have both been in 10th grade. The reason I'm pretty sure it was 2003 is because I vaguely remember my mom picking me up from school on the very day of the incident in our blue 2000 GMC Safari conversion van. My parents bought the GMC new in 2000, right before we moved from Virginia Beach to Washington. My parents traded the Safari for a brand new silver 2004 Honda Odyssey in May 2004, so by December 2004 my mom would have picked me up in the Odyssey. I am pretty sure I was picked up in the Safari that day...

Also, my mom was even more pissed about the incident than I was...

Mary and I still hung out in school, but even prior to Jane's ice pack attack, we never spent time at each other's houses. Jane and I remained on peaceful terms from that point on, but not surprisingly really didn't speak after that...

 

@Plain Jane Taco
@HomerTaco


Mary's parents were not always able to pick her up after school, and while Mary's parents' townhouse was technically within walking distance of our high school, it wasn't exactly an easy walk. I believe it all started in 2003 when Mary was stuck between a rock and a hard place. I was a teenage guy, and here was this cute, and older-than-me, Asian girl who needed a ride home. Of course I stepped forward to be her knight in shining armor, or at least her "nice guy with his mom's conversion van."

Actually, it wasn't always the van. Sometimes it was the 2000 GMC Safari, sometimes it was the 1996 Pathfinder, and on at least one occasion in 2004 it was the 1987 Mercedes. One of the annoying things about Mary was that she was terrified of dogs. I think she was bitten or almost bitten, or something like that, when she was younger. Needless to say, she was not a dog person...

My closest friend for the better part of a decade wasn't even human. She was a Black Labrador named Molly, who by the time I met Mary was 8 or 9 years old. She was unpredictable with other dogs, but she loved people and I would have trusted her around a newborn baby. My mom would regularly bring Molly along when she picked me up from school, because I loved Molly and Molly loved riding in the car almost as much as she loved me. The first time my mom happened to bring Molly along when we drove Mary home, I didn't think to tell Mary because I didn't think it was an issue. I'd had Molly since I was in kindergarten and every one of my friends between then and high school had loved her...

Molly could get quite energetic when excited, especially when meeting someone new, but I don't seem to remember her going crazy like she usually does when she saw Mary for the first time. In fact, Molly was downright calm and it was Mary who made a big deal. Obviously my mom wasn't going to go all the way back home and drop off Molly when we were already being nice enough to go slightly out of our way to drop Mary off, and Mary needed a ride; The Safari had two captain's chairs in the front for the driver and front passenger, two captain's chairs in the middle row, and a bench seat in the 3rd row; Molly preferred to lie down on the 3rd row seat, and I normally rode up front; By default, my friends would ride in the middle row captain's chair closest to the sliding door. On that particular occasion, I sat in the 2nd row next to Mary to "protect" her from my own perfectly friendly, downright docile, and slightly overweight Labrador who was pushing 70 in dog years. I did this this at least once and possibly twice. Luckily, on most occasions when Mary needed a ride, I was able to call my mom ahead of time and reluctantly ask her not to bring Molly along.

Quite often, Mary would invite Jane over to her house, and we would end up giving Jane a ride too. I say again, those two were pretty much best friends...

Mary would ask for a ride at least once a week, and Jane would come along roughly 50% of the time. It became obvious that Mary was taking advantage of my kindness (and more importantly my mom's kindness, since it was her van, her gas, and her valuable time; The Tacoma was at least 5 years away at this point and a driver's license was another year and a half away after that first 5 years!).

My mom didn't really mind giving my friends rides home, even Mary, because their houses were practically on the way to our house. My mom and are both in agreement about the one thing that annoyed us most about giving Mary and Jane a ride home...

Jane spoke perfect English, and Mary spoke decent English too, but nowhere near as good as Jane. So, it was easier for the two of them to talk in Korean. Perfectly understandable! It became annoying when the two of them were in the backseat of one of my parents' vehicles, with my mom driving and me riding shotgun, yammering away in their native tongue. In a relatively small space like the interior of a Pathfinder when the rear seat passengers are literally right behind the front seat passengers, talking loudly in ANY language is annoying. Talking in a foreign language that you know the other people in the car can't understand is downright obnoxious! Could they be making fun of us in some way? We never knew...

One time in the spring of 2004, right before I finished 10th grade, I talked my mom into picking me up in the 1987 Mercedes. It was unseasonably warm that day, and my mom found out after she was already on the road that A/C was not working. Actually the A/C worked, it just leaked, and a charge of R-12 lasted the whole summer. This was just the first warm day when we'd had the Benz out that year and we hadn't gotten it charged yet. I was excited, hoping to impress this older girl I kinda liked with what was at the time supposed to become my car when I got my license. I most certainly was not impressed with the A/C not working, neither was my mom, and I'm sure Mary wasn't either...

 

@Plain Jane Taco
@HomerTaco
@Blackout14

Remember how I said Mary could be kind of a bitch at times? To be fair, she was only truly a bitch once...

One time in either 2004 or 2005, we had a half-day at school for reasons I could never remember. Most of the student body ended up in the gym, killing time doing random shit until the last bell...

One thing the extremely bored students did was engage in "staring contests." I found Mary and half-jokingly challenged her to one of these stupid staring contests. She said no and I, again half-jokingly, called her a chicken. You would have thought I actually did call her a bitch, or the c-word, or insulted her mother, because the way she reacted went so far beyond simply crossing the line...

I called her a chicken, and the next think I know this petite 16-year old girl who's maybe be 5'3" at most shoves me to the ground (hardwood floor), pins me down, and begins pulling my hair while simultaneously screaming "What did you call me?!?! What did you call me?!?!"

I screamed for help and tried to push Mary off of me without hurting her, but she wouldn't budge. It was just the positions we were in, and the fact I didn't want to even risk hurting a girl. Pinning me down and pulling my hair resulted in quite bit of pain, but didn't quite qualify as threatening my life, and the same code of honor that allowed me to keep my cool when Jane threw the ice pack at me kicked in...

I was much larger and stronger than Mary, and I could have used all my strength to throw her off of me. I could have twisted her arm, or punched her in the face...

I would not have hesitated to do any of those things if it was a guy assaulting me in the same manner as Mary at this very moment.

For some reason, nobody seemed to realize what was going on. With my arms totally pinned, I flung my leg up not knowing where it would go, and accidentally kicked Mary right in the face. That certainly made her stop. She jumped up, and ran away crying to the girls bathroom. I tracked down the gym teacher, a middle-aged woman named Ms. Beaver who I loved, and told her what had happened. Moments later, Mary composed herself, reappeared, and immediately told Ms. Beaver that I'd kicked her in the face.

Ms. Beaver was not unsympathetic to Mary and did make sure she wasn't hurt, but her exact words were "If you'd been holding me down and pulling my hair, I probably would have kicked you in the face too."

I had not done anything wrong to begin with, and Ms. Beaver realized that my intention had been to get Mary off of me and that I had not meant to kick her in the face, and basically declared it to be self-defense...

Though getting a size-12 men's sneaker to the face is inevitably going to hurt, the pain didn't last long and Mary was, to my surprise, not injured at all. Not even a bloody nose...

With Ms. Beaver as moderator, Mary and I apologized to each other, and neither of us got in any trouble. Mary and I were on okay terms from that point on, but our friendship unsurprisingly fizzled. Then, we moved to Pennsylvania. I have not seen Mary since 2005, though we did speak on the phone once in 2006 or 2007.

Mary,
Ms. Beaver was right, but I still feel awful about kicking you in the face, even though it was a total accident. I hope you're doing well...

-Charlie

I've told a lot of people that story, and I've gotten a lot of responses as to what Mary's issue might have been that day...

Everything from the simple "She's just a bitch," all the way up to "She was probably having her period" or "It sounds like she has mental problems."

She admitted to being depressed, but I think depression is different from full-blown mental problems...

 

@ABA180
@Blackout14
@HomerTaco
@Plain Jane Taco

While I'm talking about girls I liked in my middle school and high school days, I may as well engage you all in a bit of "guy talk."

Looking back on my younger days, there were numerous times when I could have gotten laid before I was even old enough to have a driver's license in most states (I say most because some states allow minors to obtain a driver's license as young as 14, under certain circumstances; Every state I've lived in has required teen drivers to be at least 16 before getting a license). I was just too damn clueless to pick up on certain signals and social cues from various girls over the years...

As far back as 7th grade, I realize now that there were girls I went to school with who were interested in being more than just friends. I was either too suspicious to take their advances seriously or too clueless to even notice at the time...

In my early teens, my dad encouraged me to talk to girls and always tried to boost my confidence, especially when we went to football games at my high school and he ended up meeting some of the particularly pretty girls I hung out with...

As I got older, my dad would tell me to be careful, and stressed the importance of using protection. Basically, my dad knew I was a typical guy and not only respected this, but gave me advice as well...

My mom, on the other hand, wouldn't even allow me to watch movies with my friend Tiffany in our basement. I met Tiffany in 2003, when we were both 14 and in 8th grade. I would like to point out that my romantic interest in her was never serious, and we were just friends. She has been with guys, but she is openly gay, and has identified as a lesbian for close to a decade. Back in 2003-2005, she had not yet discovered her true sexual orientation. Seriously, we were kids...

However, when Tiffany came over, we had to play PlayStation and watch movies in the family room, where my mom could keep an eye on us...

I love both my parents, but unsurprisingly my dad is the one I'm more "eye-to-eye" with when it comes to things like drinking, sex, and even Tacoma modifications...

Especially Tacoma modifications!

 

I can't help but wonder...

How much money have I blown on iTunes over the last decade or so, just on music? I got my first iPod as a 16th birthday present in 2005, but my dad and I had so many CDs between us that I didn't need to use iTunes. As such, I didn't use iTunes for the first time until about 2007...

Maybe it's better that I don't know?!?!

 

The PC police will lock you up for saying "yellow fever" these days

 

​

 

Is that Joe Pesci in Home Alone?