Hooray for quotes, because I’m not half as witty as the people I steal my quotes from. I’m not even a half-wit. I’m just a no-wit. (See, that was an attempt at a joke.) Anyway, the title ("The Homecoming Grinch") and quote came from my buddy who does not go to my school, which goes to show that we few anti-homecomingers are few, but universal. At least, "universal" in a sense of "at least three of us in Racine, and one of us in Kenosha, and probably some others in other places in Wisconsin."

There’s me, there’s Kelly, and there’s Ashleigh at Horlick; we all reek of the anti-homecoming vibe. Ashleigh once, as a sign of recalcitrance (that little scamp), wore black on "school spirit day," with a red scrunchie around her wrist (school colors: gray, red, and white), which I thought was classic; it showed that she did not merely forget about school spirit day, but she recognized it and defied it. I, on the other hand, never bothered in my four years of school here to recognize school spirit one way or another. Never, ever have I worn my pajamas to school, or any other trite crap that they tell us to do to show loyalty to our football team.

This year was particularly bad, especially today. Today was embarrassing. The homecoming assembly was today, and three of my classes are with all seniors, and nearly all of them were in Senior Guys and Girls (which I will refer to from now on as "SGaG" because it’s one of those really awkward phrases to type out since I never got conditioned to the "correct" way of typing) so they were all wearing their red shirts. In my calculus class, there were only two of us who weren’t adorned in the SGaG shirts (I think the two of us shared a special bond, there). Including me, there were three non SGaG seniors in my English class, and three or four in my economics class. We sane kids, we’re becoming scarce.

In all honesty, I don’t even really know what SGaG is. I think all they do is get up unmentionably early in the mornings to practice dancing really badly at the assemblies, and then they traditionally put on a really bad SGaG skit. Nothing that would particularly impress college admissions officers if you were to write down "Senior Guys and Girls" under "extracurriculars." I’ve actually only seen one or two SGaG skits ever (I made it a challenge to figure out ways to skip the assemblies freshman and sophomore year as often as possible; last year I buckled under the intimidation of additional security and went to nearly every one), and I only remember one of them, and even that one wasn’t very memorable. But this year, I heard people saying that the skit was going to be really funny, so I thought, "Well, maybe I’ll actually go to the assembly today." Of course, the people I heard that from (overheard, to be more precise) were all preps, and you know how they think everything is just a laugh riot. But then in Calculus, my friend set me straight: "It’s supposed to be like a parody of ‘Survivor,’ but it’s not very funny. I’m in Senior Guys and Girls, and even I wouldn’t want to see it. Where would you be going instead? ["Home."] Yeah, just go home, you’ll have more fun there than at the assembly." That was enough for me. I left school an hour before the assembly (before all the hall monitors manned their stations at the doorways).

Why do I hate assemblies? Oh, let me count the reasons:

1. They’re loud. It took a few assemblies before I thought of it, but eventually I relied on earplugs to relieve at least some of the pain. Pre-earplug assemblies were particularly horrendous. I had ringing in my ears for hours. I nearly got hit by a car once, which was 2% my own ignorance, and 98% the fault of the assembly for causing massive ear-ringing and thus annihilating my sense of hearing.

2. They’re uncomfortable. All of my friends inevitably complain of back pain, butt pain, or both after an assembly. Last year I was lucky enough to get a seat right at the very top of the bleachers, right against the wall, but I had been to a couple of assemblies when it was just me sitting on my ass for an hour and a half with nothing to lean against when I felt like going to sleep.

3. They’re forced. They put more effort into making sure kids don’t skip assemblies than making sure kids don’t skip regular school. It’s stupid as hell. You never see guards manning the doorways during regular school hours, just before an assembly. You can’t even check out of school. Freshman year, they let me check out before every assembly ("my fragile ears...") but sophomore year, the authority figures decided they weren’t being idiotic enough, so they wouldn’t even let anyone check out. I couldn’t even get my dad to call in and let me check out. I had to find different ways of skipping sophomore year. Once we had a substitute teacher eighth hour, so I used a travel pass and left school in the middle of eight hour; there were hall monitors outside, and they saw me, but I was actually still somewhat in shape then so I ran about a quarter of a mile out of the way and avoided them. Another time, I went to the bathroom that was connected between the gymnasium and cafeteria; the door between the bathroom and the cafeteria was unlocked, so I just went in the bathroom through the gym, out through the cafeteria, and ran home (there were no hall monitors in front of the cafeteria doors for some reason).

4. They’re a waste of time. Every assembly is the same thing. National anthem. School song. Band. Cheerleaders. Sports teams. Pom-pom team. SGaG. Then fifty other dance teams that all suck like mad, and get really tedious to sit through after an hour and a half. All to get us revved up about school spirit and crap, even though I usually hate Horlick even more after an assembly.

5. The Spirit Horn. Possibly the worst part of the assembly. The cheerleaders go around to each section, ordering each class to run up to the black line and scream their year of graduation as loud as possible, and the class that screams the loudest gets the spirit horn. I think that’s how it works. I’ve never done a spirit horn yet. Usually there’s about five people sitting in the bleachers during spirit horn (I’m one of them), and everyone else congregates to the gym floor and screams like a bunch of monkeys. It’s loud, it’s stupid, it’s insulting. I am not a performing seal. Please people, show some dignity.

6. The "Respect" Speech. The principal gives it out at every assembly. "Respect others, and you can respect yourself." What. Ever. It makes no sense. Just shut up. Now. Shut. Up.

Okay, now my reasons for hating homecoming and spirit week in general. I just do. I don't know why. I do. Maybe it's jealousy. Jealousy that I harbor this deep resentment that keeps me from "living up" senior year by wearing pajamas to school.

I never really understood the concept of "school spirit," sort of like I never really understood patriotism (but that's a little different). Why should I love my school just because I'm forced to go here? It's just a freaking building, for God's sake. It's not even a building I'm particularly proud of. I don't hate this building, but I don't have deep pride for it, either. College might be a different story, because you sort of get to choose where you want to go to college, so it's more like "your" school. (I'm making assumptions here. I have not yet gone to college. If I go to Madison, I doubt I'll have school spirit there, either.)

Every Thursday of homecoming week (shouldn't "homecoming" be a little sooner in the school year, by the way?...) there's a bonfire. I've never been to one of those, either. Kelly actually went yesterday, for kicks and giggles; she told me it sucked. I had friends who went to it last year also, and made the same claim. I remember being particularly amused how it rained during the bonfire last year. Not that I'm some kind of sadist or anything, I just figured that the school spirit gods weren't looking down on us too fondly for some reason. It must've been really bad. I sorta wish I had gone to that, just so I could laugh about it with my friends twenty years from now.

Anyway... that was my little rant for today. I'm listening to this CD I paid five bucks for (it was one of those "free CD offers" that actually ended up costing me S&H money, so I'm forcing myself to listen to it and get my five bucks worth. Actually, my parents' five bucks worth). The track I'm on right now is "The Bad Touch." This is an interesting song. I think it's sick, I think it's repetitive, and yet, I can't stop listening to it.

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