pretty rain makes you smile

"September 24, 2002

Dear Mrs. Jacobs:

After careful review and consideration of your reasons for requesting an exemption from the School Uniform Policy #5150.1 for your child, a decision has been made regarding your request. The policy requires that the person requesting the exemption show he/she wants an exemption due to religious or a strongly-held belief, described as "a philosophy or set of moral principles that guides a person's decision about his/her life or lifestyle." The explanations provided in your written statements submitted on August 12, 14 and September 23, 2002, and expressed in our conversation of September 23, 2002, do not meet the requirements for exemption. Your allowing your children to wear uniforms for one venue but not for another demonstrates inconsistency and, therefore, does not qualify as a strongly held belief. Consequently, I am denying your request for exemption from this policy. If you wish to pursue your request further, you should contact the Mmphis City Schools office of the Board of Commissioners for a final ruling of your appeal (325-5447).
If I can be of further assistance to you, feel free to contact me. We thank you for your continued support and look forward to your children having a successful year.

Sincerely,
Dr. Richard Potts, Director
Zone 2 Schools"

so they denied me because mom put that i'd warn a uniform in the past on the little exemption form thing. i am incredibly upset with both of them. i don't think that wearing the goddam band uniform for one fucking day constitutes checking "yes" for "has your children worn any uniform in the past?" or whatever the damn question was. actually mom thinks that they denied it because morgan is wearing the uniform (after being bullied into it) and i'm the one requesting the exemption. either way it's ridiculous and i'm pissed off.
sticky rain steals my smile.

what matters is your uniform

well blogger just deleted my post and i'm really annoyed. it's taken me a while to come back and redo it but. at the time, mom had just come home (and gone back to work) with news of the "meeting." it turned out that she hadn't even had time to come by the house and get me. i'm really glad we didn't go film it. the anti-meeting consisted of mom giving the guy a (new) note, him reading it, and saying that they'd get back to us. mom did not seem very hopeful about it. she thinks she focused on all the wrong things. i'm going to post her note and you can tell me what you think:

"My concerns are:

1. The authoritarian atmosphere created by the school uniforms policy. Perhaps students are better behaved; they are also less exuberant.
2. The "us" versus "them" attitude promoted by the wearing of uniforms.
3. The increasingly "conformist" attitude towards thinking in classes. The school uniform policy is, contrary to what the school administrators say, fostering an attitude of "we should all think alike." This is especially troubling to me since Memphis, in contrast to other places I have lived, is a city that does not tolerate diversity of opinion well. The schools should be fostering individual thinking, not succumbing to peer pressure.

I have supported my daughter's decision to pursue exemption from the school uniform policy precisely because I believe that at fifteen, she should be learning how to think independently. I have encouraged her to make her own decisions, and not to follow the crowd. If I backed out now, what would I be teaching her? I believe that the process she is experiencing right now is an invaluable lesson about how the world works, regardless of what the outcome is. I am only sorry to see what she seems to be learning is that people in power aren't always thinking people, and that people in power sometimes use that power to bully others. A few teachers and administrators have seen the school uniform policy as an opportunity to throw their weight around.

While this policy may work in the short term, studies show it will not have any great long-term effects. We seem to be focused on the short term that we are risking the life lessons our children should be learning. Learning to make appropriate decisions about clothing would be better than instituting a narrow uniform policy.

4. The Memphis City School Board did not follow recommended procedures for implmenting the policy. There was no discussion with parent and teacher groups before this policy was established. The arbitrary notion that a school uniform policy would improve our scools is fallacious. School uniforms should be part of an in-depth adjustment of school environments.

Thank you for allowing my voice, and my daughter's voice, to be heard.

Leslie Jacobs and Alanna Stewart."

you wiped the floor with victory

i wish. i am upset because mom is supposed to be here. well i'm sure that what happened is that when she came by here, dad had not brought me home yet, so she left without me, to go to our Board meeting about my uniform exemption. the case will not be NEARLY as hopeful without me there, or without a statement written by me there. i was going to do that but i decided it would be better if i was there. and obviously i am not, since it is almost 3:30 and i'm at home. this is quite distressing. i feel useless.

she's got the hottest trike in town
and you know she does. today was superstar day and i was kathleen hanna. i could have done a really good job, like if i decided to be her for halloween or something. i could get some temporary hair dye and some makeup and. i would write 'slut' really big on my stomach, instead of tiny. which is what i did today. just that and i wore my bikini kill shirt. lol nobody even asked who i was, and becca was the only person who i showed my slutiness to, but i don't think anyone else would have gotten it anyway.

been rubbing a bad charm with holy fingers

so weekend. on friday, brittany and i had wanted to do something but she stayed home for waiting Button Boy to get online or call her or something along the lines of communication, which he did not. by the time i think she may have wanted to do something, i had made plans to go out with elise, robin, and brock. however, they never came to pick me (or brock) up. apparently elise and robin went on a walk and lost track of time or something. i went to bed fairly early.
on saturday, the first thing i did in the morning was listen to our lovely Launch radio station so i suggest that you should to. it's pretty good. i can't exactly perfect it because i'm trying to only rate songs that we've done previously for music log. at some point, margaret graves called and asked if i was going to the cooper-young festival. no, i had not left yet at 1pm because brittany couldn't get a ride and i couldn't get in touch with laylee. margaret and i met at java cabana and watched part of Mutant Space Bats of Doom's show or whatever theyre called. i think that's about right. the band is bennett foster, zak baker, linton holiday, and hunter deacon. ask me about getting some stills, since i filmed a bit of it. (a very little bit.) but still. i found laylee, becca, katherine, and meg but i didnt really keep up with them. when i first saw laylee she hugged me HUGE and philip jacobson stared. it made me very happy. we were everywhere. margaret and i were trying to get some hardcore club footage. katherine was JUST ABOUT to go over and interview them (with my lovely questions) but they fucking left. it was terrible. of course, laylee and becca went with them so there went the party. we should have stalked them, i'm so serious. so we got a few random people to say "i hate the hardcore club" and that was great enough in itself. margaret and i sat in java cabana for a while and just talked and that was really nice. that makes me want to hang out with her (and meg and katherine warren and christie and heather) more often. at some point we walked to felix to meet my mom, who took us to auditions for the upcoming play, the momo's curse (by our own voice) at theatreworks. margaret said she really enjoyed the auditions (which are not real auditions) but that she thought she'd done a terrible job dancing. i can't say if it's true or not because i didn't see her (ehoaoeieowooiwi i'm terrible). her dad picked her up, and my mom dropped morgan and i back off at cooper-young festival for an hour because i wanted to see if anyone i knew was still there, which they were not. except for zak, who morgan talked to. it might have been more interesting if i had remembered to bring the camera that time but i had not. and then maybe if we'd had anything to eat besides cokes (in bottles!) but we did not. mom picked us up on tanglewood (we'd been sitting there watching this great dog jump practically over his fence) and we ate backyard burger. mom said that elise had called, wanting to know if i could come with them to cooper-young and mom said they were probably already there but i hadnt seen them obviously. when we got home, i called kevin's cell (amusing that they'd be together. jesus i really do treat them like they're married.) and he was just pulling up at elise's house, so i talked to her and she invited morgan and i to come watch the royal tennenbaums with her, brock, and kevin at his house. i accepted of course and it was gala event. for those of you who care, elise's hair is now Super Blond. after the movie (which i loved for the third time) kevin drove us home because he's the sweetest thing. i stayed up too late just sitting around online.
sunday when i woke up, we went to the second auditions for momo's curse. katherine was there and that was happy. afterwards i sat around online a good bit and then did my homework. the end.
today... well this week at school is spirit week so today was Wear What You Want Day. i was going to wear the uniform because it would have been ghastly funny but i don't have one. so i just wore jeans (surprise, surprise) and my bob & doug mckenzie shirt because they are my idols. margaret gave me back my comet gain cd. meg has my sleater-kinney one beat, becca still has doolittle by the pixies (which i desperately miss), and elise STILL has dig me out by sleater-kinney. margaret was reenacting her massive fall from this morning, at lunch today, with my backpack. and when she slung it over her head and made it fly she brutally crushed my comet gain cd case but thats ok becuase i'm sure there's an extra one somewhere. also at lunch, ted link came and sat down at our table but he only talked to sam (jazz band drummer guy that i think katherine warren likes) so that was really crazy. actually hardcore was brought up somehow and he said that he'd STARTED IT! meg asked if we could make a documentary about it but i dont think he heard and that completely sucks.

did you know that rachel haden (bassist of That Dog) sings backup on jimmy eat world? i love that shit.
in other news, i am head over heels in love.

you make me wanna dance

i had a lot of stuff planned out to say about my week. it's been really weird. but i'm not really in the mood. i just kinda wanted to post on friday the 13th. i can try though. uh.
monday was mediocore.
tuesday was reallly really bad. i felt terrible and everything that happened was awful.
wednesday was pretty shitty school-wise, but ... interesting to say the least, people-wise.
thursday was great at school, believe it or not, but after i got home it was downhill from there. i got less than two hours of sleep, therefore
friday was good. i was wired all day.
i went to davis-kidd after school on tuesday and this girl who i used to have second period with (her schedule changed like.. the day before) said hi but i couldnt think of anything interesting or conversational to say until after she left, though she did wave in the hall after sixth period on wednesday. and right after that, christie and katherine warren said hi. it was amazing. three people in three minutes! wow! i felt so popular. and believe me i was, OH I WAS. i talked to ted link a couple times and heard people talk bad about him a couple times and i have no idea what to make of the guy seriously. it's incredibly confusing. ted, if you're out there (wahahha) talk to me more so i can get a goddam grasp on your tedness. he said one thing to my face that annoyed me. i was standing with him, becca, and laylee and being my usual stupid-ass self and he said something like how i was so different from last year and i said i'd always been this way. he said, "but you just didn't have a chance to show it till now?" or something like that and i couldnt explain really. i still don't "show" it, it just depends who i'm around. i also heard some pretty ungood stuff about him and i heard that he did some pretty creepy stuff (even stuff including me, believe it or not)
on a much more interesting note, i uploaded brittany, morgan, and my music video so watch it now!!!!!

GOD

and when you're near, no sky was ever quite as clear

i stayed home from school today. my throat is murderous. morgan, brittany, and i spent the weekend shooting and editting footage for the "get up" (song by sleater-kinney) video that morgan is directing. i would upload five seconds of it for you, i really would, but there is no server right now. so instead. you can download the song here and imagine all the great things we are doing with it.
in other news, i'm probably going to have to wear the uniform. i am very pissed off but i am glad that i at least tried.
in other other news, i just listened to the plumb cd and i like it even less than i did when i first got it.
if anyone knows where to get nice, free blog layouts/skins/templates/whatevers... please direct me. thank you.

satan sucks, but you're the best

well it sure has been a while. i don't really know what to say though. last week was pretty average. i got a note every single day (and this week too, so far) for not wearing the uniform. i am literally going to start a collection, put them on the wall in frames or something. last weekend was the first annual memphis digital film festival, which, as you should know, katherine submitted our short movie "romeo and juliet revisited" to. it was received fairly well, i thought. better than i had expected, what with it being shown to the indie artsy underground crowd. in fact, it was reshown on sunday as a Notable Film so that was very exciting. katherine had been giving out flyers at school for two weeks, but only melissa tuttle, alice buchanan, and elise(!) came, besides the cast (katherine, brittany, morgan, and i) and laylee. plus my parents and katherine's dad. and katherine's friend leah and her folks. but that's beside the point. real life quotes from living, breathing indie artsy types:
"...one of the biggest accomplishments of the festival." - morgan fox
"you guys kicked everybody's ass." - khyber daniel

and i can't really remember anything else but a lot of people came up and said how entertaining it was or something, and how cool or whatever. so brittany came over to my house on friday night to discover a banner that said "HAPPY DAY DAY" in purple. it was supposed to say just "happy day" because it was supposed to be a belated birthday banner. and we also had a cake for her and morgan gave her a cd by the peechees as a present (my parent's later gave her a film festival shirt). kevin and elise and robin were there and we all went to sonic and stayed there for a while and freaked some people out by being loud when kevin's window and little moon roof or whatever it's called were open. and they had my dig me out sleater-kinney cd in the car so that was awesome. laylee was supposed to join us but she had a family dinner and by the time she called and stuff she said she could get dropped off wherever we were, but she couldnt get a ride home and since the car was full, the plans didnt work out. it was quite sad. we went to black lodge and walked around cooper-young, as usual. brittany spent the night at my house. we watched rat race. the next day was the film festival, which i've already discussed in part. aside from our movie, we saw several other shorts (some of them were ok) linley's husband's movie, normal to oily which was ok, and one of the worst movies i have ever seen, called voices from the high school which was the most excruciating 72 minutes i have ever spent outside of school. it was an elongated version of one of this shitty movies they play in health class to talk about teen problems and suicide and sex and drugs and abuse. it was wretched. we literally ran out after that but we should have probably stayed for the next one, or at least to hear the man talk about the movie and let him ask us if we liked it and be able to say "TERRIBLE, EVIL MAN. DON'T QUIT YOUR DAY JOB." and anyway the next movie had something to do with this band called lucero that i know meg likes. (they're local.) we all came home and i gave laylee her birthday present (in part. i didn't have a chance to burn any cds for her yet and i still feel terrible that i couldn't find any cds she wanted.) we ate pizza and watched this punk music documentary. there was a segment about how much reggae influenced punk, but they went on and on about reggae itself and it lasted way too long. i felt kind of cheated. but there was some really great patti smith stuff and sex pistols footage. and i liked hearing the ramones talk and listening to their outrageous accents. we went to this "party" at the hi-tone, which you got into free if you had a pass for the film festival. it was not a party at all. just some free food on a table, really loud boring music, and ... pool. so we left after what felt like 10 seconds but dad's car clock said 45 minutes. it was creepy. then laylee and brittany and i were joking about how we should make a video about the White Station Hardcore Club and we "moshed" with ourselves and brittany damaged my tooth. back at home, laylee's mom came and took her away and brittany and i stayed up for like three or four hours longer than we meant to, talking. morgan's friend sara also spent the night. on sunday brittany slept incredibly late and practically right after she woke up, katherine called us and told us about our movie getting replayed. so we all went to that "did a Q&A" afterwards. the family left but katherine, brittany, and i stayed to watch the rest of the movies. this week has been boring. the end.

ted link likes my bikini kill shirt.

she didn't leave until the last flame died

yesterday mom and i went to maggie's pharm. then dad and i went to legba records and last chance records. i am in love with all three of those places. i am in love with midtown. forever. maggie's pharm has candles and incense and smelly stuff and earrings and greeting cards and all these things. legba records is pretty small, it didn't take long to go through all their cds. they have a bigger vinyl selection. apparently, the guy who runs the store (who IS the staff) was acknowledged by the white stripes before a concert they did. wow. he saw me eyeing this signed promotional sleater-kinney poster on the wall and told me that he'd gotten the new album in just that day. and he sold it to me early!! it doesn't come out until tuesday! i also got the first sleater-kinney album, which i had never seen until yesterday and it was really cheap too, for a new cd. the nice man also gave me a FREE. SIGNED. SLEATER-KINNEY POSTER, which i am going to get framed, i swear to god. i also picked up a couple other free posters. (mary timony, yeah yeah yeahs, mecca normal, and something for laylee.) then we went to last chance records which was just this little room literally CRAMMED with stuff. much more unorganized than legba. they had a huge vinyl section too, but many more cds. they also had a bunch of different sections, including a seperate 'punk' section. the first thing that caught my eye was the brand new bonfire madigan 88 ep which you can only get online. so i had to buy it of course but it was too expensive, for just five songs. then i started looking for a cd for laylee's birthday (because turtle's had sold what i wanted to get her.) during that, i accidentally found back to go by the third sex and the need's first album. i have literally never seen those and i just had to get them. of course, now i am eternally in debt to my father because i also got one more gift cd. if you are laylee you should probably not read this, but i couldn't find ANYTHING that you want. i am hoping that you have gotten them already or at least some money to buy those cds with. i'm sorry. i could have gone to another store to get one of those but 1. i had already spent all my money and more 2. i already had a gift. and i'm going to burn you all these things that i got. the woman behind the counter at last chance was awesome. she told me that she has both of the need's albums, and that she listens to the other one more. she told me that she was going to order that one too so that i could come buy it. or somebody could. she also said she'd order team dresch but i told her i had both those albums, so i don't know if she's still planning to do that. when i got home i called brittany but her mom said that she was in town (meaning memphis) with her dad at some karate thing. that made me mad because if she'd called before she left, we could have done something and she could have spent the night. she got back home like five minutes later and called me back. her parents didnt want to drive her back in, and my parents didnt either. so i don't get to give her the rest of her present (i already gave her signed books over the summer) and i don't get to see laylee at all. anyway later last night i went to kevin's house (morgan actually came too). him, his friend eddie, elise, lauren, morgan, and i watched monty python and the holy grail and pulp fiction. it was an ... interesting double feature. i'd seen pulp fiction once and monty python about a million billion times. it was nice getting to see kevin, elise, and lauren again and eating all of kevin's chex mix. today i listened to a cd by the dead milkmen that heather hyden loaned me and i really like it. it's their Best Of cd, but it's incredibly short! (less than a half hour.) and that is remotely annoying no matter how much i like it.

maybe it's a trick of the lightlast night kevin, elise, robin, and lauren picked me up around 7 and we met elise's friend hank on the corner of cooper and young. we walked to black lodge and stayed there until 10. unless i misunderstood what hank said, he is a dirty liar and i hate him. (i THINK he told me that he was in the play ephemera. my sister and dad were. he was not.) it was mostly good times. a few times i kind of just sat there and stared blankly at the walls. they were showing this AWFUL video called "backyard fight clubs" were rednecks beat each other up. it sucked, but hank kept making stupid comments about how amateur people were or whatever. how fake it was. kevin is very nice, which i obviously knew already but he sat with me for part of the time. he wrote "MAB!" and my name in japanese on my arms, sang in japanese, and created my theme song, which we decided should play on a tape recorder in my pocket every time i walk into a room. elise, robin, and lauren got to talk to joe a good deal, while he sat with them on the couch. meanwhile, kevin and hank talked to this guy trying to sell his ticket to burning man and i just sat there and listened. as usual. we met a regular named eric who does the best ozzy osbourne impression i have ever heard.

the ship is sinking

one of the things about uniforms that's good and bad at the same time is that i feel like people are proving themselves. now i can see who is REALLY who. so i guess uniforms kind of are an equalizer.
my discovery:
everyone is either a shithead or theyre scared.
one thing that is really depressing, for me, is that all these people who are supposed to be the "punks" and all this are wearing the uniform. now i know punk and i know that punks would not stand for that. so all these people that i knew were punk poseurs and people that i thought might be cool and some punk kinda people that still might be cool are not even who i thought they were. as a punk poseur, i thought that hunter thompson would absolutely refuse to wear the uniform and go around with his hair dyed purple or something, but it's the same gross bleach blond. and then people like ted link that i KNOW have GOT to be remotely awesome are wearing the fucking uniform, even if they are wearing ties along with it. everybody that i thought was against conforming and all this. jesus. it just kills me. how can they live with themselves?! going around listening to rancid and the dead kennedys and operation ivy and the bouncing souls and all this and not even being able to rebel against a uniform. well if the uniform thing ever does pass over, i sure don't want to see another "rebel" shirt ever again.

happy birthday, laylee. this post was not meant to offend you of all people, damn it.

rain falls on everyone

i just realized that i haven't even talked about school yet. so uh. let's see. monday was the first day - a half day. it was sick. everyone, as in EVERYONE that i laid my eyes on, was wearing uniforms. if you don't know, uniforms consist of white, grey, or dark green collared, button-down, tucked-in polo shirts and black, khaki, or navy "slacks" with belts for guys. for more details go here. and also, if you don't know, my friends and i have been complaining and protesting uniforms since they day the board voted. and for your information, i am the only person i know who is not wearing them. yes. i guess i have turned into a rebel. the first day, i wore jeans and my sleater-kinney shirt. a girl standing with madison young told me that she liked my shirt, but i don't know if she actually likes s-k or if she just liked the fact that i wasn't wearing the uniform. no random people have said anything about it except for a guy who just read my shirt out loud as i passed by on the second day ("the dishes.") and i have no idea what that statement was supposed to do. some people that i talk to ask him why i'm not wearing it ("why should i?! i don't want to") or how i'm not wearing it ("i just didn't wear it.") or if i've got exempt ("uhh... not yet.") and i think the main reason none of my teachers have said anything yet is because it isn't going to be enforced until september 3, according to the newspaper and the board. actually, my homeroom teacher mr. starron, on the first day, said to me while giving me my schedule, "you know that's not uniform." and i told him that i knew. then during his lovely Beginning Of The Year speech, he said (OBVIOUSLY directed at me) that he would not tolerate students not wearing the uniform and that he wouldn't let us in class if we weren't wearing it. so when i was leaving class, he stopped me and said "make sure you wear the uniform tomorrow." and i told him that i didn't believe in it. i'm very proud of myself for that. i think the thing with me not wearing the uniform makes me somewhat braver because i'm openly me ALL the time and people can see it. and i can't get away with being shy or anything because i'm sticking out like a sore thumb. and it's what they expect of me now, too. like they used to expect me to be so quiet and good and whatever and now i'm like. a juvenile delinquent. aside from s-k and the dishes, i've worn my ani difranco shirt and this black polo i bought to be ironic, but i don't think anyone got it. they just thought i forgot that we couldnt wear black or something. katherine asked me if i was caving in. so much for sarcasm. my geography teacher finally realized today that i wasn't wearing the uniform and i thought it was funny because today i was wearing the most blendie shirt.
browning: are we not wearing the uniform today?
me: no
browning: are we ever going to wear it?
me: no
browning: why not?
me: i don't believe in it and my parents don't believe in it.
and i couldn't tell if she was getting at something or if she hates me now or anything because she was just smiling away the whole time.
it's very nice because i can actually look forward to seeing some people at school. i have faces to look for in the halls and people to sit with at lunch. people that i actually LIKE and i'm really looking forward to getting to know them really well. another thing too is that a lot of these people seem very music-oriented so i can't wait to slap them with my tastes and borrow some CDs. in fact, last night i burned both albums by the pixies for both meg and brock. i have no idea how they will handle it, but brock said he likes to listen to things he's never heard of and i know that meg has heard bands she likes mention the pixies because everyone loves them. including me. don't know about you, but i am un chien andalusia.

Homeroom - Starron - 25 - with crappy people and a mean teacher
Unified Geometry Honors - Underwood - 224 - with nobody that i really know. becca foerhing
Pre-AP English - Douglas - 034 - katherine dohan, margaret graves
Geography Honors - Browning - 35 - nobody really. amanda trenshaw
Latin II Honors - Haughton - 11 - meg kerr, nina verevkina, ima paydar, melissa tuttle, dan ying liu, jenny luo, frankie blalock, hunter thompson
Etymology - Blankinship - 14 - meg, melissa, frankie
Biology Honors - Tate - 226 - heather hyden

tightrope and so on the wanting edge"There is no justice in a world where the Strokes are so highly feted, yet the Gossip are virtually unheard of." i just got that from somebody's grrrl punk listmania list on amazon. i've decided to start saying that constantly, replacing band names where appropiate. but the part about the strokes is what's so great so i probably won't have to change that bit. anyway thats going to be my new response to "WHO?"

school kills.

Nabikichan086: if i were a childrens book author, i would be high
Nabikichan086: allll the time

Nabikichan086: "lana's funny" (kevin) "she reminds me of a little elf" (me) "a little elf! that's a wonderful thing to say about lana!" (kevin)

aLittleStarlight: how was school today
aLittleStarlight: did you see morgan
PINKDIMND: a little
PINKDIMND: once going from like 5th to 6th or somethign
aLittleStarlight: did she say anything about band
PINKDIMND: no
PINKDIMND: she didnt talk much
PINKDIMND: just said SARA!
PINKDIMND: and then the mob washed her away
aLittleStarlight: nooooooo
aLittleStarlight: WOOSH went morgan
aLittleStarlight: there she blows
aLittleStarlight: and she never came home again
PINKDIMND: horribel aint it?

I am trying to imagine them as they were
It is a hard thing to resee 2,000 people
It is a hard thing to explain colors to black & white
Even the ones I respected
have turned out to be lemmings
I knew I was alone
but not this alone
Everyone claimed to be upset
But there they are
In khaki
I am shivering in my blue
The cold makes my veins more distinct
Will they punish me for that too?
Will they arrest my goosebumps?
The longer I am here
The more I want to
Scream
The windows are the only things smiling
I am no different from you
Stand up

school starts tomorrow. can you guess how excited i am? hooray. go spartans.
it seems i will be the only one un-uniformed.