In Texas School, Teachers Carry Books and Tranquilizer Darts

Inspired by this article, and (of course), Mango (who else gives me such bad ideas?).

PODONK, Texas – Students in this town spend most of the first two days of school trying to steal tranquilizer darts to shoot their buddies.

“It’s a small town,” John Doe, a junior said. “We’ll get them eventually.”

The school board in this rural hamlet has drawn national attention with its decision to force teachers to carry blow-guns and tranquilizer darts.

The darts are certified by the FDA as non-lethal weapons, but some parents are still worried.

Mr. Johnson said the board discussed the proposal and considered several options —paintball guns, security guards, and baseball bats — but each was found lacking.

Today I wandered in to Palo Alto, finished Midnight's Children, and saw the following notable things:

Muddy water in the creek (usually it's dry as dust), a toddler girl with my haircut and bright blue eyes who was referred to by her mother as "short, wobbly one", a man with a single pink and white rose, waiting waiting waiting for someone who never came (I hope she or he or they came eventually!), a dangling, thorny vine that I believe belonged to blackberries, a jungle-gym turned into disney palace with turrets, a rock-climbing wall, and everything, and a key abandoned on the side of the street.

Midnight's Children had a transformative effect on me. I guess... when I finished reading it, I looked up and was surprised that I was still in California, sitting outside a Borders, and that it was still day out, and that I was still undeniably me. Almost like that last disintegrating scene is something that happens on a visceral level, and I fully expected to be caught in the last image of crushing crowds and splintering person forever, as if I was the one who was splintering under the weight of my past my culture my family. But I looked up, and everything was still basically as it was, and it surprised me.

I need to read more books like that.