Ok, I admit it, this is a quick way to post a blog without much work. The ol’ bloviator is just run ragged right now, what with giving talks he never should have agreed to and trying like crazy to get the belongings of I and my beloved Missus under the same roof with us in Athens. I promise that more of my incredible insights about the campaign will be up shortly, and I deeply regret that so many of you will just have to keep gnawing your fists until then. In the meantime, here’s what we oft-maligned and unappreciated teachers are up against. (A “Thank you very kindly” goes out to my comical sociologist sidekick, John Shelton Reed, for sending this along.)
Every year, English teachers from across the USA can submit their
collections of actual analogies and metaphors found in high school essays.
Here are last year's winners.
1. Her face was a perfect oval, like a circle that had its two sides gently
compressed by a Thigh Master.
2. His thoughts tumbled in his head, making and breaking alliances like
underpants in a dryer without Cling Free.
3. He spoke with the wisdom that can only come from experience, like a guy
who went blind because he looked at a solar eclipse without one of those
boxes with a pinhole in it and now goes around the country speaking at high
schools about the dangers of looking at a solar eclipse without one of those
boxes with a pinhole in it.
4. She grew on him like she was a colony of E. Coli, and he was
room-temperature Canadian beef.
5. She had a deep, throaty, genuine laugh, like that sound a dog makes just
before it throws up.
6. Her vocabulary was as bad as, like, whatever.
7. He was as tall as a six-foot, three-inch tree.
8. The revelation that his marriage of 30 years had disintegrated because of
his wife's infidelity came as a rude shock, like a surcharge at a formerly
surcharge-free ATM machine.
9. The little boat gently drifted across the pond exactly the way a bowling
ball wouldn't.
10. McBride fell 12 stories, hitting the pavement like a Hefty bag filled
with vegetable soup.
11. From the attic came an unearthly howl. The whole scene had an eerie,
surreal quality, like when you're on vacation in another city and Jeopardy
comes on at 7:00 p.m. Instead of 7:30.
12. Her hair glistened in the rain like a nose hair after a sneeze.
13. The hailstones leaped from the pavement, just like maggots when you fry
them in hot grease.
14. Long separated by cruel fate, the star-crossed lovers raced across the
grassy field toward each other like two freight trains, one having left
Cleveland at 6:36 p.m. Traveling at 55 mph, the other from Topeka at 4:19
p.m. At a speed of 35 mph.
15. They lived in a typical suburban neighborhood with picket fences that
resembled Nancy Kerrigan's teeth.
16. John and Mary had never met. They were like two hummingbirds who had
also
never met.
17. He fell for her like his heart was a mob informant, and she was the East
River.
18. Even in his last years, Granddad had a mind like a steel trap, only one
that had been left out so long, it had rusted shut.
19. Shots rang out, as shots are wont to do.
20. The plan was simple, like my brother-in-law Phil. But unlike Phil, this
plan just might work.
21. The young fighter had a hungry look, the kind you get from not eating
for
a while.
22. He was as lame as a duck. Not the metaphorical lame duck, either, but a
real duck that was actually lame, maybe from stepping on a land mine or
something.
23. The ballerina rose gracefully en Pointe and extended one slender leg
behind her, like a dog at a fire hydrant.
24. It was an American tradition, like fathers chasing kids around with
power tools.
25. He was deeply in love. When she spoke, he thought he heard bells, as if
she were a garbage truck backing up.
If a some of these made you laugh at least a little, here’s something you’ll find REALLY FUNNY! It’s a guy who has actually read my latest book but still likes it. Why is it all the really smart people in this world are writing for alternative newspapers in places like Augusta? On the other hand no place I know needs a really smart person and an alternative newspaper more than Augusta. Maybe he’s doing missionary work there. In any case, he clearly deserves your prayers. A guy this good won’t last long in the newspaper business.
