The Soapbox Derby
Thinking Inside the Box
August 27th, 2009, 10:18 am · 2 Comments · posted by bbridges
Although not a fan of hockey, there is one aspect of the sport I can really get behind: the penalty box. Break the rules, spend a few minutes cooling your heels and pondering your misdeeds … brilliance.
In fact, life would be a lot better if we could adapt this form of sanction to everyday situations:
* Choose a ringtone so annoying that it causes the ears of innocent bystanders to hemorrhage - five minutes in the penalty box (with no phone privileges).
* Use the “Shave and a Haircut” riff when you knock on someone’s door - one minute in the penalty box.
* Say “knock-knock” when you knock on someone’s door - one hour in the penalty box.
* Ride two inches from someone’s rear bumper when neither of you is named Tony Stewart or Kevin Harvick - ten minutes parked in the penalty box.
* Use a non-word such as “expecially” or “irregardless” - three minutes in the penalty box with a dictionary and “The Elements of Style” by Strunk and White.
If I were running things, there’d be so many people in the box that life would seem like an endless screening of “Cool Hand Luke.”
So what everyday offenses would you like to see punished with a trip to the penalty box? Contemplate, discuss and share.
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She goes, “I saw Mike yesterday.”
I go, “That’s nice. He made me mad.”
She goes, “What did he do?”
I go, “He used the word ‘goes’ when he really meant ‘said’.”
I have a clear understanding that the “weasel goes pop” and that you’re not supposed to “go in your pants”. However, when did the verb go and all its various conjugations morph into the verb say?
Is this solely west coast vernacular, or has it spread continentally? I really want to know!
One year in the penalty box sitting in Mrs. Carolyn Hartung’s ninth grade English class.
One more thing . . . that’s not a true penalty. Thirty years later, I still consider my year with her the cornerstone for everything else that followed. I need to thank her for that.
Thanks for your input, Linda. Going, going, gone!
The teacher who really opened my eyes was Jim Cooke. His freshman English class felt like the grammatical equivalent of boot camp (minus the screaming — he never raised his voice above room temperature), but it was worth every minute. We learned subjects and predicates, diagramming and parsing, but most of all we learned how to build sentences. Mr. Cooke was also a terrific baseball coach. All his students and players owe him an immeasurable debt.