This was the first time I had been back at NHS during a school day in over two and a half years. I knew nearly none of the current students, given I'm now close to five years removed from my own graduation. And almost none of them knew me. I was only asked once whether or not I was related to that other Carberry who traversed those hallways. We got some good traffic at our table, and a few good leads on joining the Navy. But for me, the morning was more about seeing old familiar faces and catching up.
From checking online and talking to people still closely aligned with NHS, I learned that two acquaintances from the class of '98, only one year ahead of my own, were now teaching at the school. That took a little getting used to. The stunner for me was what happened to the way high schoolers dress. This is one point on which I, at not even 23, get the urge to tell these kids "when I was your age..." And it is both genders. On Wendesday I saw this one kid whose pants were steadily falling down as he walked toward the bathroom. I quipped "when he gets to the urinal, he'll be ready to go." What I saw at Northport was just...well, I'll say this. Not even passing judgment on whether some of the skirts I saw were appropriate for high school wear, it baffled me to see them being worn on 5 February!
Thursday afternoon my recruiter took my leave papers, saying he needed to have them stamped to indicate I had completed my RAP duty. Turned out that wasn't necessary, and I didn't get them back until yesterday afternoon. I did have a photocopy of the chit, and it ended up not being a big deal, but it's good to not have to worry about it anymore.
It's been five days since the release of "Miracle" and I still haven't seen it yet. I had planned to see it Friday night, but it was sold out and the weather here was horrible all day Friday. I would go see it in the afternoon, but I keep getting up at like 1200 or so and if I'm going to see in the afternoon, I'm going to a discounted show. Maybe today.
<plug>"My Boss' Daughter" is absolutely hilarious. Rent it today!</plug>
Last week my mom suggested the possibility of seeing a Broadway show. My first internal reaction to this was "excuse me?"; after which she said, "maybe 'Movin' Out'?" So we're seeing that Thursday night.
<inside joke>Stacey, I'm absolutely miserable on leave.</inside joke>
No, Stacey is not a girlfriend I've been keeping secret. And yes, she is a real person. :-)
NHL all-star game...pretty good. Nice to see Aucoin, the only Islander selected, get a goal. Pro Bowl...better than expected, like they took two AFL teams and brought them to an outdoor field or something, but still my least favorite of the four all-star games (that says something, considering that I really don't get all that excited by the NBA).
Grammys...I only watched a few snippets but I did see Christina's acceptance speech (like her, I'm also glad she could hold it together); 50 Cent's attempt to upstage Evanescence (why would you even want Best New Artist anyway? it's the kiss of death); Coldplay winning Record of the Year (I'm not really a fan of "Clocks", but better they got the award than any of the other nominees); and the Academy president's "stop piracy" speech (that, and the rollout of the accompanying ad campaign, cracked me up).
And finally...Cornell Information Technologies finally got the memo that I'm not a student anymore, and will discontinue my e-mail in a month or so. I've got some unused addresses sitting around (yahoo, wvbr come to mind) that I may turn to. For right now, it's another item on the list of things to completely ignore for the next five days and deal with upon return to Charleston.