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	<title>BrianHodges.net &#187; being a smart***</title>
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	<link>http://brianhodges.net</link>
	<description>The Blog of Brian Hodges</description>
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		<title>Reading Groups: Defining the Masses</title>
		<link>http://brianhodges.net/2008/12/30/reading-groups-defining-the-masses/</link>
		<comments>http://brianhodges.net/2008/12/30/reading-groups-defining-the-masses/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 30 Dec 2008 21:59:30 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>brian</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[being a kid]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[being a smart***]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[childhood]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[elementary school]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[humor]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[kids]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[reading groups]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[school]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://brianhodges.net/?p=26</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Do they still assign reading groups in school? Personally, I think they were an invaluable part of the learning process. It allowed us to quickly and easily identify all of the "slow people" so that we wouldn’t cheat off them during geography tests. Because inevitably, every group had a mascot, a giveaway. It was either the kid who could already count to a thousand by kindergarten, or the kid who was still drooling because he hadn’t figured out how to keep his bottom lip tucked. By association, you were able to pigeonhole every other kid in that group.

Reading groups were always given cutesy animal names based on the textbook you were reading. Since my first grade book was called "Travelling the Trade Winds," my group was The Trade Wind Tigers. Everyone knew that we were the smart group as much as they knew that The Getting Ready Rabbits (their book was "Getting Ready to Read") was the "‘tard group." Hey, we were mean little six-year-olds and they didn’t start teaching sensitivity until third grade. Fifth grade for the Rabbits.]]></description>
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		<title>The Alternative to Classroom Violence</title>
		<link>http://brianhodges.net/2008/12/30/the-alternative-to-classroom-violence/</link>
		<comments>http://brianhodges.net/2008/12/30/the-alternative-to-classroom-violence/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 30 Dec 2008 21:37:43 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>brian</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[being a kid]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[being a smart***]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[childhood]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[classroom violence]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[humor]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[kids]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[school shootings]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[science class]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[teachers]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://brianhodges.net/?p=10</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[It’s been awhile since our country’s last school shooting and I fear that the clock is ticking down to yet another Ritalin-saturated kid going berserk and blowing away his teacher or principal. Before that happens, I make this plea to every student in America. "Please stop blowing away your teachers or principals!" Honestly, what has society come to when a kid brings a gun to school and…

Okay, in the interest of journalistic integrity, I'm afraid I must step down from this particular soapbox. That little bout of self-righteousness was actually nothing more than thinly veiled jealousy. The fact is there were plenty of teachers at my high school who I wished somebody would shoot, but nobody ever did! It didn't seem like such an impossible dream considering the fact that everybody in my town owned a gun. Of course, this was rural Maine and most of those guns were hunting rifles—which I suppose were harder to conceal under a varsity jacket.

Hindsight being 20/20 and all, I am glad that nobody ever busted the proverbial cap on some of our more detestable teachers. First of all, I was in a lot of those mean old codgers’ classes, and I mean, hello… ricochet. Second, it took our janitor months to clean up vomit. And third, in the midst of a generation fixated on instant gratification, I was taught a valuable lesson. In situations like these, prolonged torture was often far better revenge than instant death. Pushing a teacher to the edge of sanity by undermining their authority was more priceless than a canister full of bullets.]]></description>
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		<title>Hot Lunch Uprising</title>
		<link>http://brianhodges.net/2008/12/30/hot-lunch-uprising/</link>
		<comments>http://brianhodges.net/2008/12/30/hot-lunch-uprising/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 30 Dec 2008 21:31:51 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>brian</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[being a kid]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[being a smart***]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[cafeteria]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[childhood]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[elementary school]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[hot lunch]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[humor]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[kids]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[rebellion]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://brianhodges.net/?p=3</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[The cooks in our elementary school didn’t take kindly to criticism. They yelled and made us spend recess inside with our heads down whenever we complained about the burnt pizza, hairs in our yogurt or rubbery meat in the spaghetti sauce. It had gotten so bad that by Christmas of fifth grade, our teacher forced me and my trouble-maker friends to write the cooks a formal apology. We drew happy pictures of ourselves eating cafeteria food under inscriptions like, “I’m sorry I said your meatloaf tasted like Play-doh… From now on I’ll just pick around the brown lettuce… My mom told me it was just a stomach flu.”]]></description>
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		<title>Would you like retards with that?</title>
		<link>http://brianhodges.net/2008/02/27/would-you-like-retards-with-that/</link>
		<comments>http://brianhodges.net/2008/02/27/would-you-like-retards-with-that/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 27 Feb 2008 21:50:43 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>brian</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[being a ridiculous human being]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[being a smart***]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[happy meal]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[humor]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[kids]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[mcdonalds]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[parenting]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[stupid people]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://brianhodges.net/?p=212</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[There are many reasons why I never ever ever eat at McDonald&#8217;s, not the least of which being I start farting about halfway through my burger and then don&#8217;t stop for about three and a half days. But also, I just find it utterly depressing that I have to deal with an entire team of [...]]]></description>
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		<title>Really?</title>
		<link>http://brianhodges.net/2007/12/03/really/</link>
		<comments>http://brianhodges.net/2007/12/03/really/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 03 Dec 2007 21:33:05 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>brian</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[being a grownup]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[being a kid]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[being a parent]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[being a ridiculous human being]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[being a smart***]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[bing crosby]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[britney spears]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[childhood]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[christmas music]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[geo metro]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[hotdogs]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[humor]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[humvee]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[kids]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[maine]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[parenting]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[ramen]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[tofu]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[whole foods]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[whoopie pies]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://brianhodges.net/?p=205</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[I saw a Humvee in the parking lot of Whole Foods today. Weird. I realized today that I don&#8217;t really like most Christmas music and haven&#8217;t since I was a kid. Actually I realized that a few years ago, but I figured out WHY today. As a kid, Christmas music is fun mostly because you&#8217;re [...]]]></description>
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		<item>
		<title>Put a lead-based sock in it, Boomers</title>
		<link>http://brianhodges.net/2007/11/04/put-a-lead-based-sock-in-it-boomers/</link>
		<comments>http://brianhodges.net/2007/11/04/put-a-lead-based-sock-in-it-boomers/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sun, 04 Nov 2007 21:26:40 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>brian</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[being a grownup]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[being a kid]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[being a ridiculous human being]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[being a smart***]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[baby boomers]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[generation]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[humor]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[rant]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://brianhodges.net/?p=203</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[I received this email forward from an older relative. Even though I can appreciate where the writer is coming from, and even tend to agree with a lot of its sentiment, for some reason it just hacked me off. It&#8217;s a typical &#8220;Our generation is better than the new generation&#8221; tirade, which acknowledges all the [...]]]></description>
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		<title>Shooting little kids RULES!</title>
		<link>http://brianhodges.net/2007/10/19/shooting-little-kids-rules/</link>
		<comments>http://brianhodges.net/2007/10/19/shooting-little-kids-rules/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 19 Oct 2007 21:08:05 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>brian</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[being a grownup]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[being a parent]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[being a ridiculous human being]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[being a smart***]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[american gladiators]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[giggleberry]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[humor]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[kids]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[peddlers village]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://brianhodges.net/?p=199</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[I am whooped. The fam and I just got back from a place in Pennsylvania called Peddler&#8217;s Village. It&#8217;s a very toursity place where people go to buy lots of crap that they don&#8217;t really need. Fortunately we didn&#8217;t go for that reason. You see they also have a mini-amusement park for kids called Giggleberry [...]]]></description>
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		<title>We Are the MySpace Generation&#8230; and we could care less</title>
		<link>http://brianhodges.net/2006/11/02/we-are-the-myspace-generation-and-we-could-care-less/</link>
		<comments>http://brianhodges.net/2006/11/02/we-are-the-myspace-generation-and-we-could-care-less/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 02 Nov 2006 20:19:00 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>brian</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[being a consumer of media]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[being a grownup]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[being a ridiculous human being]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[being a smart***]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[baby boomers]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[election]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[generation x]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[generation y]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[myspace]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[voting]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://brianhodges.net/?p=178</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[I received a rather long internet forward on my MySpace bulletin board this week which basically said, &#8220;Hey couch potato, make sure you vote next Tuesday!&#8221; Like most forwards that don&#8217;t involve filling out surveys or watching videos of indie rock bands on treadmills, I gave it only a quick skim before devoting my attention [...]]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
		</item>
		<item>
		<title>Reduce, Reuse, Re-Detonate</title>
		<link>http://brianhodges.net/2006/08/26/reduce-reuse-re-detonate/</link>
		<comments>http://brianhodges.net/2006/08/26/reduce-reuse-re-detonate/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sat, 26 Aug 2006 17:51:02 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>brian</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[being a consumer of media]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[being a smart***]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[bombs]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[humor]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[news]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[recycling]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://brianhodges.net/?p=149</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[I read a story in USA Today yesterday (actually &#8220;story&#8221; is too big a word, this was more of a blurb buried in the margins) about a series of explosions that occurred inside a bomb recycling plant in Louisiana this week. Okay, first of all, in this spectacle-fueled society, why was that one not all [...]]]></description>
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		<item>
		<title>Russel Crowe had nothing on these guys</title>
		<link>http://brianhodges.net/2006/06/18/russel-crowe-had-nothing-on-these-guys/</link>
		<comments>http://brianhodges.net/2006/06/18/russel-crowe-had-nothing-on-these-guys/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sun, 18 Jun 2006 22:15:11 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>brian</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[being a consumer of media]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[being a kid]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[being a smart***]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[80's]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[american gladiators]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[humor]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[reality TV]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[television]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[TV]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://brianhodges.net/?p=123</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[You know what TV show I used to love as a kid? American Gladiators. What an awesome show that was. To a ten-year-old boy, that show was like gym class for superheroes. I mean you had dodgeball, except the balls in this case were fired at you from a high speed canon while you shot [...]]]></description>
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