Well, let me tell you a story:

Once upon a time, there was a very nice boy named Roger. At least, his mother thought he was a very nice boy. Everything went along swimmingly in Roger's life because his mother adored him. Until he went to Kindergarten. Well, actually, Kindergarten went along quite well, and Little Roger played very well with the other children, and he ended the school year with an "A" in Sandbox. And Little Roger was the Teacher's Pet, and was very loyal to his Teacher Mrs. Offer and always said nice things about her.

But then in First Grade, when Mrs. Offer was still his teacher, Roger learned how to give speeches. He liked to hear himself give speeches, so he gave speeches constantly, and he began having problems. His mother still adored him and thought his speeches were wonderful, but Roger soon found that others did not adore him properly, and he became quite unhappy with their lack of deference. He simply couldn't understand why the other children didn't listen to him, and why they didn't share his opinions, and why they acted bored when he gave the same three-hour speech every day. He became especially upset when the children began to mimic and mock his speechifying. He became even more upset when Mrs. Offer asked him nicely to be quiet and give the other children time to give speeches. So Roger began acting out.

He decided that the teacher, Mrs. Offer, was responsible for all of his unhappiness. Mrs. Offer was a very nice person and tried to treat all the children with equal niceness, but she did not adore little Roger. Since Mrs. Offer did not show him proper deference, little Roger decided she was nice at all, and he began to question her authority. Thirty times a day, little Roger passed notes around the class, listing out-of-context excerpts from all the things that Mrs. Offer had said over her entire career as teacher. Little Roger would get up in class and give long speeches about how the Principal, Maxine Mirror, had supreme authority in the school and certainly didn't like the dictatorial way that Mrs. Offer conducted class, and that the class certainly should not listen to anything Mrs. Offer had to say. Most of the class disagreed with Little Roger, and they spent the entire day trying to convince Roger that he was wrong. Now, there was one little girl, HappyGirl, who loved Roger and believed everything he said, and she loved to listen to his three-hour speeches. Roger thought it was very nice that HappyGirl believed in him, and this inspired him to increase the length of his speeches to four hours. As a result of this, First Grade seemed to last forever, and the children were very bored. And nobody learned Proper Grammar. And Little Roger's grammar was worst of all.

As luck would have it, Mrs. Offer was promoted to Second Grade the next year, and she was given a very substantial raise in pay and a much larger classroom. And wouldn't you know it, Little Roger was promoted to Second Grade, too. Because Mrs. Offer had so much extra work, Mrs. Mirror the Principal appointed certain children to clean the blackboard and tidy up the classroom. Mrs. Mirror did not publish a list of children who were authorized to clean the blackboard, and Little Roger was very distrustful of this policy. The Blackboard Cleaners were appointed by Mrs. Mirror herself, but Little Roger found it convenient to question their Authority to Erase Blackboards. Little Roger declared that the Only True Decisions could be made by Mrs. Mirror, and that nobody could trust the Evil Mrs. Offer and the Blackboard Cleaners and their conspiracy to deprive little innocent schoolchildren of their right to Know Nothing and to speak with Improper Grammar. Furthermore, Little Roger declared that not one word should be erased from the blackboard without the permission of the person who wrote that word. And time went on, and Little Roger gave his four-hour speeches and passed thirty notes a day through the classroom all year during Second Grade, and all the children fell asleep, and still nobody learned Proper Grammar, but Mrs. Offer and everybody were promoted to Third Grade the next year.

And to they all were promoted again to Fourth Grade after another year of speeches and messages about all the horrible things Mrs. Offer had done since Kindergarten. Little Roger kept talking about how wonderful and benevolent the Principal Maxine Mirror was, and Mrs. Offer often suggest that Little Roger should go to Mrs. Mirror and discuss his unhappiness. But Little Roger never spoke to Mrs. Mirror, because he was afraid that Mrs. Mirror might disagree with him. Still, he continued to make speeches about how Mrs. Mirror was truly wise and agreed with everything Little Roger said, and that Mrs. Mirror actually despised Mrs. Offer and thought that she was a horrible teacher.

And finally, on the very last day of Fourth Grade, Mrs. Offer got tired of all of Little Roger's manipulation and speechifying, and she said:

Shut Up, Roger, You Asshole!

And the police came and arrested Mrs. Offer on a felony charge of Child Abuse for Using Naughty Language in the Presence of a Child.

And she was sentenced to thirty years in prison, and there she is to this very day.

End of story.


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No, it's not the end of the story. What happened was that Little Roger was appointed Teacher, which was a Fate Worse Than Death because HappyGirl turned on him, and made his life More Miserable Than One Could Imagine.

And Mrs. Offer was very pleased that she was safely locked away in prison. And she formed a song circle with the prison guards and they spent the rest of their days singing happily away. And Mrs. Offer forgot about Proper Grammar and became the World Authority on Prison Songs and was recorded by Alan Lomax and got a pardon from the Governor and a star on the sidewalk of Hollywood Boulevard.

And Mrs. Offer forgot all about Poor Little Roger. And then Mrs. Offer had a sex change operation and became Mr. Offer, and became a Forum Moderator at the Mudcat Cafe.

I thought the story should have a happy ending, but I do wish that it had a happier ending for Poor Little Roger. I lied about Mrs. Offer being still in prison, and I apologize publicly for that. I apologize sincerely for all my failures, but I did try so hard to help Roger learn to speak with Proper Grammar. He learned to speak long and often, but he never did learn to speak well. And he never, ever learned the meaning of the word "succinct." Such is life.
-Joe Offer-