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Saltbox
Thursday, February 17th, 2022 The Saltbox Things we’re salty about Public displays of affection
Eva Johnson
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Public displays of affection, more commonly known as PDA, are the bane of my existence. Well, during school hours at least.
As a senior, I’ve almost made it through the complicated roller coaster called high school, and I’ve learned to deal with the majority of challenges that come with it.
However, one thing that continues to piss me off is the amount of PDA that I’ve witnessed. I don’t care who you are and who you are with. It’s the fact that it’s eight-thirty in the morning, I’m barely awake and I have to walk past three couples that can’t seem to keep their freaking hands off one another.
I only want to walk down the stairs and hallways without being bombarded by love (if that’s what you can call making out in school). I don’t think that’s too much to ask. School is not a place for romance. We are literally learning in a place designed by a prison architect. Is that the kind of romantic environment that high schoolers find appealing?
Get yourself together. Go somewhere scenic, maybe the beach during sunset while you watch and listen to the waves, to up the love factor.
If you are with someone that thinks making out near the high school stairs is sexy, you are one hundred percent settling.
Do not settle. Go find someone who would rather make out at the beach than in a school hallway with people walking by.
It’s utterly ridiculous, and no one cares enough about your relationship to want to see how in love you may be. I’m a bit pessimistic on love, I’m not going to lie, Two students hold hands in the hallway
Eva Johnson/PEPPERBOX
but it doesn’t take away from the fact that seeing people rubbing up against each other when I’m trying to eat my lunch makes me want to vomit. Please let me eat in peace.
If you really need to express your love to each other that badly, maybe write a letter. It’s a lost art and more romantic anyway. After school, I couldn’t give two s**ts about what you do, but if I have to encounter one more couple blocking the hallway because they want to show off, I might scream.
I’m not joking. Be in love as much as you want, but don’t force me to endure it when all I want to do is go home, please and thanks.
COVID is not a joke, I promise
Emily Nalley
Sports Editor
By now, everyone should know that there is rapid COVID testing outside of the Principal’s Office, and if you didn’t know, now you do.
One would think that most people who are in line to get tested are thinking that they might have COVID or have been exposed. So, tell me why so many people don’t wear their masks in this line.
It seems like common sense that if they think that they might have COVID, they would want to protect those around them.
And even if they don’t and they are just in the testing line to be safe, they would want to protect themselves by wearing a mask properly, and wearing a mask properly.
Not below the nose or just loosely around your face.
The nose wire should be pinched to frame the nose correctly. All of us are tired of this too.
After two years, everyone just wants to get back to normal and with so many people being so idiotic we keep having surges.
The testing line seems like one of the most likely places for that person to be. It just seems weird and ironic to me that so many sport naked faces during the middle of a pandemic.
Also, when some people who have found out that they have COVID have been hanging out with their friends afterwards and talking about how they are happy to have the virus COVID.
What is that? Do people not know how many people have died or have life changing problems?
Over 870,000 people have died in the United States according to the CDC and people are out here not wearing their masks in the COVID testing lines?
Rapid tests are already in high demand in the United States and there are many other people who are struggling to get tested.
We are lucky to have access to them at Arcata High School and people aren’t taking it seriously.
Consider the safety of those who are testing all of the students.
They don’t deserve the disrespect of students who aren’t wearing their masks.
Nobody deserves the extra risk of people not wearing their masks in the testing line.
To help protect yourself and others around you KN95s are the best mask to wear.
And for your information you can pick them up for free at school so there should be no excuse to not be wearing one.
Thursday , February 17th, 2022 Opinion
The Saltbox Things we’re salty about The freshmen P.E. Blues
Aidan Shelton
Art Director
If you don’t know already, your physical education credits can be waived if you participate in four seasons of sports.
However, the sports you do freshman year don’t count towards this. The reason why? Because up yours, that’s why.
Like seriously, it has to be as inconvenient as possible for you to skip “physical” education, where half of the grade is based on if you dress down or how well you can hide in the locker room for two hours.
I know it’s to “encourage you to try new sports,” but then, you just get a bunch of kids showing up to like three track practices for their last credit.
It also really devalues four year athletes and the amount of commitment it takes. And why in God’s name does two sports seasons count for only one semester?
You will do more physical exercise in like half a practice of football, track or any other sport besides golf. (Yes, shade intended, you guys literally have your own type of car so you don’t have to spill your champagne and crumpets walking from hole to hole).
But back to the pure stupidity
that is the P.E. Waiving system. Being a freshman on a sports team can be a real challenge, depending on the sport. Being on a varsity team as a freshman means that you’re competing against literal grown men while being like 14 and starting puberty. That’s easily worth way more than a class consisting of taking a lap around the school and then sitting in the weight room. Why is P.E. even a requirement anyway? With the current system, there is two types of people. There is either the kids who try wildly too hard that it makes it not fun Hallway traffic etiquette
Noah Meisel
Guest Writer
From the moment we are born, we are taught the simple truth that the right side of the sidewalk, road or pathway is the correct side to move along (England and Australia have it backwards).
Despite the early age at which we learn this norm, it seems that many people have a case of selective amnesia and are wandering down the corridors and stairwells on whatever side they please, just to get to their destination one second faster.
This tumultuous behavior is especially shocking considering that an enormous number of students are in the middle of driver’s education. These students are learning about the importance of traffic law and its positive influence on travel. At the same time, many are choosing to blissfully ignore the rules when it doesn’t suit them.
This unconscious disorder has led to a drastic increase in the congestion of the school hallways, particularly in the dreaded central staircase.
Choosing to go up this staircase to reach the math wing is a deadly choice with consequences including excessive waiting, mild annoyance and slightly bruised shoulders.
Perhaps most lethal of all is the fact that you are slowly jostling along up a staircase in a giant crowd of people during the middle of a global pandemic.
It cannot be overstated how dangerous this jumble of bodies can be, especially with so many students deciding that the pandemic is over when they leave the classroom and unmasking in the halls as a result.
Luckily, the solution is as simple as the problem; just stick to the right side.
Even if you want to get to class just that one second faster, quickly hit the bathroom during that oh-so brief passing period or dash to the parking lot to join the after school car congestion fiasco, is it really worth it when you consider the people you have to push along the way. for everyone else in the class, or people who are lacking the motivation and effort to try just the bare minimum.
If you want kids to not be lazy and out of shape, make P.E. worth people’s time. Or require a sports credit that can be waived with P.E.
Don’t ask me, I’m not an administrator or someone who makes the school curriculum.
I´m just a hormonally enraged seventeen year old who has consumed way too much caffeine in the past 24 hours.
Screw you and screw your stupid P.E. class. Salt over.
We all have a choice to either fall into disorganized chaos and endure drastically longer inter-classroom traveling times or embrace order and walk together in harmony. So, next time you get to the foot of that staircase, make the right decision.
Taken by Noah Meisel The stairs are left in disarray after students hurry to lunch
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