Friday, November 5, 2010
The Record The Official Student Publication of the Saint Louis Priory School since 1960
Volume 41, Issue 9
Grinds My Gears Find out what grinds Mr. Jacob Martin’s gears! Mr. Jacob Martin, ’11
Weekly Editorial Writer
Well, here I am. I’ve made it to the front page of The Record at last. It is, therefore, with great pride that I write my article this week, the kind of pride that one only gets from making it to the front page of a high school newspaper or finally getting that monster out of my closet (yes, my closet. By one I don’t mean the everyman here. I mean that the monster in my closet is the most intense monster of all time and all other closet-monsters shudder in terror when they see it; I’m pretty sure it’s related to that locust from my second article). Anyway, I digress. Do you know, gentlemen, what it is that grinds my gears? The standards of The Record have fallen so far from where they used to be. It seems like just about anything can make it onto the front page these days; I mean More than a Miner Miracle? What? I write better puns than that in important and serious papers that really shouldn’t have any puns in them at all (e.g. my AP European History essays, Calculus homework, Statistics tests, the AP Statistics Exam, English tests, my Thesis, the AP Latin Exam, college application essays, and many, many more that I can’t even think of right now). I mean, the article itself was up to par, don’t get me wrong, I’m a huge fan
of Chileans, especially when they aren’t dying, and that article was simply full of undead Chileans. The mere fact that that pun made it past the editing-room kill floor (I highly recommend the guided tour, although it’s so shocking that you won’t read for weeks after you see how they edit articles in there) is
evidence enough of the horrible downturn of The Record’s standards. What does it take to get onto the front page? A bad pun and a picture of someone catching a pass? I remember the days when it was true writing talent, some sort of news, and/or a really attractive editor whose picture you can put next to the article. The pun was one thing. The other thing is that usually the cover is some sort of sports article. Now, I’m not against sports, but I’m totally not into those articles. I care so little about sports that they might as well be the opinions of others; I
disregard them because I don’t see the point and they have nothing to offer me (although when people start writing WRESTLING articles I’m going to read those, because that is so worth my time). Sports, to me, are like a child that I had, but didn’t know that I had, and then found out that I had had, and then continued to ignore. They’re my long-lost children of anonymity and I keep them that way. I don’t even know who plays what sport at this point. It’s a need-to-know thing for me since I’m in management. Plus, it’s not like I can’t just say, “Hey, who won the game on Friday? Was it awesome?” I mean, I already know it wasn’t awesome (unless it was wrestling) and score is usually all that matters to me, I just don’t see the point. To be perfectly honest, I really only read my own article and Lorem Ipsum, and that’s just for the entertainment value (sometimes I submit my article early, then I forget what I wrote about by the time The Record comes out, and I’m simply shocked by my own hilarity). Also, people need to stop mentioning my article from last week to me, as it’s bringing back way too many awful, awful memories. That just came to my mind. One thing I will say about The Record is that its cryptograms are always fantastic and those should remain unchanged. But really, just put me on the cover more, I’m most interesting.