Wednesday, February 18th, 1976

Dad's birthday. We never could think of anything to get him.

I forsook Cincy for coneys after school due to hunger and heavy rains.

Finally picked up my pictures. The big one looks terrible--too lifelike. The smaller ones aren't as bad. Two other weird little pix were attached.

I can't stand Spanish and I can't do Algebra! Might not be so bad later in life but right now it is wreckin' my head!!

The language trick I played on Vernon earlier this year finally paid off as he told the story today and exaggerated it, sort of enhancing my reputation!

Thinking about girls a lot again today! Why can't i just forget them? Not like I can talk to them for fear of either being rejected or them being too personally screwed up for me.

Speaking of personally screwed up, all I got from school today was some hate from Jessica. I have no doubt now she hates me but I can't tell why and that bothers me. My own fault though. I keep getting involved. Have to fight that.

The Oscars should be a farce again this year but I'll watch it for the stars. Not a single good film or actor is nominated. Well...not a great one anyway.

NOTES: No idea where that particular picture is at the moment. Also, I don't have a clue what the "language trick" was that I played on Vernon (a guy who had been in my classes since 7th grade).

I loved first year Spanish in Junior High. Got straight A's. For second year Spanish at the high school we had a French teacher due to somebody quitting early on. He was a great guy and I've seen him off and on over the years (he still looks younger than I do!) but we didn't learn a lot of Spanish. Third year (which this was) we mostly were making up for second year and by the fourth year we had a teacher from Spain. He could barely speak English and we could barely speak Spanish. It was a mess. If only we'd had a book like the one above that was published in the nineties.

I cannot believe that neither my mother nor I got my dad anything! He would have been 66 that year. This year he would have been 101 years old.