I Stopped Just Short Of Tying A Pork Chop Around His Neck

The Pony had a play date today.

As you may recall, The Pony is not a party animal. No social butterfly is he. The one who really has no interest in helping people or rescuing them from a dire situation. Contrary to blogular opinion, Mrs. Hillbilly Mom did not arrange the play date. Sure, it was held in her classroom, immediately after school. But she had nothing to do with it, other than to grunt permission for this day only.

We have a couple of students new to Newmentia this year. They are on the SmartyPants Team with The Pony. They have band and algebra together, and somewhat pal around before school. If you call sitting in the same vicinity in the gym while doing homework an act of pal-ism. The Newbs are in my last class, which had a test today, which included bonus problems on calculating change in thermal energy, and specific heat. I told the group that I would have grades posted by 4:00.

Newb 1 asked if The Pony would be in my room after school. Yes. The Newbs hang about until their folks pick them up. Usually they do homework in the cafeteria, or in a classroom supervised by faculty who tutor for Career Ladder, or work the afterschool program. I know The Newbs really like The Pony, but I also suspect their overachievedness had them jonesin' for their test scores. I agreed that they could hang out in my room until 4:00. That is a request granted as rarely as the corpse flower blooms. Though my room is just as odorous, what with 100 teens per day passing through with their feet and armpits attached. I felt it was safe enough to host a couple of Newbs as long as The Pony was also present.

Sweet Gummi Mary! You would have thought The Pony was a Great Pyrenees defending his territory. Newb 1 gamboled in after cruising the hall after final bell. "Hey, Pony! What are you doing this afternoon?"

Pony: "Nothing. Why?" He didn't look up from his phone.

Newb 1: "I thought you might want to work on some algebra."

Pony: "No. I'm going to do it in the gym tomorrow morning, and finish it in class."

Newb 1: "I thought about that. But then I thought I would do it now, and I could have tomorrow morning to talk, and class time to read my book. But maybe I'll do some in the morning. So what are you doing?"

Pony: "Right now, I'm checking my texts." As if. The Pony gets texts from his best friend and (shh!) a couple of girls. It's not like that task was going to take an hour.

Newb 1: "I can teach you how to yo-yo." He was at that very moment standing too near to my head, winging a Duncan butterlfy all willy-nilly, it whistling and hissing on each pass.

Pony: "I KNOW how to yo-yo."

Mrs. HM: "No you don't! Since when?"

Pony: "Duh. Since Elementia."

Mrs. HM: "Not like that."

Newb 2 entered. "HERE'S where you guys are. Hey, Pony! I have my saxophone, you have your trombone...want to jam?"

Pony: "Uh. No."

Newb 2: "Let's all go get some snacks! Doesn't anyone else want snacks? Am I the only one who's starving?"

Pony: "We have some snacks right here in the snack drawer. Of course, I can't guarantee that they're not expired..."

So that's how it went. The Pony shared some very old Soft Batch cookies that his grandma brought him last fall. Even the famished teen boy Newbs could not stomach more than one. "Uh, I don't think these are supposed to be...crunchy." A discussion ensued concerning the Heimlich Maneuver, and a Newb informed me that it should no longer be called the Heimlich Maneuver, because the Heimlich family is fed up with it.

The Pony went out to T-Hoe for his laptop, and the three of them started playing video games and chatting. Tests were graded, I revealed the very good scores of the Newbs, and a good time was had by all.

On the ride home, I told The Pony I was signing him up for the next ACT, but the system kicked me out when I didn't have the credit card info. "And now I have to go through all that again, clicking on each of those inventory pages to say that you want the info to stay the same. Unless you want me to change it, you know. Like if you have decided that maybe your could tolerate helping people who need rescuing."

Pony: "No. I haven't changed my mind."

HM: "What? If one of the Newbs got choked on a stale cookie? Wouldn't you do the.. that maneuver on him?"

Pony: "Which one? I can barely tell them apart unless they're standing together right in front of me." Let the record show that The Newbs are twins, and not at all identical.

HM: "So they're both not worth saving? What if the worthy one got a yo-yo string wrapped around his neck? Wouldn't you try to save him?"

Pony: "Their yo-yoing skills are much more developed than that."

You can lead a Pony to a play date...but you can't make him care about people.