eastside_purple said:
That's pretty much the route I was anticipating as well. In any event, I didn't intend to offend anyone. My impression is that area, while not as bad as a lot of PH, has deteriorated over the last 10 yrs or so.
Going up and down West 8th isn't that bad. It's still a halfway decent part of town, although I don't know that I'd want to walk around down there too late at night...
But I agree totally about Warsaw. I avoid driving up and down that street like the plague.
As far as fondest memories of Elder...
"If you don't like it, you can just go poop in your hat!" -- Buck
My very first class as a freshman was French with Mr. Rosen. We walked into the room, and he immediately starts speaking in French, asking us to "Please rise" and pray. I remember the thought going through my mind at the time like "what have I got myself into..."
Pep rallies were always awesome. I always loved when Elder students would dress up in cheaply made West Hi/LaSalle/St. X/Moeller "spirit wear," act like fools, then get beat up and leg dropped by the Elder Panther.
I love writing for the Purple Quill. We'd go drop off the final copies at the printer (on Anderson Ferry near Delhi Pike) and then go to McDonalds and get some breakfast afterwards. On the same note, we would always go down to the office and look through old copies of the Quill or the Elderado dating back to the early 30's... pretty cool stuff.
Of all the teachers I've had in my life, I have only truly disliked one: Ken Laake. I swear he had it in for me from day one... and I ended up getting him for three different classes. I was always a pretty good student, but for whatever reason he always gave me a tough time. The word on him always was (and is), if you can get him talking about abortion you can sidetrack him for an entire class. So by the end of senior year, we all knew that and would always try to get him to start talking about abortion. Well no matter what you said, he would always have to be right. He could tell you Charlie Luken was an alien from the planet Pop Tart, and the burden of proof would be on YOU to disprove him. One day I finally was able to shut him up though and caused a near full scale riot. He was talking about how "sexuality is God's greatest gift" to which I said "well if it is God's greatest gift, why are priests required to remain chaste?" He gave some BS answer, but the whole class turned on him and for about 15 minutes it was a "you are stupid, no YOU are stupid" back and forth.
Another great memory: parking on Beech St. in the morning and walking past Seton; the smell of tropical shampoo and the light scent of perfume filling your nostrils... can't beat it.
"What, you might have to go DOWNTOWN? You might have to leave the WEST SIDE? You might see a BLACK PERSON or someone who isn't CATHOLIC? Oh no!" - Mr. Beemon
The disapproving look Mr. Otten would always give at football games when chants like "A noose, a tree, hang the referee" or "nuts and bolts, nuts and bolts, we got screwed!" would break out...
Playing wiffle ball in the Pit during Coach Grippa's gym class. It was so strange to hit a "home run" by knocking a fly ball into the stands.
"J of N... Day 5!" - Father Kiffmeyer
I remember freshman year I had Mr. Geis for Arts Awareness. Some kid got demerits for something or other, and Geis put them down on his desk. The kid was like "I cannot accept these." Geis said take 'em or I will give you 2 more. Geis goes back and sits at his desk. The kid goes up to the desk, rips the demerits up and throws them in Geis' face. Kid gets more demerits and sent to Otten's office. :laugh: :laugh:
Freshman mixers, or even better, the "datamatch mixer." All night long thinking, "maybe this will be the night I finally get some" and then going home disappointed once again.
Too many great memories...