I think I’ll tell UT-Martin stories this weekend. I’ll start with one about someone who was one of my favorite people. KC was a genius who should have gotten a PHD in Philosophy instead of his Master’s in Music Education. He worked his way through school by working at Hardees, which was one of the only fast food restaurants in Martin way back then. KC’s lifestyle was not a secret, but it still made me almost fall over the first time I went by his house to pick him up for something (a crowd of us were going to have a bonfire out in the very rural country). KC grew and manufactured his own supplies in his bedroom that was inside his parents’ house! When KC was at work, he went up on the roof of the restaurant to smoke under the guise of cleaning. One day, he smoked too much and fell off the roof. He promptly filed a workmen’s comp claim and ended up with a 5 figure check. Instead of using the money for rehab or medications (he had whatever he needed already), he bought large, expensive remote control vehicles, took off the outside and drove around the wheels, motor and wires. It would entertain him for hours (duh). In spite of all this, he did get his Master’s degree in Music Ed and when I went back to Martin for a family reunion I looked him up. He was the band director at a high school in nowheresville, TN and STILL maintained the same lifestyle. “You hafta be high to listen to the same pep rally cr*p music day in and day out.” I always think about KC whenever a teacher gets arrested for doing something stupid and people are stunned and appalled that a teacher would behave in such a way. Teachers aren’t saints guys, they are clowns just like the rest of us.