I've never seen two girls... walk by an ice cream shop.

This weekend I visited Alysa. We were walking to get some lunch near her new house and an awkward man looks at us and says "I've never seen two girls....... walk past an ice cream shop before" We're still trying to figure out what he really wanted to say. Either way, it was good for more than a few laughs.

CNN just told me that they're thinking about making a gay high school in Chicago. It wouldn't be called a gay high school, obviously but it would be an option for kids who are harassed and bullied to the point where they don't feel safe in high school for their sexual orientation, or any other reasons. They talked about the statistics that gay students are more likely to miss classes and have lower GPAs. Also, apparently 39 states including NY don't have laws in place that protect students from harassment based on their sexual orientation (WHAT?!).

I have mixed feelings about this idea. On the one hand, high school kids can be about as ruthless as they come and if you don't feel safe or comfortable in school, you're not going to be in your prime to learn and succeed. But, at the same time, people need to learn to deal with not being liked or understood. Its not like high school is the only place where these students are going to be harassed or discriminated against so putting them in a special school in their own little world that shields them from mean people will only postpone the inevitable. Also, this sends the message to the students left in the regular school that you don't need to learn to be tolerant of people who are different, you can just ship them off to somewhere where you don't need to see them or think about them.

I personally think that instead of creating a new school, they should educate everyone on being tolerant and make them aware of gay issues. In my high school, there was never any discussion of that nature. But of course, talking in high school about actual issues won't be happening any time soon because parents don't want their kids subjected to anything that might actually make them decent, well informed human beings....