Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: MONDAY, July 19, 1993                   TAG: 9307200037
SECTION: EXTRA                    PAGE: 1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Ben Beagle
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

CALCULATORS? IT JUST DON'T ADD UP RIGHT

But the public-relations people are already putting out news releases about what your children are going to need when they go back to school.

Among these are calculators and a lot of other expensive stuff you poor saps who still have children in school will have to buy.

Calculators? Listen, I think kids should learn math by looking at the ceiling and panicking. I think they ought to do it the hard way - by counting on their fingers if necessary.

I like to see a kid wetting the tip of his pencil in his mouth and frowning. Builds character.

Calculators are made for people who couldn't learn math in school even though they cheated horribly.

With a calculator, these wretches can get their checkbook totals to within $50 to $100 of what the bank says they have in there.

If somebody had brought a calculator to my elementary school, the principal would have sent the kid home with a note that said:

"Dear Mrs. Jones: I am sending Johnnie home with his machine. It is not, nor will it ever be, the policy of this school to accept devices that are plainly the work of the Devil. I suggest you bury this thing under a full moon when the wind is from the east and forget it."

Anyway, allow me to gloat a little about not having to out and buy school supplies. I hated that. Eugene O'Neill could have written some of the scenes we used to have while buying school supplies:

"No, father. The little bitty spiral notebooks may cost less _ you penny-pinching old miser - but Miss Bigspender wants us to have the larger ones with the eagle on the front."

"It ill behooves you to speak to your father that way, missie. We are all here on Earth for a purpose that eludes us, and I if buy all of those spiral notebooks that dreadful woman wants, we shall all go to the wall."

"Yes, and as usual, your hateful and vile love of money will mean that my contemporaries will shun me for yet another year, and this in time will drive me to drink."

I don't like to think about what might have happened if we had been forced to shop for a calculator. We all know Miss Bigspender would have demanded the most expensive one in the store.

And don't forget all the new clothes. In this case, your student's classmates will tell you what to buy.

I'm not all that familiar with prices for young peoples' clothing, but if I were you, I'd plan a very modest Christmas.

Christmas. Right. The public-relations people should start on that just about the time your kid, beautifully dressed and loaded down with the best of learning aids, starts the seventh grade.