Smiley Anders for Oct. 2, 2008

• By SMILEY ANDERS
• Advocate columnist
• Published: Oct 2, 2008 - Page: 1B - UPDATED: 12:05 a.m.

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I find the idea that this column might be educational a bit alarming.

But Carol Babb, the gifted resources teacher at Cedarcrest-Southmoor Elementary, used my “hurricane haiku” to teach her third-, fourth- and fifth-grade classes how to compose their own poems in the Japanese manner.

Here are a few examples:

Hurricane Gustav
Trees flying in the bad wind
Not a gentle breeze

Electricity
My neighbor’s porch lights mock me
I am powerless

Cold pizza for lunch
MREs, Chinese take-out
I miss Mom’s cooking

Forts of tree debris
Crawl through tunnels for practice
Garbage everywhere!

Creative incarceration
F.C. “Butch” Felterman of Patterson says, “Let’s move Wall Street from the Frozen Nawth to the bayous of Louisiana — where crooks go to jail, not to the Bahamas.”

Not all bad
Some entries in my Worst Song Contest (which ended Tuesday) puzzle me, because they’re songs I kinda like — and you know how tasteful I am. Anyhow:

“ ‘Wild Thing’ by The Troggs is my pick for worst song. Its repetitive chords and spoken lyrics make me realize how crazy I drove my parents with loud music during my teen years!” (Judy Green of Prairieville)

“ ‘Silhouettes on the Shade’ by The Rays is about a guy who thinks he sees his girlfriend with another guy in the window, but then realizes he’s on the wrong block. You have to wonder about his mental capacity.” (Brad Smith) 

“ ‘Louie, Louie’ by The Kingsmen has words that cannot be understood at all,  except for the title and ‘Hey baby.’ It also has a beat you cannot dance to.” (Jack Belcher)

“’Wildfire’ by Michael Martin Murphy is just the worst EVER! I can’t even begin to say why, but I cringe every time I hear it on the radio and it’s now stuck in my head!” (Monette Mansur Celestin)