by Jarret Liotta

WESTPORT — I’m on a train to New York, but as always my thoughts return to the blessed antics of my hometown (as well as my perpetual fear that I won’t be able to find a bathroom in the Big City).

At the opposite end of the car two teenage girls are bantering with the intrusive ferocity of shriek monkeys, while across the aisle a wheezing portly man is lying over his seat with his shoes brazenly removed from fetid feet, drawing incredulous pity from me for whichever poor soul next inhabits that particular spot.

How Long, Great Pumpkin?!

Masks appear to be optional … but they’re not. It saddens me that people aren’t courteous enough to wear them merely because it’s the rule on the train — (Remember how we used to follow rules years ago?!) — and it’s a meager, easy sign of respect toward the employees who are forced to wear them 40 hours a week …

Yet I should not be surprised, for these are the same people, in most cases, who banter like shriek monkeys in the Quiet Car, ride with their stinky shoes off for all the train to smell, or leave their garbage on the floor and stuffed in between the seats after they depart, so what does a poor kid from Westport expect when he goes out in the big world?!!

I mean, WTF? …

Just watch the gap when you leave the train!

Generosity Filled the Fat

Before I begin bashing the Board of Finance, among others, I want to give a well-deserved shout out to the Westport Woman’s Club — and not just because, much to their collective chagrin, I was invited to speak last week.

Thanks to two of its members — directly and indirectly — the town is getting a brand new $300,000 ambulance paid for.

Holy Shoot!

What I can’t get my head around, however, is the one hearty philanthropist asking to remain anonymous following her $150K contribution to the cause.

Charitable donors earn the right to blather about their generosity. Everyone knows that!

I recently gave $200 to a couple of charities on Giving Day and as a result I’m planning to do a series of articles on what makes me tick.

But this woman (and perhaps her family too) drop $150K and then go mum without wallowing in the well-earned glory of their contribution … WTF?!!

We’ll Show Her!

The only thing I can figure is that she doesn’t want to open her door to inquiries from people like me who are seeking funding for their random ventures, such as my new film (which is not only random, but likely to offend even more people than my columns.)

Well, it’s going to backfire on her!

Going forward I’m now forced to taunt her ruthlessly in print until she ponies up $25,000 for the production …

I’ll show her that she can’t be nice and get away with it! … WTF!!

Watch this space for more …

Message Mix-Up

Speaking of taunting, loyal readers know I like to blame school officials for a lot of things, but I don’t blame them one scintilla for getting snitty about the Board of Finance’s weird and ill-timed inquiry into their hiring practices.

If you’ve read my inflammatory columns before, or know anything about me — as I assume you do, given my clear importance and prominence in this town (speaking before the WWC and what not) — you could deduce I’m a staunch supporter of diverse hiring practices, simply because there are a great range of logical benefits to them, especially in education.

Yet the idea of the finance board broaching the question with the BOE — or any department, for that matter — feels like a kind of awkward impropriety to me, given their role and their history of choices relating to a wide range of funding questions they’ve failed to ask in the past.

Guff Giving

Focusing on a question about diverse hiring is also weird given the guff the school district has had to endure recently from parents in relation to its efforts to properly explore issues of diversity at large. I mean, WTF?!

Zinger of the Week goes to school board member Dorie Hordon, per our WJ article. LMAO!! (Not this minute, I mean, but before, when I read it.)

Frankly, I’m surprised these unpaid BOE volunteers were able to check their collective tongues to the extent they did. While I may not see eye to eye with each and every one one of them, these poor devils are constantly subjected to crap from way too many helicopter parents with way too much time on their hands, as well as social media accounts that need to be given some responsible parental controls.

Where Blame is Due …

If the BOF, in its ideal role as funding watchdog, really wants to bring pointed questions before the school system, there are many more relevant ones that could be asked. (Among others, competent leadership in relation to school facilities is one big historic question that doesn’t seem to have ever been directly posed to anyone … I mean, WTF?!!)

And speaking of school facilities and the long-term capital plan, according to BOF officials Westport’s future debt could rapidly escalate over the next few years, with the only fiscal upside being that the town will probably receive a lot more pre-approved Discover card applications in the mailbox.

Again, no one seems to want to look back and point fingers of blame to the past … The problem is, however, that like the world at large, Westport seems to keep failing to learn from so many mistakes.

They say the definition of insanity is trying the same thing over and over again, and expecting different results. This aphorism could prove invaluable if the powers that be would take cold, clear looks at how — and who — is overseeing some of the situations that keep cropping up.

In other words, WTF??!!!

Well, I could go on, but we’re heading into the Grand Central tunnel now and I need to go & use the bathroom!

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