I’m bringing classy back

People here in St. Louis are famous for asking one another where they went to high school.

It used to be that it was just a convenient way to find out whether or not someone grew up in poverty. If someone said a place that sounded like it was a little bit too far north, or a little bit too far south, you might wanna take your wallet out of your back pocket and put it in your front pocket.

Not that people from the Hazelwood district are known to steal shit. It's just, you wanna keep the honest one's honest.

Of course, there's also a sexual element to St. Louis' nasty, racist social stratification. I remember back when I got to be the age when I was ready to start hollering at a beeyotch, dudes would advise me to keep it right within the central corridor. Chicks from North County, where a lot of black people live, are likely to have a disease, and chicks from South Country, where a lot of white people live, will get pregnant even if you look at them the wrong way. St. Charles (an area to the immediate northwest of here, where St. Louis keeps a lot of its best and brightest) is obviously out of the question altogether.

As it turns out, this was probably some of that advice that's actually true, even though your high school Health and Human Development teacher would never cop to it, lest she fuck around and get fired. Just like the fact that it's way more difficult to spread AIDS from a girl to a guy through regular intercourse. Which is why most guys you see with AIDS are secretly, if not obviously, teh ghey, while so many straight women keep coming down with it. (Note: I'm not offering this as advice to anyone's kids, nor am I allowed to, legally. I'm just saying. I once saw an episode of Dateline where a girl had AIDS and her boyfriend didn't, they never used rubbers, and he never got infected. The guy asked him if he was afraid of getting AIDS, and he was like, "Dude, everyone knows it's way harder to pass AIDS from a girl to a guy.")

I was checking America's finest news source, The Onion Media Take Out just now, and I saw there was a story about an HIV outbreak at a high school, where as many as 50 kids were suspected of being infected, and the entire school might be tested, and I thought to myself, "Please, Lord, don't let this be in St. Louis." Of course, not only was it in St. Louis, but it was also at a school in North County - Normandy High School, in the same school district where, because he didn't pay enough attention in college, my little brother is an elementary school teacher.

I was actually over that way the other day, when I took my epic, harrowing trip into the ghetto to pick up a ten dollar bill. To think, I could have played hide the salami with a broad while I was there and ended up with VD in 3D. It's a good thing I know better!

They say this panic stemmed from a routine HIV diagnosis, which led to an investigation into Normandy High School. At first, they were saying that "some" students might have been infected, and they sent kids home with a note. Just like that time when an emo girl called in a bomb threat at my own high school. Then, yesterday, another report came out saying that they'd increased their estimate to as many as 50 kids. Which is when the shit really hit the fan, i.e. Media Take Out.

Now, the Department of Health is gonna open up an entire substation right there in the school, where kids can go to get tested, if they think they might have AIDS. Presumably, this is gonna be on a voluntary basis. And you wonder what the privacy consideration is gonna be, since you'd have to think that any broad that takes time out of her day in high school to go check and see if she's got AIDS is obviously a hoo-er. If I went to that school, I'd check to see who was in that hallway from time to time, just to get an idea of where the threat lies.

Furthermore, I'd say that, if there's a lesson to be learned here for us guys, it's that you might not have much in the way of class yourself, but your dick should. If you're thinking about banging a broad, find out where she grew up and what that part of town looks like. And if it's not particularly nice, you might want to take extra precautions to make sure that she doesn't have AIDS, and that she's not trying to use you to get pregnant. I know it sounds harsh, but keep in mind that a lot of the shit they teach you in high school is purposely skewed to be politically correct. You don't want to fuck around and get caught out there just to save someone's feelings.