"...Don't Mess Around With Bill"

Your scribe enjoys reading blogs other than his own, such as the never-ending adventures of SaraClaraDara (see last post for the hot link), and oftens finds them a source of entertainment, information, and enlightenment. Consider if you will, dear reader, how entertaining, informing, and enlightening it was for your scribe to read in the blogosphere that:

You Don't Spit In The Wind,
You Don't Pull The Mask Off The Lone Ranger,
And You Don't Mess Around With Bill.
It is not a good idea to get on Bill Clark's bad side.
You have been warned: Bill will not easily suffer fools and he certainly wont stand by quietly when he sees an injustice.

These words were music to your scribe's inner ear, since he would never have written them about himself, but is quite happy that someone else has now written them about him.

Ironically, he does not know whom to thank for these kind words, other than that the person who wrote them also writes the prolific blog, "Greenwich Roundup". Studiously ignored (but eagerly read) by the staff of the Hearst-owned Yellowwich Time, "Greenwich Roundup" has a breezy, no-holds-barred way of presenting the actual events that transpire in this Town - which are often quite different from the sanitized version you may (or may not) read about in the local rag. If we lived in China, for example, this irreverent blog would have been expunged from the Internet on its very first day of publication; thankfully, we live in a country where the First Amendment and the freedom of speech it enshrines is still (mostly) the law of the land.

Here is the full segment of "Greenwich Roundup" that dealt with your scribe yesterday:

08/14/08 Sweet Dreams Bill "Greenwich Gossip" Clark - Boston Dumped Mario
Mario Is Not Going To Boston
Hennepin library chief offered job in BostonMinneapolis Star Tribune, MN By STEVE BRANDTHennepin County Library Director Amy Ryan has been offered the job of heading Boston's public libraries, and is expected to announce today whether she'll take it.
The 57-year-old Minnetonka resident was interviewed Thursday, along with other finalists, by that city's library trustees.
She's expected to meet with Mayor Thomas Menino and negotiate terms of the job before making her decision, said Mary Bender, a Boston library spokeswoman.
Ryan's openness and experience running community libraries in Minneapolis were considered her advantages in the Boston competition. Boston has 27 branches, and Menino wants more attention paid to them.
She's headed Hennepin County's libraries for the past three years after a career in Minneapolis libraries, and oversaw the merger of the library systems. She served as chief of the 14 branch libraries in Minneapolis before switching to oversee building projects. She described the Hennepin job as her dream job when she was named.
Hennepin County Commissioner Mark Stenglein said Ryan would be missed.
"I hate to lose her, but she needs to do what she needs to do," he said. "I think it's a compliment to the Hennepin County system that they're interested."
Stenglein said he thinks that even if Ryan departs, the continuing merger of library systems will go smoothly.
"She's done a good job of making sure she's covered things," he said. "That's what a good manager does."
Ryan said last week that she was invited to apply for the job, and found the Boston system too enchanting an opportunity to pass up. Boston is the nation's first big-city public-supported library. Its collections include Shakespeare folios, Mozart scores and the library of President John Adams.
Her parents are from Boston and a daughter attends college there.
Please See:
05/14/08 - Heard It Through The Grapevine - Greenwich Library Director Has Quit (Update - Confirmation)
08/13/08 Boston Shocker: Search for library president narrows down to Mario
You Don't Spit In The Wind
You Don't Pull The Mask Off The Long Ranger
And You Don't Mess Around With Bill
It is not a good idea to get on Bill Clark's bad side.
You have been warned Bill will not easily suffer fools and he certainly wont stand by quietly when he sees an injustice:
Please See:
07/26/08 Bill Clarke Has The Inside Scoop About What's Going On At The "Yellowich Time"
05/06/08 - Did You Know That Greenwich Gossip Webmaster Bill Clark Had Been Banned By The "Yellowich Time"
Gentleman Jim 1,079, Loopy Lee 74
Gary Kriss Gets Caught
Bye, Bye, Mario
Shocking Developments at Greenwich High School
The Unspeakable Betty Sternberg Strikes Again
Bye, Bye, Michele

Well, when you look at that list of scribal musings, dear reader, it does seem to be true that fools are not suffered gladly in these pages, and that injustices do indeed cause the scribal blood to boil. It reminds one of Sir Philip Sidney's famous dictum in his essay, "The Uses of Poetry": that a good play "can make a king fear to be a tyrant." Words and ideas have great power, as the signers of the Declaration of Independence and the framers of the Constitution well knew.

How nice to know that even in these latter days there are still worthy heirs of John Peter Zenger and Tom Paine. And one of them is hard at work writing "Greenwich Roundup".