ROAR, TIGER ROAR!!!

friend MB brought this to my attention the other day. what a shock.

it's a little documentary/film clip of my extraordinary high school english teacher and his annual performance of "Tiger Day." i remember this being the fight song for Princeton, his alma mater. Mr. A. is on my short list of great teachers. There are four on this list that spanned 15 years of school.

(like:
H.Christianson, 5th grade
L.Young, biology/philosophy 12th grade
J.Farrell, comparative lit/improv acting, 3rd year college)

cheers to ainslie. who gets an english teacher who's been a spy and a jazz musician as well? very lucky. ainslie had his own teacher's lounge in the basement of the old part of the school. the part that was not earthquake safe and should not have been inhabited. my friends and i would sometimes join him for cigarette-smoking. naturally the other teachers were not big fans of the chain-smoking alcoholic kerouac-loving, marilyn-worshipping multi-instrumentalist who was our teacher.

much appreciation to the kid four years my junior who filmed ainslie doing his thing.

ps. one of my closest friends at the time (1987) took a picture of ainslie unzipping his fly to show us his tiger shorts as well. believe me, there was nothing creepy about it. only funny. i'm sure that part of the performance did not last, however.