Kid Drops Out Of School To Guarantee Place Among Ignominous Dropouts

Alert reader, Steve, sent me this article, one that describes a 16 year-old's cunning plan: one that involves inattention to one's basic educational bedrock and explores the glories of . . . Guitar Hero:

In fact, young Mr. Peebles is dropping out of high school... in order to focus on Guitar Hero full time. Peebles hopes to join the small but growing crew of players looking to make gaming a job. Citing his victories in Guitar Hero tournaments, which include "gift certificates, gaming equipment, and chicken sandwiches," Peebles thinks he has the chops to play competitively and earn actual money in the process. As the story notes, top gamers on the competitive circuit can earn up to $80,000 a year (though $25,000 is more common). Peebles, of course, can count his 52 Chick-fil-A combo meals toward that total.

I have to admit a slight convulsive reflex that makes me want to to live-heckle anybody that employs the word "chops" in the same sentence with descriptive braggadocio and hubris that seems to follow these lords of the Stylized Simon genre. But I won't. Unemployment will do it for them.

On a larger note, the ratios of fantasy to reality, and the seemingly non-existent line that separates them is really bothersome. The kind of isolated pathology that had Bela Lugosi wearing his Dracula suit to the grave has metastasized--to the point that a whole legion of non-guitarists think they are guitarists--along with an applauding and abetting world.

Next thing you know, Martin Sheen will think he's actually President.

-R