It started with a roar. And ended with a whine.

About 30 Edward Little High School seniors streamed out of their school’s front doors mid-morning Wednesday to protest officials’ decision to hold this year’s graduation in the school gym.

They yelled and hooted. They shrugged off backpacks and stood defiantly by the school’s bell tower.

For all of 30 seconds.

Then a school administrator quietly warned them they faced suspension if they didn’t get back to class.

“Ah, man, we never get away with anything,” one senior girl complained to a friend, as a school police officer held open the front door.

Within a minute, everyone was headed back to class.

So much for the defiant spirit of protest.

– Lindsay Tice
Creepy crawlies

The tick lodged itself in the folds of skin beneath the man’s left eye.

He wanted help. So, he came to the cops.

Four Maine State Police troopers who were investigating a shooting stood beside Route 121 Tuesday as the man approached.

“Any of you got a steady hand?” he said, pulling a buck knife from his pocket. They looked at each other. Then, they looked at him.

The man had emerged from an old pickup. He had a ponytail and seemed disheveled, a contrast from the pleated, starchy blue uniforms of the troopers.

Then, they noticed the other ticks. Two had wedged themselves into the skin beneath his ear, creating a swollen lump. Another was on his cheek. There were more.

“You are covered,” said a particularly stern trooper. “You need to see a doctor.”

The man sighed.

“I thought you could help me pull that sucker off,” he said. “I didn’t know there were more.” He drove away.

-Daniel Hartill
Center of the universe?

Sometimes it seems as if the entire solar system must revolve around Portland.

On Wednesday, a nonprofit group with offices in Limestone and Yarmouth selected the Port City to make some news about an acquisition in Rumford.

The catch here is that the nonprofit bills itself as an economic development organization, and it was talking about how it wants to expand opportunity for young people by doing some wonderful things at Rumford’s Black Mountain.

Roughly a dozen news types, along with a couple of folks from Rumford and some from the Maine Winter Sports Center gathered in the plush Libra Foundation offices overlooking downtown Portland to speak of and hear of the plans.

The irony is that if that same bunch of people had gathered in Rumford, the center of the story, they might have spent a few bucks there on gasoline and lunch.

They’d have added to the Rumford economy, not a lot for sure, but every little bit helps.

And the parents of young people in the community, those the Maine Winter Sports Center says it wants to help, might have found a bit of enrichment from the gathering, money that might help to pay, say, some college costs.

– Doug Fletcher