This Wednesday was awfully odd, classes were to meet very strangely; Second period was split into two halves, the first half also held an impact assembly. After the first half came Nutrition, followed by the succeeding half of Second period, in which the actual ceremony took place. It was set in the PE Field, right next to the playground (yet not in the playground as there was a fence separating the two). There were too many chairs when I arrived, as I didn't expect a pack of fourth graders to be accompanying us - but it all made sense at 10:00. Kirk Douglas arrived, without the assistance of any security other than our police cop, Ruben. When I first saw him, no one else really did, until I started to snap some pictures (with the help of Jackson's 300mm Nikkor lens), then came "Is that him?". When he arrived at the area, he immediately crawled under the section tape and walked over to the kids to give them high fives. After he finished that, he made his way over to a group of chairs near where we [the leadership/yearbook class] were standing; as he walked, I sensed a body-builder type of attitude, very inspiring as he just had a stroke last year. When looking for his seat, the leadership class asked, "Should we give him a program?" and I immediately offered to give him one, so I did. I should've planted a note saying to visit my site, but it didn't cross my mind until someone brought it up later - but when I did give him the program, he looked up at me and said "Thank you". It was very nice. He then asked (not to me exactly) where his wife was, and I started to look around for her, hoping that I would be able to talk to him again saying, "There she is, over there" and perhaps bring her to him so that he could say "Thank you" again, but that didn't happen.

The presentation started with Mr. Weinberg speaking about how Kirk has influenced him when he was young, blah blah blah. I'm going to fast forward past numerous boring speeches and introductions, straight to Kirk's speech. As soon as he got up, he didn't go to the podium like everyone before him, he went to the center of the "stage" (a big opening which was the center between the audience, the band, the special guests, and us). He started to sing a song that he sang in 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea; you could definitely hear where the stroke had affected him, in his speech. At first, it was very difficult to understand him, but as he ended his song, and started to speak normally, it was a lot easier - yet still somewhat difficult. He said that this whole thing wasn't thanks to him, it was thanks to his wife (which he said numerous times, and I think was quite thoughtful, because to be honest, I think they only chose him cos he's an "icon"). After a very good three minutes, and a few laughs, he handed the mic to his wife (after somewhat struggling while putting it back on the podium, but he succeeded, he's quite a trooper) who went on to give one of the probably most boring things I have ever heard. Don't get me wrong, it wasn't void of humor - boy was it funny watching her BS on the mic. After a couple laughs, she gave the mic up and it was time for the Ribbon Cutting Ceremony, which was awfully crowded. We proceeded to the front gate of the playground where there was a ribbon and huge red scissors, Kirk cut it, and kids ran in.

After all the socializing in the playground, it was time for Kirk and his wife to head back to [wherever the hell he was going, I really have no clue, haha]. A magic bimmer automatically appeared to the side of where we were all standing, in which they kept the engine and the driver's side door wide open. Kirk sat inside the passenger side and closed his eyes for a bit until the socializing in the PE Field subsided. We (Bill, Marc, Josh, and I) thought about getting into the car to talk to Kirk, since relatively no one would see and no one would object, we thought. But as soon as we somewhat attempted, Ruben came over and told us that they had to go, and so the last wave good byes to the kids, and Kirk was off - he was an awful nice man.

Now, as I said earlier, I have a ton of photos and a pile of video clips for you guys to abuse, which is why it took me three days get this up (and I had to finish other things, I actually finished editing everything Wednesday night, but didn't have time to organize it all 'til last night and today). So, for the images go here, and for the videos go here. For the videos, I added something I haven't done before, I have a master .zip so that you guys can download all the files to one cool .zip archive, so take advantage of that. The interviews we did were rather funny, well I thought so - a lot of people took us really seriously, and I am thankful for that, and thanks to Bill for taping everything. Also thanks to Mr. Jackson for allowing me to borrow his Nikon N75 and 70-300mm lens for part of my photos (I also had my 350d + 17-70mm). And, of course, a very big thank you to Mr. Kirk Douglas and his foundation for coming over to our school - it was an awesome day.