Bored

I BOW TO NO ONE in my reverence for the ATM, which can be likened to the light bulb or the Salk vaccine as a milestone development for mankind.But you sure run into a lot of annoying people at these places.Like in the drive-up lane. I always seem to get behind the person who can't pull her car close enough to actually use the ATM.This is the person who ends up six feet away from the machine. She throws the car in reverse, lurches back a few feet, then lurches forward and tries it again.This time she ends up five feet away.

We couldn't wait for it to arrive. We counted days, and then we counted minutes until that last bell rang. Finally it came: summer vacation!"Sweet freedom!" you thought - except your parents keep telling you what to do. "Eons of time and no school!" you thought - only now it's July and you're totally bored.OK, so the old song says, "There ain't no cure for the summertime blues." But KidNews thinks there are lots of cures for what ails you. So poke through our summer survival kit - it's full of things that will help you keep it together.

Children's holiday dreams of napping with Sing and Snore Ernie may be a lot more realistic than women's fantasies of a chance to dress up in full gala regalia. The seasonal accumulation of magazines and catalogs is chock-a-block with beaded gowns, velvet opera coats, miles of diamante necklaces and outrageously unpractical dancing shoes. Women look, they dream, but the scenario that would merit all this finery eludes them.Dressed-down parties have become so entrenched on the social scene during the last decade that women have nearly lost the knack of going full-tilt for glamour.

THE DAY AFTER my husband and I decided that Jessica would continue to receive a public education, a third-grader in her school was found with marijuana in the pockets of his jeans.A week after my husband and I decided that our daughter would continue to attend public schools, she came home and asked for the translation of a foul remark made to her by a boy in her fifth-grade class during a soccer game.Ten days after my husband and I decided that our daughter would continue to attend public schools, Jessie said, in wistfulness, not frustration: "I'd like to go to school with kids like me, kids who like to do their work."

HAVRE DE GRACE -- It is the interminable summer of teen-age ennui.It will be followed, as always, by the autumn of teen-age ennui, and then the winter, the spring, and so forth. But those other seasons are different, because then, teen-age boredom is practiced most of the time in an institutional setting, and those not committed to those particular institutions don't notice it as much.In summer, however, bored teen-agers are particularly noticeable. This might be because one you don't know has just stolen your car, or it might be because one you know very well is in your living room, looking sullen.

I DON'T THINK I'M Christian."It was one of those conversational hand grenades that middle-schoolers so often toss at their parents.In the midst of their grousing and grouching, about the time you are turning a deaf ear to their attempts to provoke you, middle-schoolers will say something that tells you their stomachs are not the only part of them that is churning these days."Joe," I said. "Religion is not like a college major. You don't get to switch just because you are bored or failing organic chemistry.

Robert Hicks was ready to go home before his family was even an hour into their vacation.It didn't get much better during the 12-hour drive from Texas to Colorado for his family's stay in the mountains.Robert, who is 3 1/2 , fretted about whether the hotel would be nice. He was afraid of the animals at the zoo. He loves trains but screamed his lungs out on a specially arranged steam-train ride."When I said we were going home, Robert's face lit up, he was so happy," says his mother, Linda Hicks, a Midland, Texas, attorney.

We've been fortunate to have been spared from those hazy, hot and humid summer days so far this season. School has been out for only a little over a week. Not long enough for the brood to become bored. All too soon they will be retreating behind closed doors in air-conditioned hibernation, vegging out in front of the television and singing the "I'm bored blues."Savvy parents already have a game plan, but there's always room for a little help along the way.Beginning Monday, the public library will kick off its free, seven-week summer reading program for area youngsters from preschool through sixth grade.

You're a teen-ager. You live in Howard County. You're bored. There's no place to go, unless you insist on counting:* Two movie theaters featuring a dozen screens.* Two teen centers run by the Columbia Association.* An ice skating rink.* A roller rink.* An indoor pool.* In summer, activities at Columbia's lakefront.* That old standby, the mall.With all this available, one would be hard-pressed to prove that so little exists for Howard teen-agers that they are forced to hang out on street corners doing drugs and ingesting alcohol.

It used to take Jason Gill nearly eight hours a day to finish his homework."I did it during commercials," the seventh-grader explains.That's during commercial breaks starting at 3 p.m., from the time he arrived home from school and clicked on the television, through snacks and dinner in front of the tube and through whatever prime time offered.That ended last week when Jason joined a growing group of MacArthur Middle School students who have vowed to watch no television on school nights.He has been concentrating on his homework, reading the newspaper and Hardy Boys novels, playing cards and board games with his mother and helping out at home.

So you're sitting around, totally bored with the same old PC, bored with word processing, bored with spreadsheets, bored with Web browsing, bored with music, bored with news, bored with grainy YouTube videos. Then you realize it's Sunday night, and it strikes you: What you really want to do is watch Desperate Housewives. On your computer. In HD. Well, for a hundred bucks, you can satisfy that high-definition craving with the Pinnacle PCTV HD Pro Stick. Plug this nifty little gadget into a USB port on your computer, hook up an antenna or cable feed to the other end and you're in business - HDTV in a window on your desktop, or full-screen if you prefer.

Ralph Hill, a regular customer at Sweet Cascades in historic Ellicott City, likes to buy ice cream, chocolate-covered pretzels and other treats at the little chocolate shop. But on a particularly cold day last week, he just wanted a cup of coffee. No such luck. Sweet Cascades doesn't sell anything as mundane as coffee, so owner Sue Whary talked him into a cup of decadent sipping chocolate instead. It's made with chocolate, heavy cream and whole milk, she said. Hill asked if it could be made with skim milk.

I admit it: when it comes to travel, I'm a snob. I'm only interested in the "real." I would rather eat guinea pig in a Mongolian yurt than sleep on a feather pillow in a $1,000-per-night luxury resort. But with the summer rapidly dwindling, my wife Shelly and I were looking for a quick, easy and inexpensive escape. We settled on Grand Bahama Island. I resigned myself to the simple pleasures of frolicking in the ocean. I certainly didn't expect anything more. Sure enough, by the end of the first day at our massive beachfront hotel, I was bored.

Comparing the popular video game "Need for Speed" to the old-school table game Yahtzee is like comparing a NASCAR race to a walk in the park. One's not necessarily better than the other; they're just different. Video games are easy targets for educators, psychologists and social scientists. They are too often too violent, too addictive and too solitary. But they're not without their benefits. They facilitate development of strategic thinking, quick decision-making and hand-eye coordination, as well as long attention spans and concentration.

A Tout de Suite (Right Now) takes a bored 19-year-old girl on a ride she'll never forget, a multi-country odyssey that plays out like a 1970s version of Bonnie and Clyde. But the two characters at the film's center - a vaguely dissatisfied upper-class Parisian art student (Isild Le Besco) desperately in need of a thrill and a visiting Moroccan bank robber (Ouassini Embarek) suffering from chronic confusion - display neither the charisma nor the moxie to make this confused-teens-on-the-run story work.

`Bored' Dando is back Evan Dando will rock out tomorrow at Fletcher's. The ex-Lemondheads frontman has overcome substance abuse and recently released Baby I'm Bored, his first full-length CD in several years. Doors open at 9 p.m. for this all-ages show. Tickets are $15. Fletcher's is at 701 S. Bond St. For more information, call 410-558-1889 or visit www.fletchersbar.com. Three to see at Ottobar Big in Japan will appear tomorrow at the Ottobar. The rock act will headline the show after the Drug Problem and Two if By Sea throw down.

Each day seems to bring more intrigue concerning the Orioles' rotation, which is undergoing changes as the season's final month is played out. Two starters have been removed. Another starter's status has become uncertain. And an organization is reluctant to share much information. Scott Erickson and Travis Driskill have gone to the bullpen. Sidney Ponson took Driskill's spot after coming off the disabled list, starting last night against the Texas Rangers. And manager Mike Hargrove confirmed yesterday that Sean Douglass will take Erickson's turn tomorrow against the Anaheim Angels, with Rodrigo Lopez going the following night.

WALTER S. ORLINSKY started in politics as a 1960s boy-wonder state delegate. He was energetic, imaginative and idealistic, fighting for reforms in the Democratic Party and in the larger society. Mr. Orlinsky, who died this week at 63, was an important member of a progressive alliance that built bridges across racial divides, calmed tensions after the 1968 riots and later helped infuse the city with a sense of urban renaissance. With such rising activists as Parren Mitchell, Barbara Mikulski and Norman Reeves, he was involved in a movement to stop an expressway from destroying Fells Point, Federal Hill and sections of West Baltimore.

At this time of year, two words can strike fear into the heart of any parent. Snow Day. You know what happens. A little frozen precipitation falls, and no sooner can you say "Time to shovel the driveway" than the weatherman is gleefully reporting school cancellations far and wide. Suddenly, parents of grade-schoolers find themselves cast as cruise directors in their snowbound love boats. Sorry, Julie, but Captain Stubing reports the passengers are bored, bored, bored. What you need are some new ideas to keep the youngsters happy.

The student: Alison Spatz, 8 School: Ilchester Elementary Special achievement: She was one of two third-graders chosen to represent the school in the State of Maryland International Reading Association Young Authors' Writing Contest held last December. Alison wrote a short story about "a very talented dog named Ace" who travels to the moon and meets various creatures there. "One was a three-eyed black-toed turtle," Alison wrote. "And that wasn't even close to how exciting it was to see the three-headed, fifteen-eyed, twenty-four-legged alien."