Bits & Pieces

By Kim J. Harmon

Look before you leap.

It is sort of a simplistic aphorism, but – gosh – sometimes it is right on the money.

Like this past week, when Newtown High School boys’ soccer coach Brian Neumeyer and athletic director Gregg Simon were criticized for racially offensive lyrics overheard in a song playing at Blue & Gold Stadium during warmups prior to a recent game.

It seems, however, according to coach Neumeyer, that the lyrics were not racially offensive, but simply Portugese.

A phone call would have cleared that all up before some people got embarassed.

It reminded me of the time, oh, about six years ago when the Newtown High School girls’ basketball team defeated Masuk for the first time in forever and I – silly me – happened to be in Boston with former Bee sports editor Tom Wyatt accepting a New England Press Association award for outstanding sports coverage.

Nevertheless, I was ripped up one way and down the other in a letter for not being there.

The letter read, in part, “Where was the Bee? Was our reporter out sick? Or was it because Masuk being so dominant in past seasons The Bee decided to write off the girls for this game. Or would be prefer to cover the boys game instead.”

The writer did not know and did not bother to ask where I was that night. A simple phone call would have cleared it all up and spared me – and him – some embarassment.

Look before you leap.

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Behind the fence at Joel Barlow, next to the stands, a bunch of kids played a little impromptu soccer while the South-West Conference boys’ soccer championship was being played.

But Barlow athletic director Pam Goodpaster (and who could blame her?) had to put a stop to it because of the possibility of one of the kids getting hurt and suing the school district.

The fact that she had to even worry about something like that (a kid would have gotten hurt and his parents would have sued, no doubt about it) is sad.