Saturday, May 14, 2011

Silly Children....

On May 6th, one of the teachers in our hallway purchased a cheeseburger from the cafeteria for lunch. After she put mayonnaise on her sandwich, she realized she purchased a chopped beef sandwich from a fundraiser. She decided to give her uneaten cheeseburger to a student. She chose Aaron. Aaron did not eat the burger, nor did he take it home. He left it in his locker over the weekend! The air conditioning on our campus shuts off on Friday and doesn't come on until someone fixes it on Monday--usually around noon or so. The temp in our building Monday morning was approximately 87 degrees. Around 2:30 on Monday, we had locker clean-out. Aaron found his cheeseburger. Another student, Martin, offered Aaron $1 to eat the cheeseburger. SO. HE. DID!!!!!!!! One bite. The kids in the room started making noises and the teacher in the room was alerted to the situation. Another teacher and I made Aaron go to the restroom and throw up. Told him to stick his fingers down his throat if he had to. Thankfully, he was successful with this as our nurse had nothing to offer to help in the process. When I asked him why and he told me about the dollar, I told him I would give him the money next time!

Whew!!! Trip to the ER or a VERY sick child was averted!!! Hopefully he learned his lesson!!!

Friday, May 13, 2011

endangered species

I hear some pretty interesting stuff on the cb radio while driving the school bus. This is what I heard this morning.

-bus 1234 to base
-base here
-environmental call today.. there is a turtle on Street XYZ just north of Hawthorne. I can see it won't make it up the curb and they are an endangered species....you might want to call the police to let them know.
-10-4
-why don't you just run over it? (this is from another driver)
-alright, enough guys (THIS is from base)

I wonder what I will hear this afternoon.

Thursday, May 5, 2011

no radio

Just a few notes to catch this blog up with my happenings...

One day last week was a real bummer. On our buses we use what is called Zonar. It is a computer aide when we do our pretrip. Well, my Zonar wasn't working. That's number one. Then, just as all my kids leave the bus at the school for morning drop off, my wiper falls off. It was a dark, cloudy sort of day and raining. The wiper on the driver's side flipped backwards and was just hanging there. I can't drive with it this way so now what?! I drive the bus out of the school loading zone and park on the side of the street where I always do my student check. I used the radio to base... I am thinking someone from shop will have to come out and change it. They ask if I can move the one from the passenger side to the driver side... Well, here it is. In case you haven't been next to a school bus, up close, in some time, they are tall. And if you know me.. and for those of you who do not... I am short. There is a step right there so I use that. I can't do it. I am stepping on the tiny step, hanging on the handle, leaning over the bus... And the entire wiper is off. Bracket and all. I get back in the bus and radio in that I cannot change it.. I am too short!! Apparently while I was out dangling on the bus, a fellow driver said he would stop to see what he could do. He arrived and after opening the hood of the engine, he stood on the wheel and was able to change the wipers for me. (For those who don't know, the hood opens out so there was plenty of room for him to stand on the wheel.) Mind you, I was hoping and praying this nice enough man would not slip and fall off my bus! End of story, he got it changed and I was able to drive back to base. I then left it with the mechanics who had it changed by my afternoon route.

In the afternoon, one of the turns I need to make is a hard right turn. The town I drive in has very narrow streets and sharp right turns. The word is if you can drive in this town, you can drive just about anywhere. Well, I have trouble with this one turn almost every day...and the trouble isn't so much with my driving but rather that a mail truck parks just about at the end of the street...making my right turn almost impossible. I have at times, sshh, don't tell anyone had to back up to make the turn. So anyway, one of the kids says really loud when we get to the intersection from H-E-double hockey sticks, "Yeah! No mail truck today. Whoo hoot!"

I then laughed out loud.

On with the afternoon route. When only a few kids remained on the bus, it was relatively quiet. One of the kids shouts out.. "Hey, Miss Bus Driver. Can you turn on the radio?" *wink* I don't have a radio other than my cb for communication between the bus and dispatch.

Although the day began somewhat crummy, I ended up smiling a few times before all was over with. Thanks, kids, for the smiles.