Stories From Junior High

Let's talk about junior high. A time of learning, a time of chaos. A time of Team Jacob, a time of Team Edward.

Okay, maybe that was just around the time I went to junior high. But anyway, here's some school stories from when I was a young teen.

Darth Vader Meets James Brown

I had a teacher that I have about a thousand stories about. He was a man with a military background, and worked both as a junior high teacher and a pizza delivery guy. Due to a back injury, he had metal rods and such, which he said made going through airport security a pain.

During his time teaching at my school, there was one time he hurt his back by accidentally falling on his son's Death Star at home. He said that he literally took out the Death Star. When they say Legos are dangerous things, they're not exaggerating. He eventually healed from this incident, and felt so good that he actually started singing 'I Feel Good' in the middle of class.

He had some stories from when he was a kid, including a rather chaotic incident in shop class when he was a teen. Apparently the shop teacher left the room for a bit, and some kids thought it would be funny to shove a disabled student into the supply closet and spray stuff various things at him to watch him react to the fumes. This greatly angered my teacher, and as he put it, "I took a two by four and went to town."

He got into trouble for it, I think getting suspended for school. His father's reaction was along the lines of, "Well, I'm not happy about you being suspended, but I'm proud of you for defending that kid."

Also, that pizza delivery job I mentioned earlier? Well, one day he was delivering pizza to a house, and some guys in their twenties refused to pay and tried to fight him for him. Although my teacher was probably about twice their age, he was also a sturdily-built guy and a veteran, so their belief that they could jump the delivery man and get free food was sorely mistaken. My teacher came to class with cracked ribs, but as I recall, he won the fight.

 

Rubber Chicken

 

One of the teachers was a rather fun individual. Sometimes when we were acting up, she'd threaten to bring out the rubber chicken. Often the feral students' response would be to beg for her to do just that, since it basically involved whacking the misbehaving kids with the rubber chicken.

Also, one day I heard that during one class (which I sadly wasn't there for), one of the boys was being a pain, and as he was leaving the classroom, she jokingly threw her shoe at him.

Who Died and Made You King of Anything? That's Right, No One.

At some point, we had a new gymnasium built. It also functioned as a new cafeteria, with a fancy new kitchen in it. The principal was very adamant about keeping the gym floor pristine, and created some rather absurd rules. When kids went in to get lunch, we couldn't just walk directly across the floor. We had to walk along the edges, because God forbid anyone set foot on the perfect new flooring. Floors are not meant to be walked on!

Anyway, the guy who taught algebra, science, and P.E. had been at that school since the dawn of time. He frequently said things like "I've been teaching here for fifteen years now..." (Or whatever the number happened to be.) He was a strict, no-nonsense type who didn't give a flying turd about the principal's absurd rules. He didn't bother with skirting around the edges of the gym, and would just stroll directly across the middle of the floor. Who knows what the principal thought of it, but that teacher had been at that school for about as long as I'd been on this earth, and I think he had tenure by this point. So I imagine the rule-happy principal couldn't do much more besides get his knickers in a twist.

Suffer Us a Hideous Smell

One day, as class was ending and we were about to leave for next period, a terrible odor filled the air. Someone had apparently set off a stink bomb in the classroom. There were theories about who had done it, but no one was really certain of the culprit.

For the rest of the day, whoever was in that classroom suffered greatly. The room reeked, and on top of it, the teacher refused to let us open the door or any of the windows. So we all had to be miserable with the horrible stench. There was no mercy from our veteran teacher of eighty thousand years.

 

...Then again, teenage boys would frequently apply half a can of noxious body spray to their persons during class. Perhaps after so long teaching junior high, our teacher had an iron nose. Or maybe his olfactory system had simply withered away from all the fumes.

A River of Algebra

One morning, one of the boys hadn't slept well the night before, and dozed off during first period. His head was lying on his textbook, and he ended up drooling on his math book.

 

 

Teen Pattern Baldness

There was a kid in my class who was kind of a troublemaker, and sometimes did odd things. The most notable of which was the time he came to school with a rather... interesting hairstyle. For some unearthly reason, he shaved the top of his head, and the top only. A 13- or 14-year-old kid who looked like he had male pattern baldness.