Eww…

23 years….I know I haven’t literally seen everything working in a school, although I have seen and heard a lot. You know the things I’m talking about, those unusual are you kidding me kind of things. Here are a couple of those I’m referring to…

• how did your shoe get wet? Student- I tried to stand on the toilet and ya, you know the rest…
• Jr High student: Someone said it was liquid candy, the kind you spray in your mouth…not quite it was sanitizer (luckily he barely got any in his mouth! I still couldn’t keep a straight face…really?!!)

Today, I added to my experiences. Another first. Although I personally did not SEE it, I could absolutely SMELL it! Picture this, the bell is about to ring for students to enter the building and begin their day. Sounds normal. I’m in the office handling a couple last minute things before heading down to greet students being dropped off. In a split second everything changed. I was talking to one of our substitutes that was coming in when I could hear a large number of students yelling. Where was this coming from? I excused myself from the office and walked in the hall to figure out where this ruckus was coming from. Looking down the hall I see a few teachers walk towards doors in the direction of our playground. I can now hear kids yelling/screaming. What is going on?! I quickly move outside to see a bit of mayhem (as one of my 3rd graders called it later in the day). Students were screaming, running and walking briskly, but they were all moving in different directions…what in the world is going on?!! Several students run up to me yelling SKUNK!! (Oh boy…) How am I going to gain some control of these 200 kids running, yelling and some screaming…I move to the middle of the playground and start blowing my whistle as long and loud as I could in order to be heard over the yelling. Many students stopped, some slowed down, and others walked, but all were looking in my direction. We began telling the kids to walk and quiet down and move inside. Yes, a skunk chose today to share it’s most vulgar stench with all of us at school. Somehow a bit of a miracle happened through all of this…not one student was sprayed by this critter. Once we were all inside, the stench stayed with us in parts of the building, but as the day went on it did get better. Once we were all inside, we began to laugh a little…This was a first and I hope a last! I hope the skunk has taken her babies and moved on…sorry to whomever inherits our critters!! Eww….yuck!!