Escape!!!

My friend and fellow teacher Mrs. Cool just cracks me up. She's one of those gals with a quick wit and a great sense of humor. Then again, if you teach 8th grade you pretty much need both of these characteristics to keep sane.

I've been after Mrs. Cool to give up the cigarettes for ages, but she's just started grad school and just got divorced (after twenty years of marriage) so her stress level is a bit high. In any case, we have an approved smoking place for the teachers where the kids and the public can't see them, outside behind the cafeteria.

It's been really warm, unseasonably warm, and Mrs. Cool was taking one of her "checking the weather" breaks this week when a door slams open and a child comes out at a dead run, turns a corner and heads away from the building.

Sixth grader on the loose!!!

Mrs. Cool said it was sad that her first thought wasn't, "Hey, there's a sixth grader on the loose!" but was, "Oh crap, they got me with a cigarette."

In any case, she stubs out her smoke and runs back in the building, picks up the phone, calls the front office to let them know there's a kid on the run. Turns out is was a sixth grader who was apparently supposed to be getting suspended for some reason or another. When the SRO finally caught up with him he claimed he was trying to get to the local shopping center to "pick up some things." Why a sixth grader would need to go shopping to prepare for a suspension is anybody's guess.

Apparently this is the third escape that Mrs. Cool has helped catch this year. Our sixth graders are apparently quite the slippery bunch!