Landers

I’m often amazed at how the mind works when it comes to memory recall. I couldn’t tell you what I had for lunch yesterday but a simple comment on the radio has me instantly remembering something from over twenty-five years ago that I hadn’t thought about for probably the same amount of time.

On the radio today they were talking about the snow (every other news item seems irrelevant at the moment) when a caller said “and I could only go at about thirty miles per hour!” Instantly in my head it’s 1984!

I’m eleven years old and it’s my first year at secondary school. Earlier that year I’d bought a clipboard from WHSmiths with some vouchers I’d had from my Auntie Winnie for my birthday. What an eleven year old needs with a clipboad is beyond me but I know I wanted it! It was yellow and had “Speed Limit: 30mph when leaving class!” written on the front. I found it hilarious! The shame!

So there I am in a biology lesson with Miss Kelly and I’m taking notes with my notepad fastened to my clipboard. I was so proud and it obviously made me the most itelligent person in the class.

Without warning Spencer Glanville, a fellow pupil, grabs it out of my hands and “autographs” the back!

“That’ll be worth a fortune when I’m famous!” he says.

I was furious but could do little about it as I was already on report for telling an English teacher to fuck off so snapping at Glanville would have got me in more trouble!

I got my revenge by unscrewing the leg of his tripod while he fetched a beaker of water. As soon as he put the beaker on the tripod it gave way and 300mls of water soaked him and his workbook – the intended target.

Miss Kelly took one look at the tripod and knew it had been tampered with and muttered “bloody sixformers!” under her breath as she cleaned up broken glass and told us to settle down.

I still have the clipbaord somewhere at mothers and although it’s faded a litle you can still make out the feint nearly twenty-six year old signature of an eleven year old Spencer Glanville on the back.

Spencer left our school at the end of the first year and I’ve never heard of him since. If anyone knows if he ever became famous, other than his mention on the worlds most popular blog, let me know. I could be sitting on a small fortune!

I stole this thing from the gorgeous CJ… and he IS gorgeous… I know I’ve seen him!

So what do you remember about your teachers, in one word! Try to think of one word that reminds you of the teacher you had for that subject.

Maths: Itchy (She used to scratch her lady garden through her skirt and then sniff her fingers!)
English: Gay (I owe this guy a lot.)
Drama: Mother (Lovely woman who used to mother me!)
Biology: Funny (Hilarious – once got suspended for telling a naughty joke)
Computer Studies: FREAK! (He had a scrap with the drama teachers husband after he found out they were having an affair. They later married)
Rural Studies: Lanky (Really really tall – Starred in the original Dr. Doolittle)
History: Twat (This guy couldn’t teach to save his life and always talked about Crocodile Dundee)
French: Flanders (The spitting image of Ned Flanders)
Religious Education: BITCH! (I FUCKING hated this woman!)
Business Studies: Formal (Always wore a bow tie to class!)
Music: Old (She looked in her 60′s but was actually early 30′s)
Art: Pregnant (She was my form tutor and art teacher and always seemed to be pregnant)
Woodwork: Knob (I have a funny story about this guy. Read it below)
Chemistry: Shy (This woman went from reproduction to osmosis in one easy step!)
Physics: 5ft4ft (The way he walked… big strides made him go up and down!)
Geography: Asshole (I hated this teacher. VERY much!)
Latin: Tourettes (He would just spout out random latin words and then not tell us what they were!)
General Studies: Slut (We went away for a weekend and this teacher stepped off the coach EVERYONE got a view of her fur!)
Sociology: Lesbian (She looked like Lynn Foulds-Wood and I’m sure she wasn’t a lesbian but back then I was sure she was!)
Spanish: Grizzily Adams (HUGE beard!)
Law: Mrs Robinson (Male! Gay! Big big flirt with all the guys… possibly the only reason I passed Law!)

So there you have all my GCSE teachers…

And now for the story…

Okay, so the story about the woodwork teacher… Our woodwork classroom had one of those mobile blackboards in it. The kind where is rolled around two rollers, one at the top and one at the bottom. The teacher used to write work on it at the end of the lesson before ours then when we walked in he would roll it over and say “right you lot of wasters, here’s the work, get on with it!” So one day, we found the room open during the break and went it. We adjusted the work, adding some rude words etc and then rolled it back over and jammed an old fashioned wooden board rubber in the top of the rollers. So we wait back outside the class and he arrives and lets us in. He “pretends” to unlock the door obviously not wanting to admit he’d forgotten and lets us all in. We sit down and he turns to face the board. He tried to pull it down but it won’t move. So he tries again and still nothing. So with both hands he pulls the board down as hard as he can. The board rubber pops out, flies up in to the air and comes down squarely on the top of his head, knocking him out cold. An ambulance is called, we all get a SEVERE telling off and all of us get detention as the four lads who actually did won’t own up. To this day I have never owned up to being one of the four lads and I know three people who read this live journal, who I went to school with, who were also in the class and were not part of the four that will be calling me as soon as they read this and give me a bollocking for them getting detention!

I’m having one of those strange moods again and I don’t know why.

I’m not pissed off but I’m not jumping-for-joy-over-the-fucking-moon happy!

Through-out my life I have moments when for quite a number of months I’d be in a routine. It felt natural at the time. It felt right. School days… I’d get up, go to school, come home, do homework, head off to Ju-Jitsu/Ice Hockey/Gym (delete as appropriate for the day), come home, play out, watch TV, go to bed, sneakily watch TV or read, wake up in the morning, go to school, and so on…

My college/uni days… I’d get up, go to uni, come home, do some work then fuck off out for a drink, either to the pub next door or at the bottom of the road or into town. I’d come home sufficiently boozed up, go to bed, get up in the morning, head off to uni blah blah blah as the cycle went on.

My work days… I’d get up, go to work (or go downstairs if I was working at home), do what I needed to, write some shitty assignment, go home (if I wasn’t already at home), relax, then go out, come home in one of many pissed/sober/desperate (delete as appropriate) states, got to bed, get up and here we are again in the morning.

Weekends would involve nights at the gale with lovely Dave, meeting at the postbox that they have now taken down! Bastards! Falling into the gale or Route or Subway, getting pissed and passing out on Dave’s floor.

Thursday would be the Embassy. Me and Lucy on stage. Or Lucy on stage and me getting pissed and trying to entertain the punters. Stealing bottles of champagne from the stores and bunging them in our suitcase. Getting stoned on whatever the bouncers had confiscated for the retards at the door.

Looking back, I know things should change, but now I seem to have no routine at all. Literally no routine. The days roll by and I wonder where they’ve gone. I love my life, don’t get me wrong, but I do have to wonder where things are going? What am I doing?

I’ve just had a quick scan of the above (so as not to upset the Zeds with my now/not and our/out mishaps) and I wonder if there is any connection with the use of the coarse language when I describe my college/uni days, work days, weekends and the Embassy yet none when I describe school? In my head did I revert to childhood innocence when writing about school? Of course, now I’m also questioning why I’m questioning it.

Could I cook on a range?