The Wheels on the Bus. . .

Today I had the rare privilege* of going on a field trip with hundreds of ninth graders.  It was about as fun as you would imagine a field trip with hundreds of ninth graders to be, especially since we were only going across town to the tech school, so there were no fun zoos or museums to speak of.  The only fun part was when, during the presentation on the early childhood development pathway, I tried to convince a couple of my girls that the robot babies were actually dead babies.  They didn't buy it.  They also didn't believe that the mannequin heads in the cosmetology room were severed heads of fugitives.**  Shoot.

One of the best (and by best I mean, of course, worst) parts of this trip was that I got to ride across town in a school bus. 

I hate riding school buses.

Hate hate hate hate hate.

And do you know why?  (I mean, other than the fact that they smell and don't have good climate control and they're uncomfortable and always chock full of screaming children?) 

I super hate school buses because, when I was in the tenth grade I had to ride the school bus to school.  And I hated it.  It took 45 minutes each way, and there were a bunch of trashy kids on my bus, and it was uncomfortable and loud and too bumpy for me to be able to get my homework done.  So I'd just sit there, bored and miserable.  If I was lucky, I might get to talk to some preppy girl about her newest pair of jeans from Abercrombie. 

Before too long, I realized that the only thing that would make the bus ride bearable would be sleep.  So I took to sleeping on the bus.  And then I took to lying on the seat and sleeping on the bus.  And then, on one fateful day, I took to sleeping a little too hard on the bus--so hard, in fact, that I didn't wake up for my stop.  And I didn't wake up for the next stop, or the next stop after that, either.

I didn't wake up until much later, when I popped my head up, only to realize that I was the only kid on the bus and that the bus was now on the highway.

Oops.

Both I and bus driver were pretty freaked out.  Fortunately--in a very embarrassing twist--the bus was headed to my brother's middle school.  I had to go to the office, call my parents, and get permission to, in my sixteenth year of life, ride the middle school bus home with my kid brother.

It was pretty humiliating. 

And that, my friends, is why I hate school buses.  But, really, doesn't everyone hate school buses?


*The universe hates me.

**This, coupled with the fact that they didn't believe that I was Jesus the other day, makes me think that I'm losing my touch when it comes to lying to children. 

Shecky Update

Well, since I know you all are dying to know, I talked to Shecky earlier this evening about her Larry email situation.

On Monday, after she re-emailed him and then left him a voicemail, Larry finally called Shecky back. She decided to face her fears head on (apply directly to the forehead), and she brought up Friday's unfortunate email. Larry had:

• forgotten about the email
• found the email to be strange
• thought she was making jokes that he didn't get
• not been creeped out by the email

Shecky made up some lie (a lie she'd been working on for days; she'd even practiced it on the phone with me) about how it might have seemed like she was hitting on him, and how the email was intended for her friend Portney in the office. Oops!

He seemed to have bought her story, and was even so kind as to forward the email back to Portney, explaining how it is important for people to be very careful when communicating electronically.

I think I like Larry!

So, it's good news. Not the best news possible, because that would have been him saying, "I love you, too, Shecky! I have since the first moment we met!" and then running through a field of wildflowers to meet her.

She did a bad, bad thing.

So, I've got this friend who, for privacy purposes, we'll call "Shecky." Shecky is having a rough day. Shecky works at a university and is very professional. Shecky did a bad thing today.

You see, Shecky has worked at this university for about a year, and for the that year minus about 10 minutes, has been in love with her coworker named, uh, "Larry." (She's like Laura Linney's character, Sarah, in Love Actually, who is in love with Karl. Only Shecky's story is much more humiliating.)

But Larry had a girlfriend.

Larry had a girlfriend.

But he doesn't now. Because he and Shecky have become buddies through the course of the year, and Shecky recommended to him that if he wasn't happy with the girlfriend, he shouldn't be in the relationship. He took Shecky's advice.

He broke up with the girlfriend!

And this morning, he told Shecky about it. Shecky was so happy.

Larry mentioned that he was bored now, and didn't know what to do with himself now that he has so much extra time.

Shecky, of course, botched the opportunity to say something smooth. Shecky often botches opportunitites to say something smooth.

Later, Shecky left a voicemail for Larry, and "smoothly" mentioned that he could call her if he was bored over the weekend, because she often finds herself bored as well.

And she was so proud of herself!

So proud, that she immediately sent an email to another coworker that read: "I totally just asked Larry out over voicemail. Oops!"

But Shecky didn't send it to her coworker.

She sent it to Larry.

Oops!

What is Shecky to do? How can we help her get Larry the way Sarah got Karl?

(Besides making sure she never answers phone calls from family members in the midst of making out. . .)