Ned Bitters

Instead of waiting until June to recap another year’s worth of classic school moments, I thought I’d go ahead and share the year’s first half highlights now. And no, these anecdotes are not embellished, because I keep detailed notes on slips of paper I hide under my desk calendar. Yes, this is where my energies go at work.

Still Maintaining that Inner Perv

The prettiest senior girl I have this year came in my room during lunch while I was eating with another middle-aged male teacher. She cooed in her softest, sweetest, most sincere voice, “Mister Bitters, can I warm up my chocolate muffin in here?” (Yes, she’s black.) I just stared at her, unable to nod my assent and pointed to the microwave oven. She then smiled and followed that up with, “I know that sound nasty, but …”

That same week I was reading a student’s journal in which she wrote about something that worries her on a continual basis. She wrote, “I have a medical problem. My jaw locks and I can barely open it. I need to get this fixed, or otherwise I won’t be able to do the things I love to do with my mouth, such as …” And this was the last line on the page. Before I turned the page to read on, I poured a drink, dimmed the light and put on some mood music. (No knucklehead, I was not at school.) I turned the page, prepared for some juicy journal content that would make Larry Flynt blush. The first word on the next page? “… singing.” Shit. Teenage girls all across America pulling trains and going to blowjob parties, and I get the Last American Virgin in my third period. How do I know that? In a later journal entry, she proudly professed her virginity and her steely resolve to stay that way until she gets married. Here’s hoping she gets that lock-jaw problem resolved before the honeymoon.

Finally, I was passing out some stapled materials one day, and when I handed them to this very large, well sculpted, deep-voiced African-American male in the front row, he felt the heft of the packets and said, “Damn, Bitters! Why so thick?” Having forgotten to take my maturity pills that morning, I said, “Nature, my friend. I guess the gods just smiled upon me.” Damn kid was laughing so much he couldn’t even go into the usual homophobic teen overreaction to such a comment.

Honesty Is the Best Policy … I Think

Just before my fourth period class I saw one of my students from that class talking to one of my first-period students in the hall. Then they disappeared. He showed up to class 30 minutes late. That technically amounts to a cut, but he’s a great kid and the class was working quietly (the only sound was the sound of me banging on my keyboard as I fucked around online, of course), and came to my desk to explain why he missed 3/4 of the class.

Me: “Where were you?”

Him: “I went home.”

Me: “Huh?”

Him: “I had to use the bathroom.”

Me: “Huh? Wha … ?”

Him, in a calm, not-trying-at-all-to-be-sensationalistic voice: “Bitters, I had to take a dump, and there was no way I was shitting in school, so Devon drove me home. But then we came back to school!”

I issued him no official warning for his cut, did not notify an administrator about this serious breach of school policy and didn’t even give him a tardy. I mean, don’t you remember how impossible it was to shit in public high school?

Shalom, Bee-otch! (If I may quote Shulie from the Howard Stern Show.)

Girl handed in a stunningly well-written essay for her senior portfolio. It was a copy of an essay she turned in on a college application. I was so thrilled to be reading such eloquence that I was on the verge of going all A Christmas Story and writing “A+ + + +” across my board in an orgasmic display of gratitude. Then, near the end of the essay I found this red flag of a line: “I look forward to participating in the many extra-curricular activities offered there, especially those that fall under the realm of Jewish life.” How did I know right then that this paper was plagiarized? Well, the word “realm” was the first tipoff, as no student in the history of my time at that school has ever used that word. But it was more the fact that writer is very black and very not Jewish.

I did a quick Google search and found the original essay. I confronted her. She feigned innocence (you know those Jews!) but then ‘fessed up when I showed the original. Her first comment was not “I’m so sorry and I know this is wrong!” It was, “My dad did that! He found it for me!” So not only does she plagiarize, she also has her father do her work. Guess that explains her earlier autobiographical paper on the discomfort and embarrassment of prostate exams.

Honor Thy Father … Sort Of

I have one girl who has a one-year old baby. She also had a baby die a few days after it was born. She has also had one miscarriage. She is 18. She fought in school in September. She almost got into another fight in front of my room a month later. In the midst of her rage, she was screaming, “I will F you up, B!” She was actually saying the letters and not the words. I asked a day later why she was able to control herself that way. This thrice pregnant girl’s explanation? “Oh, my dad’s a minister. He’d kill me if he found out I was cursing.”

So, apparently the rules for a minister’s daughter are: Fighting in school? Acceptable. Fucking nonstop without protection? Acceptable and fun. But using the “F” word? Hell and damnation!

Say What? Some random, overheard student comments that don’t really need much commentary.

“Man, I wish I had a third tittie!”

—

“Mr. Bitters, what’s my zip code?”

“I don’t know, where do you live?”

[Pause] “I don’t know.”

—

“I got a new tattoo near my box.”

“What does it say?”

“Lick!”

—

“I seen his wife and I thought she’d be a lot cuter than she is.”

“Why do you say that?”

“Well, you know … cause he drive a Cadillac and all that.”

“Well what was it about her that made her not cute?”

“She was wearin’ this purple North Face jacket for one thing.”

—

“My boss is Chinese, and those people really do drag out the last word in every sentence. He’s like, ‘I need you make pizaaaaaaa’ and ‘You can work Fridaaaaaaaay?’ But it’s extra weird because his name is fucking ‘Simon.’”

Ned Bitters teaches high school and dreams of one day seeing one of his former students on stage at a strip club. You can contact him at teacherslounge@hobotrashcan.com.

Ned Bitters

Here is the third and final installment of the moments that make being a teacher so worthwhile. What? You’re looking for sap or inspiration or tear-inducing anecdotes? Those are for the movies. This shit is all real.

Super sweet girl came into my room during lunch one day holding a typed essay she was working on for another class. She said, “Mr. Bitters, can you please scam over this for me before I retype it?” The poor girl meant “scan,” but as I had taught this girl in 11th grade English, she wasn’t too good with words … or writing … or reading.

Instead of being a real teacher and using this moment to clarify the difference between “scam” and “scan,” I said, for the benefit of another old vet eating lunch in my room, “Sure thing, Nafeena! That’s my specialty! I’ve been scamming here for 24 years now!” The paper got scanned, the other teacher got one a good laugh, and this poor senior girl will some day tell her boss she needs a day off from work so that she can go get a CAT Scam.

I sent a kid to the restroom about ten minutes before the end of class. A new, very stern female vice principal stopped this kid, who had forgotten to take my hall pass. She began to interrogate him. Now, this kid has a pretty bad scar running down under his nose across his upper lip, so he looks like he could be “special.” He also has a rather deep voice and, due to the scar, a bit of a lisp. He’s also very smart and has balls of titanium. He recounted the following story to me, and the V.P. confirmed it later.

The VP stopped him in the hall and asked where he was going. He said, in a really slow, retarded voice: “I … don’ knowwww.” She bought it. She thought he was a short-busser, or, to use a more professional term, a window-licker.

She started questioning him very slowly. “Is your classroom upstairs or downstairs? When you go downstairs, do you go left or right? Is your teacher male or female?” To every question, he would pause, tilt his head, think real hard, and respond, “I don’ knowwww.”

She finally got him to give her his name. She looked up his schedule on her computer, saw he belonged to me, and called my room, overcome with self-satisfaction at saving the day for this boy. When I picked up the phone, she said, “Mr. Bitters, I just want you to know that I have Eduardo with me and he is okay. I’m going to hold him until the bell and then if you could send someone up with his books …” I paused for a long while, puzzled, then asked, “Is he in trouble?” She assured me in her most motherly voice, “Oh no, the poor kid was so lost and confused, but he’s okay now.” When I heard him tell the story for the entire class the next day, he became one of my heroes in the school.

And this year he became my number one school hero. He has a mustache. One day he brought in a disposable Bic razor, and when excused to the restroom he promptly shaved off the sides of each mustache to effect a spot-on Hitler ’stache. He then marched around the halls between classes yelling, “Have you SEEN KYLE?” Say it real fast and loud with a German accent. It sounds like, “Sieg heil!” Then he would yell, “I think I saw him over there!” And he’d point with his whole hand doing a Nazi salute. It was brilliant. This went on between two classes, but very few people even got the joke. Fortunately, we have no Jews in our school (hence our shitty SAT scores). However, we do have do-gooder teachers, one of whom reported him to the V.P., who made him shave off the rest of the mustache, taking him from Hitler back to another nobody with a just a few quick razor swipes. Fortunately, I did my part in showing him the type of reaction this sort of tasteless action can elicit. I took two picture of him doing the salute and still have them on my work computer.

Girl came to my class one day and immediately immersed herself in a book. Now, I can barely get them to read the results of their pregnancy or STD tests, so this was quite thrilling. I went over and commended her on doing independent reading. She looked up kind of embarrassed. I asked her what she was reading. She reluctantly showed me. It was called, Sex Chronicles: Gettin’ Buck Wild. I asked her if I could take a look. She let me have the book. I opened to a random page. I am not exaggerating one bit (remember, I take notes) when I saw that the first line I happened upon read, “… then he flipped her over and began ramming her from behind, slamming her into the headboard, pulling her hair …” Ass slapping and shouts of “Fuck me!” ensued. Then the paragraph ended. I handed it back. She said, “Mr. Bitters, you shouldn’t be readin’ that kind of stuff.” I wanted to say, “Well, sweetie, since you’ve already had two abortions in the past 18 months (people talk, namely her) maybe you shouldn’t either.” But for once I was a concerned educator. I told her I was proud of her for reading on her own and handed back her book. I found the book on Amazon, (it’s part of a series!) but it was too expensive to buy a class set.

We had a teacher get into an actual fight with a student one Thursday during eighth period. This guy is 50 and has had previous physical confrontations with students. They took him out that day and he has not been back. The next day the principal held a brief meeting after school. (I’m surprised the union didn’t grieve the fact that it was on a Friday.) He wanted us to know the facts about what had happened, to remind us not to talk to the press, and to remind us of how to avoid physical confrontations with students. I mean, the man emphasized that there is never an excuse for this. He said physical violence from staff is indefensible and one of the few legal issues you can’t overcome. We were sent off secure in knowing that we worked for a level-headed, mature principal who would lead by example. The meeting ended before 3:00.

That Friday night, a little after 9:00, when the basketball game ended, Mr. Example Setter got into a shoving match with the opposing team’s coach and had to be held back by our school cop. He was upset at the behavior of the coach’s players and told him to control his kids. The coach stepped up and called him a “bitch.” The principal gave him a good shove. A melee ensued. Fans rushed the floor. Adult fans, not kids. A swarm of cop cars soon descended upon the school. The security video shows one man running down from the stands with an infant in a car carrier. He was trying to protect his lovely child, his fatherly instincts kicking into high gear … yeah, right. No, wanted to kick some ass. He put the carriage, which contained an actual live baby, down on the floor and went off looking to punch and get punched. Strangely, no meeting was held Monday to remind us to refrain from violence.

A special ed kid I know only from the halls stopped to talk to me as I stood outside my classroom door between classes. He told me it was physically impossible to open one’s mouth very wide and nod one’s head at the same time. I, who apparently just hopped off the banana truck in the hope of buying some prime Florida swampland real estate, immediately took up his challenge, showing him that I could not only do it but do it with gusto. And there I was, pantomiming a rather serious blowjob in the middle of the crowded hall. Yep, 24 years on the job and still getting duped by special ed kids. (But to my credit, I think I’d give great head.)

On the last day of school, I heard this same kid ask a girl, “Hey, you wanna go to the cookout?” The girl, who I believe sat behind me in the back of the banana truck and later bid against me for that swampland, said, “Yeah … what cookout?” The Sped replied, “The one where I slap my meat against your grill.” Since it was the last day, I let that hilarious bit of sexual harassment pass. I was too busy laughing to fill out any forms anyway.

And finally, we were sitting in the annual meeting last fall in which the pupil personnel worker reminds us of the signs of physical and sexual abuse. She was going down the list, mentioning bruises and black eyes and compound fractures and severed heads, and near the end she mentioned “bloody underwear.” I was sitting next to a man who is somewhere between 65 and 127. The last witty comment this guy made was probably some crack about Eisenhower’s chances at getting re-elected. He leaned over to me and said, “If I turn in a kid because of bloody underwear, I’m going to be the first one arrested.” There I was, laughing in the middle of the presentation about the horrific abuse kids are subjected to.

And there you have it, the greatest hits from another year in one public high school. Yes, I get paid decent money to enjoy my job that much. Sometimes I laugh so hard my stomach hurts. Which is why I need this 61-day summer vacation to recuperate. Now get back to work, suckers!

Ned Bitters teaches high school and dreams of one day seeing one of his former students on stage at a strip club. You can contact him at teacherslounge@hobotrashcan.com.

Ned Bitters

The first installment of this year’s greatest hits consisted only of comments made by me. Let’s start Volume II with some of the wisdom-laced remarks made by the people who will some day draw your blood in a hospital … or direct your plane in for landing at the busiest time of the day … or monitor the control room at the nearest nuclear facility. Oh wait, those are kids at a school near you. Our graduates will be glad to get your Burger King order right … on the third try.

Overheard during a passionate discussion on some NBA star: “Dude! He’s got talent but he got no skills!” Please note that this kid swore he was making perfect sense.

Shouted out loud to the entire class while watching a documentary about the Lost Boys of Sudan when one of the film’s subjects was shown putting a suitcase in his car: “Yo Bitt! Is he gonna driiiiiiive all the way back to Africa?” Please note that this car was in Syracuse, New York, and that this girl was completely serious. A world map was produced so that the class could explain to her what all that blue was between the U.S. and Africa.

Overheard in the hall from the senior class’s biggest handjob of a kid, a chunky boy with a shit personality: “Oh my God! Tell that girl I’ll give her my whole KFC check if she goes out with me!” Please note that this kid couldn’t get laid in Southeast D.C. with Lebron James’s paycheck.

Comment offered in response to a question asking what the evil hags in Macbeth plan to do to wreak havoc on a certain sailor: “She said she can’t wait to blow that man all over the place!” Please note that Macbeth does not have any blowjob scenes.

Student’s way of identifying the character Krogstad in the play A Doll’s House: “Yo! That’s that nigga tryin’ to give Nora the clap!” Please note that the character Krogstad does indeed have an STD and that the kid’s answer was actually correct. Not very eloquent, but correct.

Overheard during the first week of school as students reminisced about summer parties: “Wait a minute. When is the Fourth of July?” Please note that I had a friend in college who asked the same question and who also held his New Year’s Eve party on December 30.

Question asked to me, in a very low voice by an NCAA division I football prospect as he walked by me into my class one day: “Yo Bitters … smellyourdick?” Please note that I have no idea where that question came from, and further note that I yelled in after him, “No, but you will tonight when your mom kisses you goodnight?” Yes, I really did say that. I was proud of how quickly I came up with it.

Girl’s attempt to offer a helpful comment during a science class discussion on recessive genes, just after the teacher cited examples such as attached earlobes and webbed toes: “My brother says I have camel toe! What’s that?” Please note that this might, in fact, also be caused by a recessive gene, but alas, a gynecologist was not on hand to confirm.

Of course, not all the student humor was in the form of unintentionally absurd comments. Sometimes a student can provide educational wonder just with his actions. Take the injured football star who was so depressed about not being able to suit up for his final homecoming game that he drank most of a fifth of vodka before school and during first period. (It mixes well with Gatorade.) By third period he staggered almost comatose into a coach’s empty classroom and collapsed. Other coaches and a jock-sniffing VP were secretly called to the room. They got him to lie down on one of the computer counters while they went about filling out the paperwork and reporting this to … oh please. Didn’t I say he was a football player, and a good one? Those kids don’t get in trouble. They let him sleep it off on the coach’s office couch. The contacted the kid’s father to come get him.

The father promptly came up to the school, signed out his son and they led the kid to the parking lot when the halls were empty during class. The father was heard yelling in the parking lot, “You gonna drive yourself home, and I’m gonna follow behind you, and if you get a DWI or get in a wreck, it’s on you and maybe then you learn your lesson!” Luckily, the kid made it home, and Father of the Year, a.k.a. Mr. Good Judgment, avoided a potential lawsuit and jail time himself. For the rest of the year, every time I saw this kid, I would either demonstrate the sobriety test nose touch or just yell out, “Hey hey, buddy! 53 days and still sober! I’m proud of ya!”

This same kid provided a classic video moment when one of the snack machine vendors inadvertently left a machine’s front door unlocked after stocking the machine. Kids noticed it and emptied the machine in minutes during second period. In third period, an angry principal took to the P.A. with the following message: “We have you all on camera. You can all come to Mr. VP’s office in the next ten minutes to either return the items your took or make restitution for what you ate, and the matter will be closed, but those of you who do not show up will be charged with theft by the school officer.”

A video shows this kid in the VP’s office opening one of those big, bulky Staypuff Marshmallow Man jackets and letting loose an avalanche of Doritos, Fritos and Sun Chips. His friend told me later that after loading his jacket with upwards of 30 bags of chips, he had to walk very slowly because of all the crunching sounds from the bags. His friend kept poking him, and the friend said to me, through actual tears of laughter, “Everywhere I’d poke him [demonstrates 3-4 light, slow pokes] you’d hear ‘crunch … crunch … crunch.”

And there you have it, another collection of true tales from another shit ass American high school. And I didn’t even tell about:

The A.P. student who I had to help address an envelope (She had NO idea where any of the info went.)

How for the second time in four years one of my students had a baby mid-year without me even realizing she was pregnant. (Give me a break. The girl was the size of Manitoba before she got knocked up.)

The student who, after getting arrested and suspended, enacted revenge by lobbing a Molotov cocktails at the cop’s car in the parking lot. I’d love to tell you about the spectacular gas explosion once the glass bottle broke on impact … but the dipshit used a plastic bottle. All that ensued was a little parking lot fire that lasted about 45 seconds.

I taught all seniors this year, so all of the kids in these stories were seniors. They all graduated. Which tells you all you need to no about the expression, “No Child Left Behind.”

Ned Bitters teaches high school and dreams of one day seeing one of his former students on stage at a strip club. You can contact him at teacherslounge@hobotrashcan.com.

Similar Posts:

• The Teachers’ Lounge – Memorable Moments 2010, Pt. II
• The Teachers’ Lounge – Memorable Moments 2011, Pt. I
• The Teachers’ Lounge – Memorable moments 08, Pt. III
• The Teachers’ Lounge – Memorable moments 08, Pt. II
• The Teachers’ Lounge – Memorable moments 08, Pt. I

Ned Bitters

Another school year is coming to a close, which means I have another collection of insanely inappropriate, crude and stupid comments to share. Because I am insanely inappropriate, crude and stupid. Volume I of this year’s wrap-up is a collection limited only to things that came out of my mouth. The fact that I have never been fired, let alone reprimanded, speaks volumes about the state of our public high schools. These are all verbatim, because I take careful notes right after the moment passes.

Building Student Esteem in Just 60 Seconds!
We have a course called “Walking for Wellness.” The curriculum is real brainbuster. The kids walk all period. That’s all there is. If the weather is nice, they walk outside. If it’s not, they walk inside. In mid-May, senior a girl was telling me about her graduation status and told me she had failed “Walking for Wellness” for the year. A caring teacher (meaning “not me”) would have offered some words of encouragement or solace. Instead, I took the opportunity to deride her for a good sixty seconds with comments such as “You FAILED walking class? Christopher Fucking Reeves could have passed walking class. All you do is walk. Let me guess … you got a D in Sitting Class. What’s your status in Advanced Breathing class?” This was made all the more fun by the fact that three of her friends who were with us in the room added a chorus of abusive laughter.

Having Your Students’ Backs … and Their Moms’, Too
I was talking with a few kids near the end of class one day, and one told us that his mother had actually punched him in his face four times in his life. I suppose this was an opportunity for a caring teacher to make sure he was not living in an abusive household. I could pull him aside and discuss the situation further or perhaps refer him to the guidance counselor or the pupil personnel worker, which we are legally required to do if we suspect abuse. I, on the other hand, asked him, “Did you punch her back?”

The boy said, “Hell no!”

I said, “Well, I’ll slap her ass extra hard when I’m with her tonight.” Hilarity ensued and I saved a trip to the guidance office.

I See Your Smartass Comment and Raise You One Annihilating Comeback
In the middle of class one day, as students worked silently on some kind of busywork I would throw away ungraded as soon as they left, I reached into my bookbag and pulled out a bottle of Advil. As I shook out two pills (can’t remember if it was a vodka or scotch hangover), the senior class’s biggest smartass quipped, “Yo, Bitters … is that your Vi-aaaaaaagra?”

Before the no-longer-working class could burst into laughter at my expense, I lectured this boy about the need for tact, class and … yeah, right, like I’m that kind of teacher. No, I calmly replied, “No, your mom keeps those locked in her nightstand for me. In fact, you’ll hear me shaking one of them out of the bottle around nine tonight.”

Tables turned. Your turn, douchebag. What’s that? You’ve got nothing to say? Or can’t I hear you over the rest of the class laughing?

Open Mouth, Insert Foot … Twice
A girl in my honors class went to a neighboring school’s prom instead of ours. She came in the Monday after and showed me a prom picture of her and her date. I mustered up all the fake enthusiasm I could and went into full rave mode, saying, “Oh wow! Look at you two! You guys look so good. You look so pretty and I love your date’s tux. Those turquoise shoes are so cool. I gotta tell you, he is one handsome young man.”

She looked at me aghast and yelled, “Mr. Bitters! That’s my girlfriend!” Yep. The handsome young man was, in fact, a girl, a full-blown dykey dyke. How did I wiggle out of this contretemps and save face? I said, “Well, she sure makes one good looking guy!”

Mentoring with Wisdom 101
A boy who sits near my desk was talking about how rip roaring drunk he was going to get before prom. He asked me if I thought the chaperones would notice and what would happen if he got caught. I informed him that police would be on hand looking for drunk students and that he could possibly be arrested. This caused him great consternation, as he was more intent on getting hammered than he was on getting laid after prom. He asked if chewing a lot of gum might mask the alcohol smell. He asked about drinking vodka because of its odorlessness. I finally offered him some very sage, very mature and very teacher-like advice, which was, “Why don’t you just forget about drinking and just smoke a ton of weed and gets really high instead?” It speaks to how pathetic I am that he was not at all shocked by this suggestion. We then went over the pros and cons of this option and decided it was the right way to go.

24 Years in and I’m Still a Teacher Who Really Gets to Know His Students
In the fall, one of my student’s father’s fatally shot the girl’s mother, then killed himself. He did this on a Friday morning before the girl and her brother left for school. She was the one who ran upstairs to find them. (No, I am not going to make one wisecrack about that incident. Even I have limits.) She was out of school for only two weeks.

Upon her first day back, I was outside my door waiting for her to come to class. I had thought long and hard about what I might say to her. I didn’t want to be maudlin, or super sweet and sappy, or act like nothing had happened. I finally decided upon just giving her a very cheery “Hello!” and “Welcome back!” saving my sincere condolences for a later time. She finally came around the corner and got to my door. I put on my cheesiest smile and said, “Hey! There she is! Welcome back! I’m so glad to see you again!” Her reaction? Bewilderment. She looked at me like she didn’t know what the hell I was talking about.

I figured she was in some bizarre state of denial or was ashamed, so I let it go and she passed into my room. Later, during lunch, I saw her headed toward the front doors of the school, as she is a senior who leaves school early every day. I went up to her and this time, because it was just the two of us, got very serious and somber and expressed my sincere condolences on her loss. Or at least I tried to. I got about 16 words in before she stomped her foot and said, “Mr. Bitters! Stop! I’m Sharina, not Nateeka!” Yep, I had the wrong fat black girl. Both times. So, not only did I offend Sharina, who, by the way, I had also had in tenth grade, so I knew her pretty well, but I let Nateeka, scarred, bereaved, distraught (and very big) Nateeka, come to my class without any acknowledgment of the tragedy and trauma that befell her.

I Bet She’ll Think Twice Before Emailing Me Again
Woman just last week emailed me the following: “What happened to his grade? It went down!”
The first line of my response? “Seems to me you already answered your own question.”

Ned Bitters teaches high school and dreams of one day seeing one of his former students on stage at a strip club. You can contact him at teacherslounge@hobotrashcan.com.

Similar Posts:

• The Teachers’ Lounge – Memorable Moments 2010, Pt. II
• The Teachers’ Lounge – Memorable moments 08, Pt. I
• The Teachers’ Lounge – Memorable moments 08, Pt. II
• The Teachers’ Lounge – Memorable Moments 2011, Pt. II
• The Teachers’ Lounge – Memorable Moments 2009

Ned Bitters

[Editor's Note: Joel Murphy is busy plotting Jimmy Fallon's demise, so today we bring you part two of high school teacher and former HoboTrashcan columnist Ned Bitters' favorite moments in the classroom this year. If you missed part one, you can find it here.]

HOW TO PICK UP WOMEN, PAGE 457
I caught this snippet of a conversation while walking through the halls between classes. Senior boy said to a cute girl, “C’mon girl, give me your phone number.” Girl replied, “No, you ain’t gettin’ my number. You always in trouble. It’s not like you gonna be able to come over.” The boy persisted with a line that, amazingly, failed to procure the desired phone number: “C’mon shortie, I get off house arrest next week!”

I’M NOT SURE THIS IS WHAT DR. KING HAD IN MIND
Saw a kid with a t-shirt that said “Celebrate Diversity!” Isn’t it great that a high school kid would go out on a limb and wear a shirt with that message? Doesn’t it take a lot of guts to risk derision from his peers? Oh, the shirt had some art on it. No, not a black kid, a white kid, an Asian kid all holding hands in front of United Nations. The picture was of about 15 different kinds of pistols.

WELL HELL, THEN HAVE YOUR PEOPLE CALL MY PEOPLE … I’VE GOT SOME LESSON PLANS THAT NEED TAKEN CARE OF
In our state, performing some sort of community service is a graduation requirement. Kids have four years to get this done. It’s no big deal. And if a kid does not want to actually perform some useful service to his community, he can take the pathetically easy route of doing a prescribed written project, which the school’s community service coordinator will grant rubber stamp approval to without even reading. In other words, it’s a piece of cake.

Still, every May the coordinator starts sending out frenzied emails listing the 40 or so seniors who still have not met this requirement, urging us to urge them to get this graduation requirement out of the way. I saw one of the kids from the list, a senior I like a lot. He’s one of those very mature kids who figured out how to coast through school by doing almost no work, probably because his ass is always in the halls. I call him The Mayor. Most teachers can’t stand him. He’s one of my favorites. (Side note: He’s black, I’m white. Every time I’d go into the bagel store where he worked, he’d yell down to the girl at the register, “Hey, this guy … family discount.” The girl would invariably give him a quizzical look, to which he’d reply, “He’s my uncle.”)

I said to him, “So, uh, Darrin, you think you might want to, you know, take care of that community service thing any time soon, what with graduation about four weeks from now? Shit, all you gotta do is that bullshit project and it’s done.” He thinks for a second, furrows his brow, then lights up and says, “Oh yeah, that! Shit, I got people workin’ on that for me as we speak.” A week later his name was off the list. I saw him again and asked him what his project was about. He had no idea.

YOU KNOW YOU’RE A DYNAMIC TEACHER WHEN …
It’s the second week of October. School started in August. I hear this exchange between two kids who have been in my class since day one. First girl: “I don’t know, you better ask Mr. Bitters.”

Second Girl: “Mr. Bitters? Who’s that?”

Yep, I had the girl in class for six weeks and she had no idea who I was.

ANOTHER TEACHABLE MOMENT SHOT TO HELL
In my eighth period knucklehead class we were reading a book written by a former female slave. Of course, it was filled with the horrors you would expect to find in a book about slavery. Whippings … rape … forced separation of family members … hunger. Even I, the man with no limits, just couldn’t find a single thing to crack wise about while we read page after page of this woman’s heartbreaking life story. Perhaps I was actually moved by something for once, but more likely it was the fact that most kids were actually paying attention and trying to read. I felt almost like a bona fide grown up teacher, handling sensitive material in the proper fashion.

Almost. In the middle of one chapter, this poor woman describes the pressure to have sex from another slave, her white master and another white man 35 years her senior. How did I handle the excruciating period of helplessness and despair this badly abused slave was describing?

I stopped reading and said, “Damn. This woman must have been one hot smokin’ piece of womanhood. She had every guy for 20 miles after her ass.” Thankfully, the juniors in this class were similarly immature. They woke from their trances and all chimed in with speculation about this woman. “Oh man, you know she had a sweet one goin’ on down there!” “She was probably more flexible than this rubber band.” “I bet that phat ass looked good bobbin’ up and down when she was chopping cotton!” On and on it went for about 90 seconds.

A teachable moment was at hand. I don’t lecture much, but this was an opportunity ripe for a stern sermon on how wrong these comments were. However, I was incapable of seizing the moment, as I was doubled over laughing to the point I fell off my stool. I tried to return to the book three times but was unable to do so due to my inability to stop laughing … and picturing how hot that sweet Sallie probably was.

And that’s about it for this year. No need to talk about the kid who asked me to watch the door so he could go have a cigarette. (I laughed and said okay, thinking he was joking. Three minutes later he came in smelling like an ashtray and thanked me with great sincerity.)

Or the time the principal and the girls basketball coach almost got into a fist fight at a home game when the principal had the unmitigated gall to suggest that the coach needed to get his roughneck girls in line.

Or the girl who showed up the first day, got in a fight before second period, then explained that the only reason she came back to school was “to beat that girl’s ass one more time.” She never came back the rest of the year.

Or the kid in my class who asked me if it would be proper to use the following pick-up line the new sub for the French teacher who walked out in the middle of a class and never returned: “Hey, my dick is dead! Can I bury it in your ass?” It was another teachable moment for Mr. Bitters. But I was too busy laughing to seize it.

Ned Bitters teaches high school and dreams of one day seeing one of his former students on stage at a strip club. You can contact him at teacherslounge@hobotrashcan.com.

Similar Posts:

• The Teachers’ Lounge – Memorable Moments 2011, Pt. I
• The Teachers’ Lounge – Memorable moments 08, Pt. III
• The Teachers’ Lounge – Memorable Moments 2011, Pt. II
• The Teachers’ Lounge – Memorable moments 08, Pt. II
• The Teachers’ Lounge – Memorable moments 08, Pt. I