Teachers on a bus

Hollywood loves sequels. They'll even crank out versions II, III, and IV of a box office dud if they can think of good titles. If some bored producer with deep pockets is looking for a movie idea, he might want to try a follow-up to Snakes on a Plane. He can call it Teachers on a Bus. I didn't see Snakes, but I'm betting this sequel will be scarier and more disturbing than any scary movie ever made.

Our district is always organizing bus trips. I don't know the person at the central office whose job it is to organize these monthly outings, but I bet she likes her job. Who wouldn't like a job that entails buying event tickets in bulk, chartering a bus and sending out a few mass emails telling everyone to sign up now because spots are filling up fast!

Where do these busloads of teachers go on these day and weekend trips? (By the way, could there a phrase in the English language scarier than "busloads of teachers"? Perhaps "four more years of George W. Bush," but otherwise I can't think of one.) If there were a website called "clichedtripsforthosemindlessmoronswholikepaintbynumbersculturalexperiences.com," you might find the itineraries of these trips.

They go to New York City - called "the Big Apple" in the breathless emails - and see a Broadway play, then hit some famous store or two ("Oh, Barneys!"), then stop at Rockefeller Center (and ... do what? Look at Rockefeller Center, I guess), then have a big dinner at some tourist-welcoming joint where a real New Yorker wouldn't be caught stabbed. Sometimes they go to Washington, D.C. and, you guessed it, see a play, then have dinner, then go look at all the Christmas trees, or the cherry blossoms, or whatever cliched overcrowded and overrated experience is all the rage there.

They'll go to museums in a big city, but only if some traveling exhibit will be there. ("The impressionists are coming! The impressionists are coming!") They'll go to Major League Baseball games and sit the worst seats in the house and wait for the wave, which will earn 100 percent participation from the teacher contingent. Sometimes they'll go to a minor league game and the team will call it "This County Teacher Night," which means the team will charge a ridiculous sum for a tented area that serves cheap burgers, soggy fries and soda. Despite the $40 charge, the teachers will still have to buy their own beers. The bus will sell out.

Of course, this is mainly speculation on my part, as I've never once gone on a district-organized bus trip. I did, however, go on one county-wide bus trip, but this trip was organized by a couple of teachers at a neighboring school. They chartered a bus and bought 40 tickets to a Major League Baseball game 60 miles away. This trip was not sanctioned by the central office in any way. It was invitation only. I think you had to have a liver the color and consistency of scrambled eggs to make the list. Hence the invitation to Ned Bitters. Something tells me that this particular bus excursion was quite different from any of the ones mentioned above. Being on one of those would make me puke. Come to think of it, I guess there was one similarity, as I'm sure all 40 of us puked at some point of the night on that infamous Drive of Debauchery.

We met at a local Park n Ride around 4:30, and being a warm spring Friday, most of us had already hit a happy hour somewhere. The trip organizers had a full keg of Budweiser already chilling on ice in the back of the bus, plus two large coolers jammed with beers. It was the loudest, sloppiest, rudest, drunkenest 60 miles I've ever experienced. Wait, make that 120 miles. We came back that night, I think.

Have you ever been stuck in rush hour traffic near a bus full of high school kids who insist on making faces and gestures at you, forcing you to humor them with smiles and waves? Have you ever been mooned by a kid on a bus? Ever seen a college kid hanging out the window guzzling beer, yelling inanities to no one in particular? Trapped drivers at Interstate 95 toll booths had to endure this and more from shitfaced teachers one May night. And that was just on the way to the game.

By the time we arrived and decided to make our way into the stadium, the keg was empty and three cases of emtpy beer cans were rattling under the bus seats. The drinking continued inside the stadium. I think the Blue Jays played. Someone won. Those are the only details about the game that I remember. I do remember an usher threatening to throw me out for throwing something at someone else in our party. I remember they assigned more security and ushers to our section midway through the game. I remember a vice principal standing up and shouting, "Hey ump, get off of your knees, you're blowing the game!"

We didn't have to sit in traffic after the game because it took almost an hour for everyone to find the bus. One girl, who drank like a sailor on leave, reported later that she sat on a curb and cried for 15 minutes because she couldn't find the bus among the 20 or so that were parked there. She finally realized which bus was hers after all the other buses pulled out and ours was the only one left. She also was helped by the fact that she recognized a vice principal, who was pissing on the back of the bus because the line inside the bus was too long.

This should be the point in the story where we all pass out for the long ride home. Only we didn't. We were out of beer, so one of the trip's organizers, the vice principal who had just finished pissing on the bus, talked the driver into stopping in some shithole area of the city so that he could run into the diviest of inner city dive bars and grab some six-packs. He passed a hat and collected money, most of it crumpled up bills of all denominations, because when you're piss-drunk and still wanting to drink, you'll trade your mother's eyes for a sixer of Bud.

One of my favorite images from 20 years of teaching is watching this vice principal try to run across a city street around 11:00, his legs wobbling, his body zigging this way and zagging that way, until he finally went sprawling right in the middle of the road. I think the yellow lines tripped him up. The roaring of the bus was louder than the noise 40,000 people made at the game. He somehow got himself up, turned to the bus, bowed, saluted, then proceeded to make his way to the bar. A few moments later he appeared at the bar door and motioned for help. Two big football coach types staggered over to help him. They disappeared inside the bar. Half a minute later, they came out toting four six packs each. The reaction on the bus was probably a lot like that of those rugby players in the movie Alive when the rescue helicopter came.

As for the ride home, things got very quiet after about 20 minutes, but not because people were passing out. People were hooking up. Hands were full of tit, cock and who knows what else all up and down the bus. I have a vague memory of a soft mouth and a two big floppy tits. I might have been with Maureen. Or it could have been my buddy Randy. I was pretty drunk.

We finally arrived back at the Park n Ride around 1:00 AM. What did these 40 teachers with off-the-chart blood alcohol levels do next? Got in their cars and drove home. I don't remember the game or what this trip cost, but I know that it gave me more enjoyment than seeing The Lion King and buying an $80 teddy bear at FAO Schwarz.

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.