More school life

I have had a ‘bit of a day’.
We have been interviewing teachers today. We had 6 candidates and being a primary school (ages 4 to 11); interviewing teachers is something we have done once or twice before. We like to give them a false impression. First stop is the petrol station to pick up a gaudy bunch of flowers. Once at school it’s on with the real coffee so it smells nice. Then it’s happy smiling faces to meet and greet, barricade them in the staffroom and make sure all the most badly behaved children have special jobs to do and are out of the way.

The first 4 candidates were safely ensconced when the first fight of the day broke out between a child, with a preference for staying at home, and his parent with a preference for us to have him. Luckily Social Services are much too scared to come here and I managed to manoeuvre the antagonists out of sight of the staff room before he belted his dad. Whilst I was mediating, the other candidates arrived and were whistled smartly into the haven of coffee and calm (did I mention the Danish Pastries?).

A little pep talk was given to them by the Headmaster and I heard one of them say,
“What a lovely, friendly school and so quiet.” Concurrence all around to the sound of us snorting in the office, when a small child clutching her stomach came racing down the corridor, wailing,
“Feeeeel sick”
And promptly threw up in the staff room doorway.

Actually I always like it when there are Danish Pasties left over because I take them home for tea.
That dealt with and they were off, one by one, to display their teaching acumen and run the gauntlet of the interview panel.

The momentary lull was shattered by a spine-chilling scream coming from a small boy. As he clutched his face, blood was spurting between his fingers. He was being pursued by a bigger boy, who was brandishing a chair in a menacing manner

I tried to shut the staff room door before they passed but I think they may have caught a glimpse. I disarmed the perpetrator whose reason for the attack was,
“He called me an Arsenal Supporter” (Actually I can understand why he hit him, but we do have a no hitting with chairs policy). I had to leave the building, much like Elvis, to escort the bad mouthing victim to the medical centre (which, luckily, is across the road), whilst leaving the chair wielding offender, cordoned in my office.

I left him with strict instructions not to use my chair in anger unless someone was making off with the safe, and would he mind just answering the phone politely. By the time I returned peace seemed to have broken out. The safe was still there, although chair-wielder was occupied trying to break into it; so I thought (never wise) I would just check that all our candidates were here. In the excitement I hadn’t actually clocked them all and ticked them off my important list. It was now lunch time and so they were all back in the staffroom. I stuck my head round the door and did a quick head count – yep 6 – all was well.

A sudden realisation dawned on me that one of the candidates was supposed to be a man, but I was sure I hadn’t seen a man. I casually meandered back into the staffroom under the pretext of getting a glass of water and looked around. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, all women. I sauntered back out with my water and checked my list. Yep, Mr John Smith (name changed to protect the not very innocent). Checked signing in form, Ms Joanne Smith. Checked staffroom more carefully. Actually on closer inspection he stood out like a sore thumb. It was the size of the hands, and the feet, (surprisingly shapely legs), in fact the overall size of him!

I have to say he actually looked very good. I just wish he’d told us! I scuttled off to tell on him, but before I had a chance the Headmaster was in there and shipping them off for a tour of the premises. I stood behind them pointing at him as discretely as is possible to point and mouthing “SHE’S A MAN”. Eventually he got it and tried not to do the double take I knew he would. With the benefit of hindsight I should have kept my mouth shut. The Head marched round in a twitchy sort of fashion trying not to look, and failing miserably, as our hero(ine) hung on his every word (something he’s definitely not used too). The other candidates, who were obviously way ahead of the rest of us in the noticing she’s a he department, lagged behind and tried to cover their sniggering with unconvincing bouts of coughing.

It was a credit to him that none of the interview panel had noticed anything other than she was really tall and not a Claudia Schiffer lookalike.

As they were leaving the building the rather aggressive and large over-baring parent of the chair wielder arrived to take his errant offspring home. As he came into the office he said,
“There’s a fucking bloke in a frock out there” I smiled weakly whilst making some non committal noise to which he replied
“Where d’you think you can buy ladies’ shoes that size then?”

I have had a ‘bit of a day’.