Strate Up Bitches.

Let me just begin by saying that the bathrooms in my school are in a deplorable state. They are rotten. Filthy. Gross. Try as the janitor may (and he makes a valiant effort), he just cannot stay on top of the situation. The kids are constantly in there writing hideous things on the walls, stuffing rolls of toilet paper down the sinks and toilets, and just generally trashing the place.

Anyway, today one of my students told me that there was a "rude message" about me and my teaching colleague on the wall. I pretended not to care, but right after dismissal, I rounded up my colleague and we went down to search for the evidence.

We donned our haz-mat suits and made sure that our wills were up to date and then we ventured in.

The first thing I noticed was that since my last trip in there, the four stalls have been designated (unofficially by the students, of course) as grade level gossip stalls. The mean stuff about 5th grade students and teachers is confined to the first stall, the sixth grade to the second stall, etc. The seventh and eighth grade stalls are the third and fourth respectively.

In the 7th grade stall, one line of graffiti says, "I hate Ms. B (that's me) she's a bitch." The remark right next to it says, "Ms. B and Ms. L, STRATE UP BITCHES."

All my colleague and I could do was laugh and remind ourselves that we are, after all, middle school teachers. This is par for the course.

And to be honest, I'm pretty sure that I am a strate up bitch sometimes, so it can't be entirely undeserved.