by Jeff Kinney
There used to be a lot of BOYS on the Patrols,
but most of them quit or got kicked off before
the start of the new year.
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The last two boys on the Patrols were Eric
Reynolds and Dougie Finch, who were both
captains. But they had their badges taken away
in the first week of January when they got into
a snowball fight in front of the kindergarten
classroom at the elementary school.
So now the Safety Patrols are 100% GIRLS.
And I’ll bet they’ve been planning a takeover for
a WHILE.
The reason is because the guys at my school can
be real JERKS. And when it snows, they’re
REALLY bad.
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After a while, I’m sure the girls got SICK of it,
and that’s why they put themselves in charge.
Now that the girls are in power, they’re not messing
around. If you throw a single snowball on a school
day, the Safety Patrols will report you to the
principal, and it’ll get you an automatic suspension.
So the girls are just PRAYING one of us guys
will step out of line.
Today the road was cleared, but the sidewalk
WASN’T. Whenever that happens, me and
Rowley just walk in the road. But these new
Safety Patrols are sticklers for the rules, and
they won’t let us walk in the street, even though
THEY do it.
But it’s practically IMPOSSIBLE to walk on the
sidewalk when it hasn’t been plowed, ESPECIALLY
when people are clearing their driveways.
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In fact, it’s hard to even know where the sidewalk
IS, and this morning I almost busted a kneecap on
a fire hydrant that was buried in a snowdrift.
The thing that REALLY stinks is that the Safety
Patrols make all us guys walk on the SIDEWALK,
but they let all the GIRLS walk on the ROAD.
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When me and Rowley got to school today, we were
totally wiped out from the trip in. But the girls in
our class were fresh and ready to go. And if one
of them goes on to be president, it’s because they
got an unfair advantage back in middle school.
I don’t really blame the Safety Patrols for
sticking it to the guys in my grade. Most boys are
basically SAVAGES, and they make civilized guys
like ME look bad.
But with this new Safety Patrol situation, I’ve
been thinking there might be a way for me to
separate myself from those fools.
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If I can work FOR the Safety Patrols, I can
stay on their GOOD side. And if I report the
troublemakers to the girls, then they’ll OWE me.
For some reason, though, snitching is really frowned
on in my school. If you tell on a kid for doing
something WRONG, then everyone says you’re a
tattletale, and it’s hard to recover from that.
But from what I can tell, the only people the
“no snitching” thing helps are the BULLIES. I’m
sure they’re the ones who came up with the idea in
the FIRST place.
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Personally, I don’t have ANY problem with
snitching. And apparently, you can make MONEY
off of being a tattletale.
Rodrick told me about a guy in his high school who
turned out to be a “narc,” which means the guy
PRETENDED to be a high-schooler, but he was
actually a cop in DISGUISE.
I’ve heard about this kind of thing before,
and sometimes I wonder if there are narcs in
MIDDLE school, too.
There’s a new kid named Shane Browning who
came to our school in the middle of the year, and
he looks a lot older than the rest of us. I’m
starting to wonder if maybe HE’S a narc.
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So I’ve been giving him the inside scoop on my
classmates, just in case he is.
Anyway, the snow situation is causing a LOT of
problems.
For the past few days, kids have been
wearing their boots in school, and everyone tracks
snow through the hallways.
So today, the teachers made everyone take off
their boots in the entryway. But the snow on the
boots MELTED and made a giant PUDDLE.
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Then kids WALKED through the puddle on their
way to class, and before long everyone’s socks were
SOAKED. One thing led to another, and by third
period it was just complete CHAOS in the hallways.
It got so bad the teachers had to collect all of
our socks and keep them in the front office.
But a bunch of barefoot middle schoolers isn’t such
a great thing, either.
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At the end of the day, we all went to the front
office to get our socks. But most socks look the
SAME, so no one could tell which ones belonged
to who.
Luckily, Jake McGough has a really good sense
of smell, and he paired each kid up with their
correct socks.
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He even got the socks right for the Garza twins,
which you have to admit is pretty IMPRESSIVE.
I was glad it was a little warmer on the way home
today, since me and Rowley didn’t have Gramma’s
house to use as a pit stop. But that didn’t mean
the walk home was EASY.
You’re not allowed to throw snowballs on the way
home from school. But AFTER you get home, you
can do anything you WANT.
So kids who live close to school have figured out that
if they drop their bags off at their houses, that
counts as being HOME. Then they come after the
kids like me and Rowley who still have a long way to
WALK.
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The SAFETY PATROLS get ambushed, too.
But rules are rules, and they’re not allowed to
fight BACK.
And they get attacked from both SIDES. Some
of the kids on my hill who get rides home walk
halfway back to school just to get their licks in.
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It’s supposed to snow another few inches tomorrow.
I told my parents that I’m saving up for a
SNOWMOBILE so getting to school isn’t such a
hassle on days like today.
But Mom and Dad started listing all the reasons
why a middle school kid can’t have a snowmobile,
and after a while I kind of tuned them out.
Any time I come up with a good idea, my parents
shoot it down. They did the same exact thing
when I had my dogsled idea LAST winter.
I figured if I bought a few dogs and trained
them to pull a sled, getting to school in the
morning would be a SNAP.
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I guess my parents thought I was JOKING,
though, because they told me I should go for it.
But when I used my Christmas money to buy a
litter of puppies from the lady up the street,
Mom and Dad made me return every last one.
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Thursday
Today reminded me why the winter is my least
favorite time of year.
It was another snowy day, but this morning I
decided to do some extra preparation to stay warm
on the way to school. Dad lit a fire before he left
for work, and I figured I could use it to warm
up my coat and boots before I put them on.
But I put my boots too close to the fire, and
the rubber soles melted into the bricks. So when it
was time to go, they wouldn’t BUDGE.
Rowley was coming by to get me at any minute, so
I had to figure out something ELSE to wear on
my feet.
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I knew the Safety Patrols wouldn’t let us walk
in the street, and my sneakers were gonna get
SOAKED if I had to walk through the snow.
So I created my own SNOWSHOES out of pizza
boxes and duct tape. And by the time Rowley
knocked on the door, I was ready to go.
I’ve gotta say, my snowshoes worked even better
than I EXPECTED. In fact, I was moving
along so fast that Rowley had trouble keeping up
with me.
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But once we got to the bottom of Surrey Street,
things fell apart.
The boxes got SOGGY, and I started sinking
into the snow. And then it was even WORSE
than having sneakers on, because now I was
dragging these wet BOXES along with me.
I knew this wasn’t working, so I had Rowley try
to help me pull the boxes off my sneakers. But it
was practically IMPOSSIBLE, because they were
double-wrapped in duct tape.
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Unfortunately, we were right at the edge of the
Guzmans’ yard, and they’ve got about eleven dogs.
The dogs were curious about what we were doing,
and that wasn’t helping things.
Then the dogs got AGGRESSIVE and started
fighting over the pizza boxes. That’s when I
remembered there were a few slices of pizza still
in them.
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The dogs chewed up the pizza boxes, and thankfully
didn’t take off my FEET. We got out of there
as quick as we could, but my sneakers were getting
soaked in the snow.
The second I stepped onto the street, though,
the Safety Patrols were right there with their
whistles. So I had to just suck it up and walk on
the sidewalk.
It didn’t take long for the COLD to set in.
I was worried I could lose my TOES if I
didn’t find a way to warm them up. But the
school was still a long way off, and I was
desperate.
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So we stopped every few houses, and I’d shove
my feet into a dryer vent until I got the feeling
back in my toes.
We finally made it to school. But it took me a
minute to realize it was almost as cold in THERE
as it was OUTSIDE.
Apparently what happened was that the sock
smell from yesterday was so strong that it was
too much for the night janitor.
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So he went around and opened all the windows to
let some fresh air circulate.
But then I guess he forgot to CLOSE the
windows at the end of his shift. And the furnace
couldn’t keep up, so it shut down. That meant we
had a whole day of school with NO HEAT.
At first the teachers let us wear our winter stuff
in class. But I guess that was too weird, so they
changed their minds and made us put our gear in
the lockers.
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In History we were FREEZING, but our teacher
was just FINE. Mrs. Willey keeps a space heater
next to her desk, and she had that thing
cranked up to the MAX.
Halfway through class, a girl named Becky
Cosgrove tipped over her desk and started
yelling, which was totally random.
As punishment, Mrs. Willey made Becky sit in a chair
next to her desk. And it took a minute for the
REST of us to figure out what Becky’s game was.
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But kids in middle school are idiots, and within
thirty seconds EVERYONE was trying to get a
seat next to Mrs. Willey.
For the rest of the day, everybody did whatever
they could to keep WARM. And some kids got
pretty CREATIVE about it.
We had a school play a few weeks ago, and
somebody had the bright idea to get one of the
costumes
from behind the stage.
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While most of us were freezing our butts
off INSIDE, the snow was really piling up
OUTSIDE. And by fourth period, people were
freaking out that we were gonna be stuck at
school OVERNIGHT.
At lunch, kids bought up everything in the cafeteria
so they’d have something to eat if we got snowed in.
That sent everyone ELSE into a panic, so kids made
a run on the vending machines in the hallways.
At that point, people were just trying to get their
hands on anything that was EDIBLE. A rumor
spread that there was food in the SCIENCE lab,
so a bunch of kids ran down THERE.
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And from what I heard, they picked that place
CLEAN.
I think the principal could see that she was about
to have a RIOT on her hands, so she announced
an early dismissal.
Well that was great news for everyone who rode
the BUS home, but us kids who had to WALK
didn’t have it so easy. I really wasn’t looking