by Dan Gutman
My Weird School Daze #9
Mrs. Lizzy Is Dizzy!
Dan Gutman
Pictures by Jim Paillot
To Mr. Rafael T. Botello
and his third graders at
Brunswick Acres School
in Kendall Park, New Jersey
Contents
1 The Lockdown!
2 Crazy Week
3 Crazy-Hair Day
4 An Important Life Skill
5 Crazy-Clothes Day
6 Crazy-Hat Day
7 Crazy-Shoes Day
8 Crazy-Everything Day
9 Every Week Is Crazy Week
Screwball World of My Weird School!
About the Author and the Illustrator
Credits
Copyright
About the Publisher
1
The Lockdown!
My name is A.J. and I hate school.
It was Friday, one of my favorite days of the week. Do you know why Friday is one of my favorite days? Because the next day is Saturday. And then comes Sunday. And on Saturday and Sunday there’s no school.
Yay!
My teacher is Mr. Granite. He’s from another planet, but he’s always talking about our environment.
“Always recycle your plastic bottles,” Mr. Granite told us. “Because plastic bottles can be made into plastic lawn furniture. And plastic lawn furniture can be made back into plastic bottles. And plastic bottles and plastic lawn furniture can be made into plastic cup holders, so you can relax and drink from a plastic bottle while you’re sitting on your plastic lawn furniture. And plastic…”
Mr. Granite didn’t get the chance to finish his sentence because at that very moment the school secretary, Mrs. Patty, made an announcement over the loudspeaker.
“Attention,” she said, “Dr. Emer is in the building.”
“Dr. Emer is in the building!” shouted Michael, who never ties his shoes.
“Dr. Emer is in the building!” shouted Ryan, who will eat anything, even stuff that isn’t food.
“Dr. Emer is in the building!” shouted Neil, who we call the nude kid even though he wears clothes.
“Dr. Emer is in the building!” shouted Andrea Young, this annoying girl with curly brown hair who I hate.
Everybody was freaking out!
“Who’s Dr. Emer?” I asked.
“‘Emer’ is short for ‘emergency,’ Arlo!” said Andrea. (She calls me by my real name because she knows I don’t like it.) “You probably weren’t paying attention when they told us about Dr. Emer.”
“I wasn’t paying attention to your face,” I told Andrea.
“It’s a lockdown, A.J.!” said Ryan. “That’s what it means when they announce that Dr. Emer is in the building.”
Oh, yeah! Now I remember. Lockdowns are cool. Just in case a bad guy ever breaks into the school, we have to lock our classroom door, turn off the lights, sit on the floor in the corner, and stay really quiet until the lockdown is over.*
We all rushed over to the corner. Mr. Granite locked the door. He made us sit boy-girl-boy-girl so we wouldn’t talk to each other. I had to sit next to Andrea Young. Ugh, disgusting!
“Everyone stay calm,” said Mr. Granite.
We all sat without talking for like a million hundred seconds.
“Can we whisper now?” I finally asked.
“Okay,” Mr. Granite said, “but quietly.”
“I heard on TV that a crazy person escaped from the loony bin last week,” I whispered.
“Really?” whispered Emily, who is Andrea’s crybaby friend.
“You shouldn’t say ‘crazy person,’ Arlo,” whispered Andrea. “My mother is a psychologist. She told me we should say ‘psychotic.’”
“Maybe the psycho who escaped from the loony bin is inside our school right now!” said Michael.
“Maybe it’s a zombie psycho,” said Ryan.
“Maybe it’s a zombie cannibal psycho,” said Neil.
“Maybe it’s a zombie cannibal psycho who eats kids for breakfast!” I said.
“Shhhhhhhhhhh!” said Mr. Granite.
“Stop trying to scare Emily,” whispered Andrea.
Emily is such a scaredy-cat. I bet she would have run out of the room if we weren’t in the middle of a lockdown.
“We’re all going to die,” I whispered.
“I’m scared!” said Emily.
“Me too,” somebody else said.
Sheesh, get a grip! It’s just a lockdown.
“I have an idea,” said Mr. Granite. “Let’s hold hands. It will help calm us down. Everyone take the hand of the person sitting next to you.”
Andrea looked at me.
“Hold my hand, Arlo,” she said.
“No way,” I said. “I’m not holding your hand.”
“You have to,” Andrea told me. “Mr. Granite said so.”
I looked at Mr. Granite. He gave me one of those teacher looks.
I held Andrea’s hand. Ugh, gross!
“Oooooh!” Ryan whispered. “A.J. and Andrea are holding hands. They must be in love!”
“When are you gonna get married?” whispered Michael.
“Shhhhhhhhhhhhh!” said Mr. Granite.
Andrea kept looking at me and smiling.
“If we were married, Arlo, we would hold hands like this all the time,” she told me. “Holding hands is so romantic.”
“If we were married,” I said, “I would jump off a bridge.”
“Oh, snap!” said Ryan.
“You’re mean, Arlo!”
I had to hold hands with Andrea in the dark for a million hundred minutes. I thought I was gonna die.
And then suddenly, the door unlocked.
And then the doorknob turned.
“It’s the crazy person who escaped from the loony bin!” whispered Ryan. Everybody was freaking out.
And you’ll never believe who walked through the door at that moment.
Nobody. It’s impossible to walk through a door! Doors are made of wood. If we could walk through wood, they wouldn’t bother putting up doors.
But you’ll never believe who walked through the doorway.
I’m not gonna tell you.
Okay, okay, I’ll tell you. But you have to read the next chapter. So nah-nah-nah boo-boo on you.
2
Crazy Week
The person who walked through the doorway was Officer Spence, our school security guard!
Officer Spence acts like he’s a real policeman. But security guards aren’t allowed to carry guns or beat up bad guys or do anything cool.
“It’s all clear,” Officer Spence announced. “The lockdown is over.”
“Yay!” everybody shouted.
“Thank you, Officer Spence,” said Mr. Granite.
“Just doing my duty, sir.”
We all giggled because Officer Spence said the word “duty,” which sounds just like “doody.” It’s okay to say “duty” in school, but you’re not allowed to say “doody.” Grown-ups get really mad. Nobody knows why.
“Did they find the crazy person who escaped from the loony bin?” I asked Officer Spence.
“No,” he replied. “That person is still at large.”
“If they didn’t find him, how do they know how big he is?” I asked.
Andrea rolled her eyes.
“At large means ‘missing,’ Arlo!” she said.
“Your face is missing,” I told Andrea.
“Oh, snap!” said Ryan.
“Don’t worry,” Officer Spence told us. “I’ve got my eyes open.”
I hope so. It would be weird to walk around trying to find crazy people with your eyes closed. You’d bump into stuff. Officer Spence makes no sense.
Mr. G
ranite went back to teaching us about recycling plastic, but a few minutes later there was a knock on the door.
“Who is it now?” Mr. Granite looked annoyed.
It was our principal, Mr. Klutz, and our vice principal, Mrs. Jafee. Mr. Klutz has no hair at all. I mean none. But when he poked his head in the doorway, he was wearing a long blond wig! Mrs. Jafee had one on too. It was hilarious.
“To what do we owe the pleasure of your company?”* asked Mr. Granite. “And what’s with the crazy hair?”
“Next week will be Crazy Week at Ella Mentry School,” announced Mr. Klutz. “Monday will be Crazy-Hair Day, so everybody should come to school with crazy hair. Doesn’t that sound like fun?”
“Yes!” said all the girls.
“No!” said all the boys.
“And Tuesday will be Crazy-Clothes Day,” said Mrs. Jafee. “Everybody should dress up crazy, you betcha!”
“Wednesday will be Crazy-Hat Day,” said Mr. Klutz.
“Thursday will be Crazy-Shoes Day,” said Mrs. Jafee. “And Friday will be Crazy-Everything Day!”
“We’ll send a note home for your parents in your backpacks,” said Mr. Klutz.* “But we wanted you kids to get excited about Crazy Week at Ella Mentry School.”
“It’s going to be one crazy week, by golly!” said Mrs. Jafee.
Like our school wasn’t crazy enough already!
3
Crazy-Hair Day
Monday was Crazy-Hair Day. My mom put this stinky gel stuff on my hair and combed it all toward the middle to make a fake mohawk. She called it a “fohawk.” It was cool.
Michael sprayed green dye in his hair. Neil the nude kid had on a baldy wig. He looked just like Mr. Klutz! Ryan put some orange stuff in his hair but left thin, dark lines in it so his head looked like a basketball. Andrea and Emily put colored ribbons and bows all over their hair.
Even Mr. Granite had crazy hair. He showed up with purple dreadlocks. It was hilarious. You should have been there!
After we put our backpacks away and pledged the allegiance, Mr. Granite said it was time for math. I hate math. Why do we have to learn math when there are calculators in the world? That’s like walking ten miles to a store when you can take a car.
It’s really hard to pay attention to math when your teacher has purple dreadlocks. In fact, it was hard to learn anything that morning because we were all looking at each other’s crazy hair. My mohawk was itching, too.
After a million hundred hours, it was time for lunch. And then, of course, it was the best time of the day.
Recess!
Recess rocks! It’s the only thing I like about school. We get to go out on the playground and do whatever we want. My friend Billy who lives around the corner told me that when you go to heaven, it’s like recess all the time.
I went to play on the swings with Ryan, Michael, and Neil the nude kid. Andrea and her girly friends hung around so they could annoy us, like always.
So there we were, minding our own business on the swings, when this lady walked over from across the street with yellow hair. Well, her hair was yellow, not the street. It would be weird if streets were yellow.
Anyway, the hair on both sides of her head was curled up into buns like Princess Leia from Star Wars. It looked like she was wearing earmuffs. Or maybe she taped dinner rolls to her head. She looked weird.
“Hi kids!” she said. “My name is Elizabeth. But you can call me Mrs. Lizzy.”
We told Mrs. Lizzy our names. Andrea and Emily said they liked her hairstyle.
“Are you Princess Leia?” asked Michael.
“Are those dinner rolls taped to your head?” I asked. “Or are you wearing earmuffs?”
“Goodness no!” Mrs. Lizzy said. “This is my real hair.”
“Did you do that for Crazy-Hair Day?” asked Ryan.
“No, I wear my hair like this every day,” said Mrs. Lizzy.
If you ask me, she should cut her hair and get earmuffs instead.
“Are you a new teacher?” asked Andrea, who never misses a chance to brownnose a teacher.
“In a way, yes,” Mrs. Lizzy told us. “The Board of Education decided that kids don’t learn enough in school. So they started the ‘Recess Enrichment Program.’ That means you kids will get to learn new things during recess. Doesn’t that sound like fun?”
“Yes!” said the girls.
“No!” said the boys.
What?! We have to learn stuff during recess? What’s the deal with that?
Mrs. Lizzy told us boys to cheer up. She said that the Recess Enrichment Program will be fun and that she was going to teach us lots of cool things.
Bummer in the summer! It wasn’t fair, if you ask me. Recess is supposed to be for burning off energy and running around. Nobody told us anything about a Recess Enrichment Program.
This was the worst thing to happen in my life since TV Turnoff Week.
4
An Important Life Skill
Mother’s Day was coming up on Sunday. Mrs. Lizzy said that for our first recess enrichment project we should make something for our mothers.
“I’m going to cook my mom breakfast in bed,” said Andrea.
“How are you gonna do that?” I asked. “Do you have a stove in your bed?”
“No, Arlo!” Andrea said, rolling her eyes. “I’m going to make her breakfast on the stove and then bring it to her in bed.”
“Oh,” I said. “That’s different.”
“My mom loves to eat breakfast in her pajamas,” Emily said.
“She should put her breakfast on a plate,” I told Emily. “Your mom is weird.”
Emily looked all mad, like she was going to start crying. As usual.
“No, dumbhead!” Andrea said to me, rolling her eyes again. “Emily’s mom doesn’t put the breakfast in her pajamas! She eats it while she’s wearing her pajamas!”
I knew that. I just like yanking Andrea’s and Emily’s chains.
“Mothers like it when you make them a gift for Mother’s Day,” Mrs. Lizzy told us. “Today I’m going to teach you how to make the perfect Mother’s Day gift.”
“What’s the perfect Mother’s Day gift?” asked Ryan.
“A balloon animal!” said Mrs. Lizzy.
She pulled a long red balloon out of her pocket and blew it up. Then she tied the end and twisted the balloon every which way. It was really squeaky. The next thing we knew, the balloon animal was finished.
“See?” Mrs. Lizzy said. “It’s a little doggie! Here, I’ll show you kids how to make one.”
Mrs. Lizzy’s balloon dog was cool. It really looked like a dog. She pulled more balloons out of her pocket and gave one to each of us.
“Is it really important for children to learn how to make balloon animals?” asked Andrea. “Maybe we should use the Recess Enrichment Program to improve our reading, writing, and math skills.”
“Can you possibly be more boring?” I asked Andrea.
What is her problem? Reading, writing, and math are way overrated. And balloon animals are cool.
“Think of it this way, Andrea,” said Mrs. Lizzy. “When you grow up, you’ll probably go on a job interview one day. What would happen if you were on a job interview and they asked you to make a balloon animal? If you had never learned how to do that as a child, you wouldn’t get the job. That would be a shame. Unemployment is a big problem in our country. That’s why it’s so important for kids to learn how to make balloon animals.”
Yeah! In her face! I love it when Andrea’s wrong.
“And imagine if all the bad people in the world made balloon animals instead of committing crimes and hurting people,” Mrs. Lizzy told us. “The world would be a much better place, don’t you think?”
Mrs. Lizzy made sense. I liked her a lot. She also made great balloon animals. We all blew up our balloons and twisted them every which way.
“I worked my way through college by making balloon animals,” Mrs. Lizzie told us. “I graduated with a degree in balloon an
imal construction.”
“College must have been a lot cheaper in those days,” I said.
Some kids from the other classes gathered around to watch us make balloon animals. It was cool.
Maybe the Recess Enrichment Program wasn’t such a bad idea after all.
5
Crazy-Clothes Day
Tuesday was Crazy-Clothes Day. I wore my dad’s pinstriped shirt, a red bow tie, soccer shorts, mittens, and knee pads. Knee pads are cool because you can flop down on your knees and it doesn’t hurt.
“A.J.,” Ryan said when he saw me come into our classroom, “those are the craziest clothes I ever saw.”
Like he should talk! Ryan was wearing his sister’s dress, his mom’s fur coat, and a pair of 2009 glasses that had the 00 go over his eyes and the 2 and the 9 on either side of his head.
Everybody was wearing crazy clothes.
At recess, guess who showed up at the playground again? Mrs. Lizzy, of course. She was wearing a black plastic trash bag with holes cut out for her arms and legs. And she was carrying a bucket.
“Hi kids!” she said when she saw us.
“Hi Mrs. Lizzy!” we all yelled.
“Did you dress like that because it’s Crazy-Clothes Day?” asked Andrea.
“No,” she replied, “I always dress like this on Tuesdays.”
That was weird. But if you think that was weird, you’ll never believe in a million hundred years what Mrs. Lizzy brought with her to the playground.
I’m not gonna tell you.
Okay, okay, I’ll tell you.
It was a goat!
She had a goat with her! And it was on a leash!
“Where did you get that goat, Mrs. Lizzy?” asked Michael.
“From Rent-A-Goat,” she told us. “You can rent anything. This is my friend Pootie. Goats are my favorite animals. Do you kids have pets at home?”