by Dan Gutman
My Weird School Daze #6
Mrs. Jafee Is Daffy!
Dan Gutman
Pictures by
Jim Paillot
To Emma
Contents
1 The End of Mr. Klutz?
2 A New National Holiday
3 Nice and Calm
4 The New Fizz Ed Teacher
5 I Thought I Was Gonna Die
6 Stonewall Jackson
7 A New Way to Learn
8 Mrs. Jafee’s Evil Plan
9 The Greatest Moment of My Life
10 The Un-Civil War
11 Arurahruhmrah
About the Author and the Illustrator
Credits
Copyright
About the Publisher
1
The End of Mr. Klutz?
My name is A.J. and I hate school.*
I would rather go shopping for clothes with my mom than go to school. I would rather watch a ballet than go to school. I would rather eat a squirrel that got hit by a car and was lying in the middle of the road for a week than go to school.
Well, maybe not that last one.
It was Monday, the worst day of the week. Everybody had to go to the all-purpose room, which is a room we use for all purposes, so it has the perfect name.
The whole school was gabbing when our principal, Mr. Klutz, got up on the stage. He was holding a suitcase. Mr. Klutz has no hair at all. I mean none. Not even a little on the sides, like my grandpa.
“I have an important announcement to make,” said Mr. Klutz.
“Quiet!” said Michael, who never ties his shoes. “Mr. Klutz is gonna make an important announcement!”
“Shhhhh!” said Ryan, who will eat anything. “Mr. Klutz is gonna make an important announcement!”
“Stop talking!” said Neil, who we call the nude kid even though he wears clothes. “Mr. Klutz is gonna make an important announcement!”
We were all buzzing so much about Mr. Klutz’s announcement that he couldn’t make the announcement that he was trying to announce.
The teachers held up peace signs with their fingers, which means “shut up.” But nobody shut up.
Mr. Klutz reached into his pocket and pulled out one of those air horn cans that people bring to football games.
BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP!
We all covered our ears and stopped talking.
“Boys and girls, I want to let you know that I have to go to the airport, because I’m leaving—”
WHAT?!
“Mr. Klutz is leaving!” one of the second graders yelled.
Everybody started freaking out, screaming, crying, and falling out of their seats. You should have been there!
“Mr. Klutz isn’t going to be our principal anymore!” wailed Andrea Young, this annoying girl in my class with curly brown hair. “He must have been fired!”
“We’ve got to do something!” shouted Andrea’s crybaby friend, Emily. Then she went running out of the all-purpose room.
Even the teachers were sobbing and blowing their noses into tissues. Well, they blew the snot from their noses into the tissues, not the noses themselves. If they blew their noses into the tissues, their noses would fall off; and it would be weird to walk around without a nose.
“Don’t leave us!” wailed Ms. Hannah, the art teacher. She jumped onstage and was hanging on to Mr. Klutz’s leg.
“What will we do without you?” moaned Miss Lazar, the custodian.
Mr. Klutz held up the air horn can again.
BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP!
Everybody stopped yelling and crying.
“As I was saying,” Mr. Klutz said, “I’m leaving…for four days.”
Oh. That’s different.
2
A New National Holiday
We were all glad that Mr. Klutz wasn’t leaving for good, because he’s the best principal in the history of the world. One time I got sent to his office for bad behavior and he gave me a candy bar. It was the greatest moment of my life.
After Mr. Klutz’s big announcement, we went back to class with our teacher, Mr. Granite, who is from another planet.
“G’day, mates!” said Mr. Granite. “This week we’re going to learn about the Civil War. It was called the War between the States because the Northern states and the Southern states fought each other.”
What?! That makes no sense at all.
“If you’re gonna have a war,” Michael said, “you should fight somebody else.”
“Yeah,” I said. “Having a war with yourself is like punching yourself in the nose.”
“Maybe we ran out of other countries to fight,” said Ryan, “so we had to fight ourselves.”
“Boys are dumbheads,” said Andrea, rolling her eyes.
I was going to say “So is your face” to Andrea, but you’ll never believe in a million hundred years who walked into the door at that moment.
Nobody, because if you walked into a door it would hurt. But you’ll never believe who walked into the door way.
It was Mrs. Jafee, the vice principal!
“To what do we owe the pleasure of your company, Mrs. Jafee?” asked Mr. Granite.
(That’s grown-up talk for “What are you doing here?”)
“Howdy, guys and gals!” said Mrs. Jafee. “I’m still new at Ella Mentry School, so I wanted to introduce myself to each class personally. With Mr. Klutz away for four days, I say it’s a good chance for us to get to know each other better, by golly.”
“Does anybody know what the word ‘vice’ means in ‘vice principal’?” asked Mr. Granite.
A bunch of hands shot in the air. Mr. Granite called on Michael.
“Vice means ‘not good enough,’” Michael said. “Like, the vice president isn’t good enough to be president.”
“Uh, not exactly,” said Mrs. Jafee.
I got called on next.
“My dad uses a vice in his workshop to hold stuff,” I said. “I took one of my sister’s dolls and crushed it in the vice. That was cool.”
“Uh, not that kind of vice, A.J.,” said Mr. Granite.
Andrea was waving her hands around like somebody who was stranded on a desert island trying to signal a plane. She is so annoying. Andrea keeps a dictionary on her desk so she can look up words and show everybody how smart she is.
“A vice is a bad habit, like smoking, drinking, or gambling,” she said.
“Yes, but that’s not it either,” said Mr. Granite.
Ha! For the first time in her life, Andrea got something wrong! It should be a national holiday. They could call it Dumbhead Andrea Day. We should get that day off from school every year. Nah-nah-nah boo-boo on Andrea! In her face!
“Vice means ‘instead of’ or ‘in the place of,’” Mrs. Jafee told us. “I’m going to be responsible while Mr. Klutz is away. Do you know what it means to be responsible?”
“That means you mess up a lot,” I said. “Any time something goes wrong at my house, my mom says I’m responsible.”
Everybody laughed even though I didn’t say anything funny.
“You haven’t been vice principal for very long, Mrs. Jafee,” said Mr. Granite. “Are you sure you have enough experience to be principal?”
“You betcha!” Mrs. Jafee said. “When I sit at my desk, I can see Mr. Klutz’s office.”
I didn’t see what that had to do with anything.
“Where did Mr. Klutz go?” asked Emily.
“He is on his way to Principal Camp,” Mrs. Jafee told us. “He’s going to learn how to be a better principal.”
“But Mr. Klutz is already a great principal,” said Neil the nude kid.
“He’ll be even better when he gets back,” Mrs. Jafee said.
“Princi
pal Camp sounds like fun,” said Emily.
“What if something terrible happens to Mr. Klutz at Principal Camp?” I asked.
“Like what, A.J.?” said Mr. Granite.
“Well, what if his canoe tips over and he drowns in the lake?” I asked.
“They don’t have canoes and lakes at Principal Camp, Arlo!” Andrea said, rolling her eyes. She calls me by my real name because she knows I don’t like it.
“They do too.”
“Do not.”
We went on like that for a while. Andrea said that Principal Camp was probably just a bunch of grown-ups sitting around eating cheese and crackers. That’s what all grown-ups do.
“I like cheese and crackers,” said Ryan.
“What kind of cheese will they have?” asked Michael. “I like monster cheese.”
“It’s not monster cheese, dumbhead,” said Andrea. “It’s Muenster cheese.”
“Oh, snap!” said Ryan.
“My mom told me there used to be a TV show called The Munsters,” said Neil.
Mr. Granite made the shut-up peace sign with his fingers.
“Okeydokey, can we get back on topic, please?” asked Mrs. Jafee. “Everything is going to be fine while Mr. Klutz is away. What could possibly go wrong?”
I remember the last time somebody asked what could possibly go wrong. It was our graduation from second grade. I threw my cap in the air and it knocked over the eternal flame and set Emily on fire and Emily freaked out and knocked over the graduation cake and Neil the nude kid almost got trampled by a goat that escaped from the petting zoo and the fire department came and sprayed water on everybody and Andrea’s mom and Ryan’s mom started wrestling each other and my teacher Miss Daisy fainted and we thought the school security guard was kissing her even though he was just giving her mouth-to-mouth resuscitation and then we found out that Miss Daisy fainted because she was pregnant.
You should have been there!
But I’m sure nothing like that could possibly happen this time.
3
Nice and Calm
When I came into the school on Tuesday morning, I saw the strangest thing in the history of the world: four grown-ups sitting in chairs playing violins!* And they were all dressed up in black suits and dresses! Mrs. Jafee was watching them.
“What’s going on?” I asked.
“Mr. Klutz told me he wants everything to be nice and calm while he’s away,” said Mrs. Jafee. “So I hired a string quartet. Studies show that children can relax and learn better when they listen to soothing music.”
“I think we would learn better if we ate lots of ice cream, cookies, cake, and candy,” I said.
“Hmmmmm,” said Mrs. Jafee.
Grown-ups always say “Hmmmmm” when they’re thinking. Nobody knows why.
That’s when Little Miss Brownnoser waltzed into the hallway.
“Oh, I just love classical music,” Andrea announced (as if anybody asked her). That’s Violin Concerto number 5, by Mozart. I learned about it in the music appreciation class I take after school.”
Andrea takes classes in everything after school. If they gave a class in picking lint out of your belly button, Andrea would take that class so she could get better at it. Why can’t a truck full of violins fall on her head?
The hall was filling up with kids and teachers listening to the boring music.
“Man, that’s the fattest violin in the history of the world,” I said. “That lady can’t even hold it up.”
“It’s a cello, dumbhead!” Andrea said, rolling her eyes.
“Oh, snap!” said Ryan.
“Well, it looks like a violin that needs to go on a diet, if you ask me,” I said.
Everybody clapped after the boring song was over. Then the musicians started playing some other boring song.
“Can you feel the tension oozing out of your pores?” Mrs. Jafee said, taking a deep breath. “I learned in graduate school that listening to classical music increases the flow of blood to your brain.”
“Ugh, disgusting!” I said. “I don’t want blood flowing to my brain.”
“Arlo,” Andrea said, “if blood didn’t flow to your brain, you would die.”
I was going to say something mean to Andrea, but I realized that Mrs. Jafee had just said the most amazing thing in the history of the world.
“Wait a minute,” I said to her. “Did you just say you went to graduate school?”
“You betcha!” she said. “After I finished college, I went to graduate school so I could learn more.”
I slapped my forehead. Was she out of her mind? Why would anybody want to go to school after they graduated from school? What is Mrs. Jafee’s problem?
“After I graduate,” I told her, “I’m not going anywhere near a school.”
“Well, I spent four years in graduate school studying how children learn,” Mrs. Jafee told me. “I’m looking forward to trying some of those new and exciting ideas right here at Ella Mentry School this week. We’re going to think outside the box.”
Huh? Why would anyone be thinking in a box to begin with? If I was in a box, I know what I would be thinking about: how to get out of that dumb box! Mrs. Jafee was weird. If she was really a learning expert, she would have learned that after you graduate, you don’t have to go to school anymore.
“The music is soooooooo beautiful!” Andrea said. “Don’t you think so, Arlo?”
“Yeah, just the opposite of your face,” I said.
I wanted to say “So is your face.” But that would have meant that Andrea is beautiful. And if the guys ever heard me say that, they would say I was in love with her.
So don’t ever say “So is your face” after somebody says a word like “nice” or “pretty” or “beautiful.” That’s the first rule of being a kid.
4
The New Fizz Ed Teacher
The bell rang, and everybody rushed to their classrooms. We pledged the allegiance with Mr. Granite. Then our computer teacher, Mrs. Yonkers, came into the classroom.
“I have bad news,” Mrs. Yonkers told us. “There’s no computer class this week.”
“Why not?” asked Emily. “I love computer class!”
She looked as if she was gonna cry, like always.
“As you know, this is Civil War Week,” Mrs. Yonkers told us, “and kids didn’t have computers during the Civil War.”
“They didn’t?” Ryan said. “How could they get on the internet?”
“There was no internet,” Mrs. Yonkers said.
“WHAT?!”
“No internet?” I said. “No YouTube?”
Sometimes me and my friends go on YouTube and search for “people falling down” or “hamsters playing the piano.”
I could watch that stuff for hours.
“What a horrible world it must have been without computers,” Ryan said.
Mrs. Yonkers told us that during the Civil War there were no calculators, no DVD players, no iPods, no airplanes, no cars, no lightbulbs, and no video games.
“Did they have cell phones?” asked Neil the nude kid.
“Cell phones?” Mrs. Yonkers said. “They didn’t even have regular phones!”
“How about big-screen TVs?” asked Michael.
“Big-screen TVs?” Mrs. Yonkers said. “They didn’t even have small-screen TVs!”
“WHAT?!” We were all amazed.
“No TVs?” I said. “Those poor kids! How did they survive?”
“Back in Civil War days,” Mrs. Yonkers told us, “kids would actually go outside and play.”
“Play? Outside?” Ryan asked. “Why would anybody want to do a crazy thing like that?”
“That reminds me,” Mr. Granite suddenly said. “We have to go. It’s time for fizz ed.”
Fizz ed! Yay!
Fizz ed is my favorite part of the day because we get to play sports and games and run around the gym instead of learn boring stuff. Our fizz ed teacher, Miss Small, is off the wall.
We walked a m
illion hundred miles to the gym. But when we got there, Miss Small wasn’t around. And the gym smelled funny.
“What’s that weird smell?” I asked.
“I think it’s incense,” said Andrea.
I never heard of that stuff, but it stinks. I thought I was gonna throw up.
In the far corner of the gym, there was a guy lying on the floor. We all ran over to see if he was okay. That’s when I saw that the guy wasn’t really lying on the floor. He was lying on a bed made of nails!
A bed made of nails?!
The guy got up. He was wearing a turban on his head.
“Oh, excuse me,” he said in a squeaky voice. “I was just taking a nap.”
“On nails?” Neil said. “Doesn’t that hurt?”
“Not at all,” he said. “It is very comfortable. Studies show that children learn faster when they sleep on a bed of nails.”
Those kids are weird. I know what I would learn if I slept on nails. I would learn to get off those dumb nails and go to sleep in a real bed.
That’s when Mrs. Jafee came into the gym.
“Okeydokey!” she said. “I want to introduce you guys and gals to Swami Havabanana. He’s from India.”
“Good day,” Swami Havabanana said as he bowed to us. “It is a most beautiful morning in which to be alive, is it not?”
“Where’s Miss Small?” we all asked.
“Oh, her?” said Mrs. Jafee. “I fired her, by golly! Swami Havabanana is our new gym teacher.”
“WHAT?!”
“Miss Small just wanted to play sports and silly games,” said Mrs. Jafee. “What a waste of time. Studies show that sports and games don’t help kids learn. Swami Havabanana has some different ideas. Don’tcha, Swami?”
“Oh, yes,” he said, “we are going to learn about yoga.”