What’s the most ridiculous thing you’ve bullshitted someone into believing?
When me and my siblings were much younger my dad owned a Volvo car with a computerized voice. It was a very deep voice that would give you warnings about the car’s status. “The boot (trunk) is not shut” being one I remember. Very creepy now I look back at it.
Me, my older brother and our dad would joke that the voice came from “a little man” inside the car. My younger sister was at an age where you could tell her anything and she would take it as gospel. She actually believed there was a tiny person with an extraordinarily deep voice living in the car. We kept it going for a long time until one day someone crashed into the vehicle and it ended up in the scrapyard. As she cried for the safety of the little man we had to tell her the truth. She was mad at us for weeks.
I convinced my kids that my car’s triangular, red, hazard button was a ‘self destruct’ button. This was initially to keep them from hitting it since it is a really prominently placed, large, red button. This worked out great until I quickly pulled the car over the other day to get a dog off the road. Threw on my hazards and jumped out of the car after the dog. I looked back and both kids are hitting the ditch.
Dealing with that kind of betrayal must have been hard for them. “Dad hit the self-destruct and ran away!!!”
Dad killed a dog, hit self-destruct on the car to remove all evidence and witnesses and ran away.
SHIT
I once briefly convinced a significant portion of my readership that it was possible to “win” Tetris.
an incomplete list of unsettling short stories I read in textbooks
the scarlet ibis
marigolds
the diamond necklace
the monkey’s paw
the open boat
the lady and the tiger
the minister’s black veil
an occurrence at owl creek bridge
a rose for emily
(I found that one by googling “short story corpse in the house,” first result)
the cask of amontillado
the yellow wallpaper
the most dangerous game
a good man is hard to find
some are well-known, some obscure, some I enjoy as an adult, all made me uncomfortable between the ages of 11-15
add your own weird shit, I wanna be literary and disturbed
The Tell-Tale Heart, The Gift of the Magi, The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calavaras County, Thank You Ma’am
the box social by james reaney. i remember we all had to silently read it in class, and you would hear the moment everyone reached the Part because some people would audibly go “what”
wHat did I just put my eyes on
“The Veldt” by Ray Bradbury
Not quite a short story, but read in class: “The Monsters are Due on Maple Street” from The Twilight Zone
Harrison Bergeron, Cat and the Coffee Drinkers
“Where are you going and where have you been” by Joyce carol oates
“The Pedestrian” by Ray Bradbury
the lottery by shirley jackson
i can’t believe Roald Dahl’s “The Landlady” wasn’t already mentioned
and also it’s not so much unsettling as more absurdist but “The Leader” by Eugene Ionesco definitely made me go wtf
Ett halvt ark papper. I cried so much.
Ночь у мазара, А. Шалимов
A Sound of Thunder by Ray Bradbury
I Have no Mouth, and I Must Scream by Harlan Ellison
The Lottery by Shirley Jackson
All Summer in a Day by Ray Bradbury
Some of Us Had Been Threatening Our Friend Colby, by Donald Barthelme
We read lots of good disturbing shit in hs or in the writing groups I joined in hs but somehow the top of the heap for shit that haunted me’s still indisputably Ethan Canin’s “The Palace Thief”. It’s not horror as such but it freaked me the fuck out.
There was another O. Henry short story we read that was also really alarming but I had to google a major spoiler (which is also a warning) to recall the name – “The Furnished Room”.
there will come soft rains by bradbury was very unsettling for middle school me
I had no idea so many were all written by Ray Bradbury, why did he do this to us
“Emergency” by Dennis Johnson – not entirely disturbing but really weird and there’s one Bad Part
“A Small, Good Thing” by Raymond Carver – again not all that bad but sad and kind of creepy
Bradbury wrote a lot of weird shit. But, “The Book of Sand” and"The Library of Babel" by Luis Borges.
“It’s a Good Life” – Jerome Bixby
“The Little Black Bag” – Cyril M. Cornbluth
“The Cold Equations” – Tom Godwin
“The Nine Billion Names of God” – Arthur C. Clarke
“Mars is Heaven!” – Ray Bradbury
“Born of Man and Woman” – Richard Matheson
“That Only A Mother” – Judith Maril
“The Country of the Kind” – Damon Knight
“Mimsy Were The Borogroves” – Lewis Padgett
“Lamb to the Slaughter” – Roald Dahl
“We Can Get Them For You Wholesale” – Neil Gaiman
“BLIT” and “Different Kinds of Darkness” – David Langford (set in the same universe) (there are a couple of other “basilisk” stories and they’re worth checking out)
“The Secret Number” – Igor Teper
There will come soft rains and the other Bradbury one fucked me right up as a kid
In fairy tales and fantasy, two types of people go in towers: princesses and wizards.
Princesses are placed there against their will or with the intention of ‘keeping them safe.’
This is very different from wizards, who seek out towers to hone their sorcery in solitude.
I would like a story where a princess is placed in an abandoned tower that used to belong to a wizard, and so she spends long years learning the craft of wizardry from the scraps left behind and becomes the most powerful magic wielder the world has seen in centuries, busts out of the tower and wreaks glorious, bloody vengeance on the fools that imprisoned her.
That would be my kind of story.
When
Princess Talia was fourteen, her eldest sister was placed in a tower.
Princess
Adina was eighteen by then, and so of a marriageable age. She had grown quite
beautiful, though she was more willful than winsome, and she did not care for
the notion of the tower very much at all. Their mother did her best to persuade
her on the subject. After all, the queen herself had been eighteen when her own
parents had sent her to live in that very same tower, to be safely tucked away
until her husband could be chosen, and then ride out to claim her. A tradition
going back ages and ages.
You’re a regular office worker born with the ability to “see” how dangerous a person is with a number scale of 1-10 above their heads. A toddler would be a 1, while a skilled soldier with a firearm may score a 7. Today, you notice the reserved new guy at the office measures a 10.
You decide it’s best to find out what you can about this person. Cautiously, you approach his desk. He’s a handsome man, tall, but with a disarming smile. How could such a friendly guy with such cute, dorky glasses be dangerous?
You extend your hand. “I noticed you’re new here. What’s your name?”
He shakes your hand warmly. His gaze is piercing, as if he’s looking right through you. “The name’s Clark,” he says. “So, how long have you worked for the Daily Planet?”
This one wins.
It’s been a few weeks, and one of Clark’s friends shows up. She’s pretty and all, enough muscle that she must work out. First thought would be that she should be maybe a 6.
Clark’s introducing her around. “This is my good friend, Diana, she’s in from out of town.”
You blink, and take a step back in fear. You’ve never seen an 11 before.
The day Bruce Wayne shows up for his long promised interview with Lois Lane, you can’t help it, the mug your holding drops from your fingers and sends a shock of hot coffee and ceramic shards across the floor.
Clark stops a few feet away and squints at you worriedly from behind those ridiculous glasses you’re 99% sure he doesn’t actually need, and asks tentatively, “Everything all right?”
You ignore him in favor of staring at the inky dark numerals hovering over the beaming fool gesticulating some fantastic yacht story for a gaggle of secretaries and minor columnists.
That’s it. Your gift has officially gone haywire. There is no other explanation. Because there is absolutely no way that Brucie Wayne is a 10.
At this point, you’ve seen it all. Miled manner reporters and billionaires at a 10 and a model-like woman at 11. You were really starting to doubt your power. The day you really stopped believeing in it was when Bruce Wayne came for another visit, and this time with a kid. The kid couldn’t be more than 10 years old, a bit on the short side.
He was an 8.
The day you started believing in it again was when you saw on tv the formation of something called the justice league.
There were those same numbers over superman, batman, wonder woman and robin. That’s when you put two and two together. You wonder how nobody at the daily planet noticed that Clarke was Superman with glasses. You wonder why you didn’t notice. You wonder why nobody put two and two together that Diana Prince and Wonder Woman looked exactly the same. You look in the mirror as the realization hit you and you see your own number change from a 3 to a 9.
IT GOT BETTER
Despite this, you go about your life. You don’t talk to Clark – Superman? – and kept out of his way. His girlfriend Lois Lane – she was a five when you first met, but now she’s a nine just like you – tries to get you to interview Bruce Wayne, but you refuse. You meet other people in Clark’s group of friends with high numbers. The daughter of the police commissioner from Gotham. The forensic scientist from Central City. More and more people to avoid and worry about.
Meanwhile, your paranoia gets to you. You start working out. Training in self defense. Studying the Justice League, trying to find its members. Finding out all their identities so you can be ready.
One day you wake up with a ten above your head.
That day you get a call. You recognize the area code. Gotham. Your heart is in your throat. You should throw the phone away, run. They’ve found you. You’re doomed. You might be a ten, but you can’t beat them all.
You pick up the phone anyways.
“Hello?”
“Hey, this is Clark Kent. I was wondering if we could talk.”
Your mouth goes dry. “About what?”
Clark’s voice goes quiet. “Well. About the Justice League.”
You stiffen in your seat. Your adrenaline kicks in, and your eyes dart around the room. You can hang up, pack, grab a plane ticket to wherever and disappear. Your passport hasn’t expired, and you’ve been talking to Perry White about a vacation anyways. You could say it’s a family emergency and never come back.
But they’d find you. You know they’d find you. They’re goddamned superheroes. They can carry buildings. They could probably manage finding you.
“Hello?” Clark’s voice returns, tinged with concern, and suddenly you stop. Calm down. They’re the good guys. At least they’re supposed to be.
“Yeah, sorry, just a little shocked you–”
“Caught up to you?” Clark asked. He laughed a little, but it wasn’t teasing. His voice had his regular ease, the same casual tone he would employ to talk about the weather in the break room. “Yeah. Lois noticed your odd behavior, actually. We didn’t realize it was linked to the League until you refused to interview Bruce, and then we knew something was up.”
“Speaking of Bruce Wayne, are you using his phone? Your area code is Gotham, not Metropolis.”
Clark laughed. “Damn. Lois wasn’t kidding when she said you were the best investigator working for the Daily Planet.”
“I just notice things is all.” You laughed nervously. You still can’t shake your general unease. This guy could kill you without any effort. You’re no match for him, or for any of his friends for that matter. Hell, Batman didn’t even have powers and he’d still fuck you up.
“Yeah, and that’s a skill we could use around here. Would you like to talk about joining? Bruce can send you a car, bring you here–”
“No,” you say, sharper than you intended. “Sorry. I’d rather meet in public, if that’s okay with you.”
“Of course. Lunch or coffee? It’s still early, but it’s a bit easier to cram all of us in a restaurant than a coffee shop.”
“Lunch, I guess. And no superhero stuff.”
Clark pauses, then sighs sadly. You’ve heard this sadness before in rare amounts. When bad things happened and fear and greed overtook people, he’d always frown and sigh, like someone watching their best friend self destruct, unable to help or save them. “You’re afraid of us. Aren’t you?” His voice is concerned and hushed.
A pang of guilt starts to replace the fear. “You can throw around buildings like a sack of potatoes, Clark. Your friend is powerful on an impossible level, Bruce’s kid is a fucking eight–”
“Wait, wait, wait,” Clark said, the sadness disappearing. “You have a number system for us?”
“Look, it’s a whole thing. I’ll talk about it over lunch.” You grab your laptop bag. “Where are we meeting?”
Clark said something to someone else. “Got any restaurant ideas? They want lunch.”
Bruce Wayne – you’ve heard enough interviews to recognize his voice – said, “Saffron’s pretty good.”
“Jesus,” someone else said. You’ve heard the voice, but you couldn’t place it. “I keep on forgetting you’re rich.”
“You don’t think it’s a little much, Bruce? The pay at Daily Planet is good but not that good,” said Clark.
“I’ll cover their tab.”
“Okay…” Clark returned to the call. “Saffron, in…thirty minutes? You’re downtown, right?”
“You can get a table to Saffron in thirty minutes?” said the strange voice. “Boy, am I glad I made friends with you guys.”
“Yeah, that works.” You’re a bit hesitant, but you swallow your nerves. At least for now. Your thoughts about threat levels made you forget that Clark is a decent guy. All you could do is hope that he thinks you’re decent, too. “See you then.”
“See you then. Be safe. Bye.” Clark hangs up, and you’re left in your room. The worry is starting to turn into something different. Excitement.
You shove the phone into your pocket, grab your keys, and head out the door. You’re so full of restless energy you walk the whole way there. Once you arrive, you catch your reflection in the mirror and notice that you’re starting to suit that ten above your head.
KEEP GOING!!!!!!!
The hostess takes you to a hidden corner of the restaurant. It’s mostly empty, as though it’s only just opened. Sitting at a long table, chatting politely, was the Justice League.
They aren’t wearing masks or uniforms, no bright colors and costumes. Clark Kent is in his usual office wear, Bruce Wayne is wearing a tailored suit, Diana Prince dons a nice blue dress, and Oliver Queen wears a nice button down. You don’t recognize two of them – a twenty something in jeans and a hoodie, a man in a green shirt, and a burly guy in a baggy t-shirt and old jeans who looks like he had just washed up from the sea. All of them, aside from Diana, are tens, of course.
Clark Kent stands, shakes your hand when you come in. “Glad to see you made it.” He introduces you to the others, and they all shake your hand quite happily and greet you like a friend. You learn that the guy in the hoodie is Barry Allen, the dude in green is Hal Jordan, and the beach dude is Arthur Curry. Waitresses, all ones, twos, and threes, come in with drinks, and one plops a mug of coffee in front of you, along with a small menu. Clark Kent gives you a knowing gaze.
Once the waitresses clear out, Bruce sits up straight. “Clark, would you rather I do the honors?” His silver watch glitters in the light from the windows.
“No, no, Bruce,” Clark says, setting down his glass of water. “I think it’s best if I ask them myself.”
Within a moment, you piece it together. “You want me to join the Justice League?”
Clark Kent cracks a smile. “How’d you guess?”
“You call me out of the blue, mention the Justice League, invite me to Bruce Wayne’s place, and then here, where you introduce me to a group of people who all look strikingly similar to the members of the Justice League.” You take a sip of coffee. “Subtlety is hardly your strong suit.”
Barry Allen laughed. “They got you there on that one.”
“Well, you’re right. At first Bruce wanted to handle the situation himself,” – you’d rather not think about what handle was a euphemism for – “but I insisted we do some more digging. We did, and what we found was…surprising. To say the least.”
You look at him oddly. You aren’t normal – no one else saw numbers floating above people’s heads – but you weren’t surprising. Your parents were the only ones who knew about your ability, and they’re long gone. You’ve got no checkered past, no odd history–
“You have powers.” Clark’s voice was clearly impressed.
“How did you find out about that?” The fear comes back, forming a knot in your stomach. “I’ve never told anyone else about it.”
“It’s not hard to notice,” Barry Allen says in between sips of soda. “Most of the information we got we got from Lois after she’s hung out with you.”
“I’ve never her told her anything about the numbers, though.”
Oliver Queen sits up, flashing you a confused look. “Numbers?”
Okay, something’s not right here. “The number I see over everyone’s heads,” you say, keeping your voice low. “It ties into how dangerous everyone is. Usually it’s just a one or two, maybe a three or four or five if they’ve got some kind of training or if they work out or whatever. Almost everyone at this table has a ten.”
“Almost?” Diana furrows her brow.
“You have an eleven,” you add.
Diana nods, smiling with a bit of pride and making an “I told you so” face to Bruce Wayne, who rolls his eyes. Oliver Queen clears his throat as Bruce and Hal pass him a couple bills.
“Ignore them,” Barry says, rolling his eyes at the three of them. “What you said was interesting – I might have to ask you a few questions on that later – but it wasn’t what I found. Remember the sensory and memory study you did when you were ten?”
You do remember it. Your parents were contacted by a scientist friend of theirs who needed kids to run a study on memory and stimuli. You remember it clearly. The large sterile room, the tests, the person conducting them, a handsome woman with a four above her head, the questions, the smell of latex gloves and fresh bleach. But you don’t remember the results. You were never told the results, other than that they were good, though with a test like that it was hard to say.
“Well, I found the tests. And they were superhuman.”
this ask has so many questions around it. why did you try to eat the snake? why was the hospital visit secret? was it secret to you as well? why are their quotation marks around the number 7?? as if you weren’t actually seven?? this is so upsetting. thank you.
this ask has so many questions around it. why did you try to eat the snake? why was the hospital visit secret? was it secret to you as well? why are their quotation marks around the number 7?? as if you weren’t actually seven?? this is so upsetting. thank you.
A Disney Cast Members’ top priority is the comfort and safety of our guests. For this reason, all Disney World employees must follow these rules. Failure to do so will result in disciplinary action.
Ask to examine the photos our guests have taken. Be friendly. Check for abnormalities. If any are found, call for security. Guests may be distracted with free merchandise.
Every seventh photograph taken on the Dinosaur attraction must be deleted. If questioned, explain that it was a technical error and offer Fast Passes.
The rumors of sharks and crocodiles in the Lagoon are false. However, there is no swimming outside of designated swimming pools on Disney property.
Dead alligators are common around the Lagoon. Simply evacuate the area, call security, then take note of how much has been eaten.
There is only one Mickey out at once. If you find a second Mickey having an autograph session, check for eye holes. All Disney costumes have eye holes.
If you don’t find eye holes, allow the session to continue, but disallow photos. Call security immediately after the session concludes.
If you spot a second Mickey off to the side, lure him into the tunnels. That’s what the ducks are there for. Leave immediately afterwards, and do not look back.
The Disney World security unit does not wear specially marked clothing. If you see someone wearing a shirt that says “Disney Security”, shut down that section of the park immediately.
Following these rules will help ensure a safe and pleasurable trip to the happiest place on Earth. So stay knowledgeable, and stay safe.
Grace fuck, why would you invoke her name like that???
Okay, fine, gather round children, buckle up because we’re going on a bumpy ride back to everyone’s collective least favorite place: 7th grade.
Some background: I went to a very small Catholic school. One class per grade (we were the largest with 19 kids), everyone knew each other whether they wanted to or not. Despite basically every teacher and faculty members insistence that we were The Best And Most Special Class In The School and that everyone loved having us, the longstanding 7th grade teacher Mrs. O’Haradecided to retire in the summer of 2008, meaning the school had to find us a new teacher for the upcoming year. This would be like, the first new teacher in the school in a while, and as she was getting the ‘best class’, it was viewed as a Big Deal. Somewhere in like July or August we got a letter announcing Mrs. Stubel, and it came with a list of books to pick for the summer reading, and that was basically all the information we had.
So…the first day of class. She seems nice enough. Very…ditsy, I guess? It was very easy for her to get herself off topic while talking. She constantly paced around the room, never staying in one spot for longer than a second, complaining she has restless leg syndrome. Which like, I’m sure she did, but she was in the middle of introducing herself and then went on a 20 minute tangent about restless leg syndrome without anyone prompting her. It was almost like you could see her scattered thoughts flying around her head.
So anyone, she eventually gives somewhat of an introduction- she had only taught in public schools before, and kept worrying she ‘didn’t know’ how to teach in a Catholic school despite the entire class insisting literally nothing was different, you just teach the curriculum, twice a week we have religion class with Sister Mary King, that’s literally it (she still talked over us in worry), she told us about her kids, she told us about her obsession with Emily Dickinson, stuff like that.
And then she hands us this worksheet.
She’s like, “Oh, these are just some basic questions for you to answer! Just so I can get to know you guys better!” like in lieu of an icebreaker game, which is fine, but…the questions. The questions were all “What is your most haunting fear?”, “What is your deepest regret?”, “Have you ever experienced the pain of loss?”, “What was your worst injury?”, “What was your worst nightmare?”, all questions like that, and then on the back she wanted us to draw a gravestone and write out what we wanted our epitaph to be.
We were twelve year olds, mind you.
Oh my God and one girl missed the first day because of her grandmother’s funeral, so when she came the next day and saw what the teacher was insisting she do for homework, she almost had a panic attack? And the lady still made her do it? Literally who wants to think about death anymore at a time like that omfg.
Okay, so then we get to the summer reading book reports, right? Now, she had given a list of maybe, 20 books that you could pick from, read it, and then present an oral report on it. You had to have notecards and you had to be able to answer questions from the class at the end. All in all, I’ve had worse projects.
So, on this list, she apparently put Madeleine L’Engle’s entire book series on the list…only she did not make it known that this was a series and not multiple stand alone books, so when reports started up it caused mass-panic of kids trying to put together plot points and make connections on what the hell they had read.
I was the only kid in the class who had chosen to read “A Wrinkle In Time”, and that has since lead to a series of events that…really actually scares me, I’m still incredibly freaked out, I’m not going to get into it right now because it’ll take away from the current story, but just know that I’m not above wondering if it only happened because I read the book for Stubel.
Anyway, so like, I got through the report okay. The class asking questions about it was fine, but the teacher kept asking questions that didn’t make sense, like, at all. My friend Angie has always had super neat handwriting and Mrs. Stubel got like, obsessed with her notecards and asked if she could borrow them for something. When we got our grades back a few weeks later, Angie had points taken off for not having notecards.
And then her teaching just…didn’t happen. She’d never stay on a topic, she’d always get herself distracted! We were not learning anything. And like, this wasn’t a class of advanced smart kids that loved to learn. By all accounts we should’ve been thrilled. But it got out of hand. It got to points where we had to start teaching lessons to ourselves, asking teacher from other grades for help, always coming home in tears, complaining constantly to our parents and the principal because this woman wasn’t teaching us anything. There were two kids who asked her multiple times for extra help, and she told them each time to ‘talk to me after school’, but then she’d leave immediately after school so they wouldn’t be able to talk to her. They finally brought up the issue in the middle of class and she had a breakdown, yelling about how nobody ever thinks that maybe the teacher has a lot of work to do, and maybe she’s entitled to taking off early, but when we tried to argue she shouldn’t schedule meetings and then break them off in the name of relaxation, she stormed out of the room and tried to get the principal to give us detention. (Which, like, our school didn’t even do, and she was the only one in the wrong during this situation) We are still in September at this point, and already at least ten kids have parents considering transferring them to another school. (And remember, there was only 19 of us, and most of the class had been together since preschool, so that was a big deal).
Then, she starts coming in with all the weird bruises. All the Moms™ immediately started gossiping that her husband had to be beating her, and that’s why she was so screwy in the head. But the way she talked about her husband made it seem like he *might* be dead, and we actually did witness her fall and smack her head into a doorknob once, so no one really knew what to believe. (Also, I’m not trying to imply that abuse would make someone crazy or ‘damaged’ or anything, this is just what was being said. I think they were trying to turn her into a more sympathetic character, because if you feel sorry for her you don’t have to hate her for frustrating your kids so much, and Hate Is A Bad Emotion.)
Also…this woman and Emily Dickinson.
She talked about Emily Dickinson every chance she could get. None of us knew who Emily Dickinson really was before she got there and you could see in her mind it was a capitol offense. She found out the curriculum didn’t have room to cover her (because like, we had a text book), and was way too upset about it. She started reading her poems whenever she found the time (usually somewhere in history class), and always gave us very detailed accounts about her dressing up as Emily and reading her poetry at the library.
Now, two things to note here:
The library did not hire her to do this. She would literally just get in the mood, put on an Emily Dickinson costume that she made by herself, drive to different libraries, and just read poetry out loud to everyone there until someone eventually asked her to leave.
The way she described these events…her tone, the look on her face, her posture…you could just tell that she was getting some sort of sexual gratification out of this? Like dressing up as Emily Dickinson in public and reading her sad poems is really what got this lady’s jollies rocking? Got her all hot and bothered? Which is…a lot, but why would you tell a bunch of seventh graders about it holy shit. What about that sounds like a good idea! What about that turns you back on!
So anyway, we learned a lot about Emily Dickinson against our will.
One of the Davids™ was reading a book for pleasure- which shouldn’t have been a shocker, a lot of kids always had books on them, but Stubel got really interested and asked if she could borrow it from him. He was like ‘sure, after I finish it?’ but she took it that day. He asked her for it back for like five weeks straight.
And…the strudels.
Okay, so the school was trying some dorky thing to promote ~togetherness~ or some virtue or something, I don’t remember the specifics of why, but each class had to make a huge themed poster and hang it on the wall outside the classroom. Which was like, whatever, not the most thrilling project but at least it allowed us to be productive vs just sitting there as the teacher runs about the room rambling about her family vacation from four years ago. Mrs. Stubel decided we needed a quirky nickname and after like three days of deliberation we were christened “Stubel’s Special Strudels”!
(points for alliteration or whatever, but no one actually voted for that and what exactly do strudels have to do with Catholicism? It became a big running joke amongst the kids)
Also, in case you were wondering, she didn’t explain the assignment correctly to us- so every other class had like these beautiful, artistic, well-themed and put together posters, while ours was just…literally a bunch of shit thrown together on paper. Nothing fit with each other, it was literally embarrassing to look at.
But then…she wouldn’t drop the strudel thing. Like she kept bringing it up. She got really into strudels and would just tell us random shit about them. Finally, someone jokes that we should get strudels one day for a party (like instead of a pizza party), and she’s Freaking Out and On Board. She really wants to buy us strudels and have a breakfast party now. She talked about it for like two days straight.
So like… you know in school when you would have a pizza party, usually the teacher would buy it? That’s how they always happened in my experience (not counting the last day of 10th grade when some kid had pizza delivered to the school for lunch but it didn’t get there until math class lol). But especially in grade school? Like if it wasn’t a PTA made party that’s super organized, the school would buy the food, right? Right?
Yeah, so she was like, if this is happening you guys need to give me the money. Just give me the money and then I’ll pick them up on my way to work!! And after some arguing some kids are on board. Strudels should only cost a couple dollars right?
And she’s like, oh no, I’m gonna get them from this high end bakery near my house so it’ll be special, but they’re not cheap and it’ll be a big order! I’m gonna need like fifteen dollars from each of you!
And at this point I’m just like…lady. Come on.
But she keeps insisting. She’s not gonna go until every student in class pays up.
And I’m like…I’m poor. I don’t even like strudel. And some of the less-naïve kids are siding with me.
And then she pulls that “you guys are just spoiling all the fun for your classmates” shit, like the naïve kids who already paid up, so it gets to the point where we just gotta cave and give her the money.
(I ended up stealing it out of my Crazy Bitch Aunt’s wallet so it’s whatever, I guess.)
And then of course, shockingly enough, every morning she was met with “where are the strudels?” and every morning she went wide eyed, slapped her forehead and yelled in embarrassed horror “I totally forgot! Tomorrow, guys, I promise!”
Honestly, with how scatterbrained and confused she always was…like to this day I can’t tell you with 100% certainty whether she hustled us or was just actually forgetting about the damn pastries, I choose to lean towards the hustled us side because that’s just the type of people I’m used to, but if I found out it was innocent forgetfulness I wouldn’t exactly be surprised.
She couldn’t handle more than one person talking at a time. Like, we’d have break periods, or group work, or something and all the talking made her go wide-eyed and batty. She’d look overworked and anxious and would be darting around the room trying to do work or something but she couldn’t focus and she’d yell at anyone who tried to talk to her directly. I remember one time she was using this boys desk for something so he asked “where am I supposed to sit?” and she snapped “Sit on the ceiling for all I care!”. And this kid was the Class Clown™ , so he immediately grabbed a chair in one hand and started climbing the bookcase to try and reach the ceiling. She’s standing right next to this and doesn’t even notice. He got all four chair legs planted on the ceiling and was trying to somehow maneuver his way into the chair (I really don’t know what the plan was exactly– he was really tall and it was a small building, so I think he probably had the idea that if he can get his body upside down and in the chair, and stretch out his arms like a hand-stand to hold onto bookcase, he could arguably sit on the ceiling.) but he slipped. Crashed into my desk and the two desks next to me, knocked over the book case, broke the chair in half and hit the desks with enough force to knock them down lower. It was hilarious. Everyone was loosing their shit cracking up (he was fine) and it still took Stubel like five minutes to notice his lying out across the desks right in front of her eyes. She was pissed but how did she miss any of it in the first place? She was barely being helpful in whatever it was she was trying to do.
This was the year the Phillies were going to the World Series, and all the grades were having a Phillies Rally in the cafeteria so a news crew was coming to the school and each class was supposed to come up with fun little cheers for them to broadcast. Multiple cheer ideas were presented to her and she vetoed all of them, someone even suggested just singing the damn eagles theme song with replaced words and calling it a day but she vetoed that too, she was very adamant that she could come up with a cheer all by herself and it’ll be the best one (whoever had the best cheer was winning like an ice cream day or something idk). And then like…literally five minutes before the rally she just hands us signs with the letters and was like ‘we’re just gonna spell out Phillies it will be cute won’t it my strudels???’. We were the weakest class there, predictably. I think we lost to the kindergarteners. There might still be a video online of me yelling “i “ passionately at the top of my lungs. It was online bc our cheer was so bland the news crew cut it out of the broadcast.
I literally can’t say enough about how she never taught us anything. She’d be going on some tangent about how she doesn’t understand the science behind skiing, and I’d be like “Okay yes but please can you just tell me where Romania is on a map???” And she’d start fights whenever someone actually wanted to learn. It was so easy to get her angry but so hard for her to stay on topic. Kids started teaching the class themselves! Like seriously, she’d be rambling and one of us would just go up to the podium, open the teacher’s guide textbook and just start reading out loud and talking over her. By the time she noticed we’d be halfway through a lesson. And we understood it better than when she tried! You know something’s wrong when pre-teens are more qualified for a job than an adult who supposedly went to school for this.
We were in the church having run-throughs for our upcoming Confirmation and she almost set the church on fire…fifteen different times. In less than half an hour. How hard is it to hold a candle?
Okay, and here’s when stuff starts kicking up. It was October 28th, a Tuesday, and it was our last day of school that week because they were having parent-teacher conferences the rest of the week. So we were just hanging out, watching movies in class and reading (lord knows we weren’t learning), and Stubel calls me over to her desk.
So like, she had given everyone little bags with candy for Halloween, but I get up there and she hands me an extra one. And she’s like “Molly I know your birthday is tomorrow and I bought you a present but I left it on my coffee table this morning by accident! So just have the candy for now!”
And I’m like….”Ma’am I’m like, the sixth birthday this year. You didn’t give anyone else presents?”
And she goes “Oh, I know but this is a special secret surprise. I just know you’re gonna love it! Do you wanna stop by my house later this week to pick it up or should I just give it to you Monday after school?”
And like…In writing this sounds like a non-threatening exchange, and like, it was, but I felt so uncomfortable holy shit. I’m looking over my shoulder and shooting my friends SOS signals. Something about this felt so weird in my gut omfg. I told her thanks and I’d just see her Monday.
So we flash forward to Wednesday- my 13th birthday, the day the Phillies won the world series, and also the day my mother innocently strolled into the school for her meeting only to be met with screaming, the sound of heavy destruction, and the school secretary Mrs. Daily running at her in a panic, waving her arms and yelling “YOUR MEETING IS CANCELLED YOUR MEETING IS CANCELLED GET IN MY OFFICE NOW!”
So my poor mother, who thought she could handle this whole meeting in a few minutes and barely be an hour late for work, is now barricaded in the front office with the school secretary, as the noises from down the hall get louder and louder. The woman explains that they had gotten so many complaints about Mrs. Stubel that this morning, when she got to the school, the principal Sister Patricia called her in and said “Listen, we need you to be professional and still have the parent conferences, but we have to let you go. We just don’t think you fit in well here, and the kids need to come first and feel comfortable in their school.” and like, I’m paraphrasing because I wasn’t there, but we all know she was very polite and professional about it.
Mrs. Stubel, however…was not.
She flipped her chair and stormed out of the office, and locks herself in the seventh grade classroom. She started wrecking the shit out of that place, screaming obscenities and the top of her lungs, they had to call the cops on her! She was locked in there for almost an hour! And let me just give you a nice little list of everything she did in that classroom:
Smashed three windows.
Threw everything off her desk and carved swear words all over it.
Got cleaning fluid that she knew would damage the chalk boards, smeared it all over.
Cracked the chalk boards by repeatedly smashing chairs against them.
Wrote swear words all over the walls and on desks
Went into students desks, ripped up their books.
Stole my glasses. (which were in my desk bc I only used them in class at the time)
Threw some desks around.
Carved swear words into the boards. (there was so much carving I’m assuming she just had a knife on her person, which has to lead to the question, did she have a knife on her while she was in class with us?)
Physically ripped the hooks to hang backpacks on out of the wall.
Knocked the closet door off it’s hinges.
Ripped up all the books in the bookcases and threw their pages all around the room.
Wrote lewd phrases inside student’s desks.
Broke multiple chairs.
Used her podium as a battering ram against the wall that’s in front of where the backpacks go. (the wall won but Damage Was Inflicted)
Set a fire in the trash can.
When the principal and other teachers started trying to get in, she tossed her rolling chair at the door to scare them off.
She was screaming curse words at the top of her lungs the entire time, and cursing the school and the kids and the principal and the church in general, and the school building was small, so all the parents and the smaller children that had to come to the meetings (who were locked in their respective classrooms in fear) heard everything.
So much more? But it’s 4:30 in this morning and this list is already long.
So my mom is in the front office and deadass the
entire police force
shows up, running down the hallway to the classroom yelling at her to stop, and it takes a while for them to get her out holy shit. They knocked down the door and she tried to escape out of one of the broken windows! But they got her and dragged her out.
So of course, in such a small school with very involved parents this shit spread like wildfire. The entire town knew within the day. The poor principal called the newly retired old-seventh grade teacher and was like “So we…need some help” and the lady was like “I already heard I’ll be there Monday” omfg. I remember I got a text from one of my classmates saying “if your birthday wish was for us to be set free from the beast I love you” omfg.
So, we eventually go back to school on Monday and everyone’s buzzing. The principal has us go to the cafeteria and she ‘delicately’ explains the situation, and that the old teacher is coming out of retirement for us, the school has a restraining order against Mrs. Stubel now and that she’s sorry we had to deal with this mess. Our classroom had to go under some heavy reconstruction before we could be let back in there, so for like two weeks we alternated between the cafeteria and the preschooler’s classroom, we had no books or anything, just provided loose-leaf paper and pens. It was like, surreal, but everyone was just so happy to be rid of her and to be in the presence of a competent teacher omfg. We eventually were able to get back into our usual classroom.
It took a while for things to go completely back to normal, though. After the big spectacle she made, for weeks after she was fired we were all very scared of the possibility of Mrs. Stubel returning to the school with a gun in hand. It was always a topic we whispered about at lunch with wide eyes and shivers. Like…genuine nightmare scenario.
About two weeks after she was fired, a boy in the back of the classroom gasped loudly during SSR, and when we all looked at him, he whispered in anger “She never gave us our freakin’ strudels!”
About three months after she was fired, we were lined up at the door to go to Library when a few of us looked through the windows and saw something darting through the trees. It was fast and we couldn’t make anything out, so we let it drop. When the class and teacher returned half and hour later, the book she had borrowed months before from one of the boys was sitting on his desk. It was just laying there, the room was silent, nothing had been disturbed…but I have never seen a book look so threatening. People were freaking out. Someone kept insisting that she turned the book into a bomb. No one figure out how she got in the school, and no one could figure out how she got it on the right desk, as we had switched the seating arrangement since she had last been there.
A full six months after she had left, it was nearing the end of the school year and our class was dicking around during our last computer class. Someone found a website (that we weren’t allowed to be on) that pulls up any police records attached to whoever’s name you enter, so someone decided to search Mrs. Stubel as a joke. We ended up finding out she had like six DUI’s.
Aaaaand that’s the story of the horrendous teacher I had for two months in 7th grade. One of my favorite party stories but tbh she still haunts me™ .
… I’m not sure this earns World’s Worst Teacher but it sure as hell earns World’s Most Bizarre Teacher. Good gods.
…Guys, I think she’s still teaching out there.
Jesus fuck this was a ride from start to finish
Wow
This was so long, but absolutely riveting. I’d scroll back up and start if you skipped it. Or if you dont have time, save it to read for later.
It’s coming up on a year now since I got my current job as a pizza delivery girl, and I thought this would be a good time to delve into the little ever-expanding “WTFPIZZA” note I keep on my cell that helps me remember some of my more, uh – interesting deliveries.
So without further ado and in no particular order, here’s some pizza customers who left a lasting impression on me thus far:
– A bearded man who answered the door and periodically spat blood into a crusted Harley-Davidson coffee mug while counting out his cash.
– A woman who slipped me a business card (in lieu of tip) for a laser tattoo removal clinic, explaining “In case you want to bring your mutilated skin back to how God intended it to be.”
– At least three Batmans so far, but only one who did the voice.
– An elderly Spanish woman who meekly presented me with a (rather classy) pearl-handled .32 snub nosed revolver and asked if I knew how to load it (I do) and also, if I could load it for her (I didn’t).
– A group of EMT’s hanging out in the back of an ambulance at a recently extinguished (but still smouldering) house fire.
– A man with a thick Alabama accent who admonished me for standing in front of his mailbox while I waited for him to answer the door. He then explained how this was a federal offense because I was “obstructing the mail system” and demanded my social security number so he could “report me to the proper authorities”.
– A group of young teenage girls (like 14-16) who begged me to buy a case of Bud Light (ew why) and bring it back to them.
– A hotel room full of badass middle-aged women all dressed as Professor McGonagall from the Harry Potter films, who were also completely wasted on Jello shots. They kept encouraging me to stay and party with them.
– A 20-something dude who answered the door with an unsheathed katana dangling through a belt loop on his jeans.
– Multiple instances of people asking if I would sell them pot. (bitch get your own dealer sheesh)
– A guy who slipped a twenty directly into my shirt because I apparently was the “spitting image” of his deceased daughter.
– A woman who admonished me for driving a Mazda, and wrote “get a real car” in the tip portion of my credit receipt.
– A very drunk dude who gave me his iPhone and had me take a bunch of Myspace-esque pictures of the both of us. He did the duck lips thing in every shot.
– Multiple prank deliveries (joke’s on you motherfucker, I get paid for the gas AND I eat the pizzas you ordered)
– An elderly man who wrote “FUCK OFF” as his signature on a credit receipt.
– A thirty-something guy who begged to get his order for free because he “works so hard”. He visibly teared up and sniffled when I told him I couldn’t do anything.
– A dudebro wearing a bath robe and socks + sandals (indoors) who straight up wordlessly yanked the pizzas out of my hands without paying and shut the door. Multiple knockings were of no avail.
– A woman who angrily demanded to see my ID because she refused to believe my claims that I’m female. She proceeded to snatch my driver’s license out of my hand, run back into her house and show it to her children while pointing back at me.
– A kid no older than 14 who desperately tried to convince me to play WoW on the free custom server he was playing on. (But it has double XP!)
– A guy who spent the entire time I was there digging a (impressively large) booger out of his nose. He proceeded to smear it on, thankfully, HIS copy of the receipt.
– An on-duty cop who flagged me down by intercepting me on the road before I got to the police station and pulling me over to get his pizza.
– A drill instructor looking-guy who filled out his entire credit card receipt, specifically wrote “0.00” in the tip portion, then proceeded to write out a check for seventy-eight cents and handed it to me. It said “pizza tip” in the “For” section.
– A furious lady who yelled at me for a solid five minutes (I kept track) all about how long it took for her delivery to get to her. She then tipped me an extra ten bucks on a six dollar order. I dunno.
– An incredibly stoned teenager trying and failing to look sober. When I complimented his Adventure Time wallet (which was super cute) and asked where he got it, he immediately looked terrified, sat down on the floor and muttered “I… I don’t know….”
– Obligatory naked man with unimpressive penis
– A chick at a house party who answered the door and immediately turned to vomit into her mailbox.
– A surly Korean mom with an amazing shoulder tattoo of a baby giving birth to a full-grown woman.
– A man who lived in one of those mini-mansions inside a gated community, who sported a seemingly massive collection of what appeared to be solid glass spheres of varying size and color. I only got a quick glance in his house but there had to be hundreds of them in display racks, tables, shelves – everywhere.
– A group of 20-something guys who challenged me to sing the original Pokemon theme song, which I did. And perfectly, I may add.
– A completely iced-out musclebound gangster kid who was blaring Regina Spektor so loud and with so much bass I actually couldn’t hear anything he was saying.
– An elderly guy who deadpan asked me if I knew anyone who could score him hollowpoint bullets.
– An adorable older lesbian couple who were mortified that they didn’t have any extra money for a tip, so they gave me a big sack of pistachios instead. It took me three weeks to finish the bag.
this was so worth reading
God I’ve been an American for too long because my first thought was “God I want that revolver.”
i used to get self-conscious over the smallest things but friends let me tell you that today i had to smuggle a furious 8ft python onto the bus during the school rush and not a single person noticed. not one. if people don’t care enough to notice a shopping bag writhing and seething with barely-contained reptilian hatred then i promise you that no-one will pay any attention to that blemish you’re fretting about or how you’ve done your hair
Question, why are you bringing a 8 ft python into a public bus? You know that this reptile can kill anyone inside there?
buddy she’s a snake not a flying death tentacle
snakes are not evil killers out for blood, and length doesn’t mean lethality! my biggest guy is 11 ft– if i have him around my neck, both his face and his tail touch the floor– and even his species struggles to take down anything bigger than a small-to-medium dog
the worst damage that my 8fter is capable of is when she decides to do an impression of a blood-pressure cuff and makes my arm go a bit purple, and even that’s just when i humour her dreams of being big and scary and let her squeeze her hardest before i unwind her like a bratty garden hose
as long as you’re not some sort of magical tumblring rat, you’re fine
Okay, I gotta ask…
1. Why was she angry?
2. Where were you taking her on the bus? Is there a leash-free snake park where you live?
I need to know.
1. she’s a cranky ass in general, but her mood was absolutely not improved by eating a bit of a snake hook, getting stuffed in a sack, experiencing an hour of adelaide’s finest public transport, and having a vet jam a tube into her stomach
2. i think all of australia is technically a leash-free snake park tbh
I am so glad there was follow up on this post explaining why the snake was on the bus!!!
“bratty garden hose” I’m dying
All of Australia is a leash-free snake park.
“
buddy she’s a snake not a flying death tentacle
“
Learning this took place in Australia really makes it all make much more sense.