The march.

So, the strike and that. I’ve never done a strike before, I’m not a natural trades unionist to be honest. I had assumed that members of my family would have taken part in industrial action in the ‘30s as they were either ship builders or miners at the time, but apparently when the strikes happened my predecessors just quit and joined the army. Fair enough. So there you go, I was the first of the Chipz line to come out on strike. And what an interesting day it was too.

I met a colleague at the tube and walked to the rallying point. We tried to find our LEA so we could march with them, but the whole thing had clearly not been organised by a primary school teacher as the boroughs were not lined up alphabetically. Disgusting. What’s the world fucking coming to? I didn’t care though, Billy Bragg was doing the warm-up so I was turgid with glee. Despite being no leftie I do like Billy Bragg. Eventually found my comrades by their underwhelming banner. My LEA is not really a hotbed of left-wing militancy so the banner was just plain shite. However, you should have seen the ones from places like Lambeth. Fuck me, proper left-wing headbangers that lot. I liked the Pimlico one, they’d obviously had this very impressive banner for ages and were loathe to change it, even though one of the demands on it was to “Free Nelson Mandela”. Or maybe if you marched with them you got a free Nelson Mandela, I’ll never know now. My friend and I were joined by a lovely bloke who’s just retired from teaching, he used to teach occasionally at my school while his career wound down. He’d turned up to support us young ‘uns. Good on him. None of the other fuckers from my school bothered to turn up, although at least they came out on strike, which is more than can be said for a shower of bastards down the road from us who didn’t. Whistles blew, some random bloke started egging us on with a mic about how the teachers fought the fascists from the National Front in the 80s (great, but this is about pay, let’s not start banging on about other shit eh?) and off we went. I’ve never been on a march before and it took a while to get used to the idea that the bearded waster next to me blowing a fucking annoying whistle was on my side. Every fibre of my being fought the urge to thrash him for the pinko layabout he probably might have been.

As we headed down the Strand that utter pillock George Galloway threw his corpulent body onto the bandwagon and went thundering past in his open top battle bus honking like a scotch goose and demanding ‘Respect’ for teachers. Very clever, see what you’ve done there George. Now fuck off and pretend to be a cat. Before someone else knocks you out with a fucking stress ball. Cunt.

We approached the houses of parliament and were diverted around the green. It was quite bizarre, some insane woman wearing a top hat and a ‘Bollocks to Blair’ t-shirt was haranguing us, took me a while to realise that she (I think) was on ‘our’ side. The t-shirt had gold lettering on it, like the Pimlico School she probably figured there was still some mileage in it. She shouted at us through a very distorted megaphone that we were going the wrong way (yes dear, that’s because the nice policemen want us to, and being teachers we do what the police ask us), we should in fact be marching on the very houses of parliament. No, you see we can’t, there’s that law in place and what would we do anyway? Storm it? 10,000 teachers flapping about the palaces of the mighty in sandals would just be embarrassing. Then she urged us to march on Buckingham Palace. What? Why? The Queen doesn’t sign our pay checks you silly bitch! And hang on…you’re American! What on earth was this insane American woman haranguing English teachers for? Thanks for lesson in British politics dear but you know, fuck off. I suspect she’s ‘rent a mob’, I’d wager she’s there for any march wearing her top hat and ‘Bollocks to Blair’ t-shirt.

We arrived at the destination for the rally and the hordes of upset educators filed indoors. Man, it was going to be crowded in there. The only option was to go the pub and have lunch, so we did.

Vive la revolution!

Here we go.

I’m off in half an hour. My comrades and I are going to march…all 1 in 10 of us teachers in this city apparently, so clearly it’s already a phenomenal success. Well fine, I hope 9 in 10 of us turn down any payrise that’s offered. Not that it will be but that’s not the point! I’m meeting a colleague at the rendezvous point, and have been advised to decline any requests to hold the end of a banner (wind catches them and they rip your arms off apparently) or a placard (feels great for mile and then you just want to ditch it). Anyway, I need my hands free to punch the air and shout dramatically.

I’m taking with me a satchel (yes, satchel) containing:

My camera to document the uprising.

A cagoule (essential for any teacher)

A sketchbook and pencils as I intend to go to an amour collection afterwards. I met the curator over the weekend and want to go and see all the boss gear on display.

I might hang around in town, some mates are meeting after work so depending on what time they meet I might loiter, if it’s late I won’t. I can’t see this rally going on for very long. Since most of my colleagues in this city appear to be in other unions (fair play) or FUCKING SCABS I think we’ll be a bit thin on the ground. Still, it’s my first rally/march so I’m jolly excited.

Right, I’m off to fill some wine bottles with petrol.

Striking

Going out on strike tomorrow, education fans. All the teachers at my school are NUT so we’re all out and the school is shutting down for the day. I’ve heard of another school in the borough which isn’t shutting down because some of the NUT members ‘don’t need the money’. Selfish bastards! They don’t need the money because they have working husbands in high income jobs…not quite the same if you’re an NQT on fuck-all, but hey, I’m OK Jack.

Anyway, off to a rally tomorrow, to shout things like “down with Balls!” and “Maggy, Maggy, Maggy! Out, out, out!” Or maybe not. Anyway, it should be lots of fun and will no doubt bringing the government crashing to its knees. So don’t be alarmed if anarchy explodes around you tomorrow, it’s just the long awaited revolution.

I’ll let you know how it goes. I’m sure it will be very very interesting.

What I’ve been up to while you work.

These are things what I dun this holiday so far:

• 1) No planning yet.
• 2) Bought a camera.
• 3) And a hoodie. A sweatshirt, not a spotty youth.
• 4) Gone to the pub with my mate down the road four times. Or maybe five.
• 5) Eaten a curry in a curry house. Which upset my girlfriend because of some unfathomable female reason which she was unable to explain because she knows, yes knows she’s prey to them hormones which upset the ladies for no fucking reason.
• 6) Eaten out far too many times.
• 7) Got drunk almost every day. Thanks workers, keep paying them taxes. Thirteen weeks of holiday is a long time to fill.
• 8 ) Argued with stupid fucking sanctimonious teachers on the TES website. Honestly, most teachers are cunts. I’m not.
• 9) Said “I knew that would happen” during every new report on the Shannon Matthews case.
• 10) Watched Thirty Days of Nights. It was ok.
• 11) Self abused.
• 12) Gone on a dirty weekend to a picture postcard village in the south of England with my girlfriend. It was great. Two hours sleep. Two hours!
• 13) Tried to figure out my finances. Can’t handle it.
• 14) Failed to see my brother and his family up north. Again.
• 15) Half-heartedly mopped the kitchen floor.
• 16) Taken some rubbish out for the bin men. Some. Couldn’t be arsed with the rest and I think that was a mistake.
• 17) Upset someone by lazily calling them a scab when they gave an impassioned speech on why they were choosing not to strike. I enjoyed it. Well it’s true, fucking scab bitch.
• 18) Sent a card to my cousin what’s had a baby. Should’ve called really but I’m really bad at calling my family.
• 19) Got through half of book called Blood Meridian by that bloke what wrote that film that got rave reviews, There’s No Country for the Older Men or something like that. It is a good book but honestly, the writer wouldn’t even get a Level 3 for his punctuation, he can only do full stops and the occasional comma. No speech marks! Honestly, you’d think he would’ve got someone to point that out to him. Maybe the foreigns can’t do punctuation.
• 20) Neglected Chipz, mainly because every time I’ve sat in front of the computer I’ve just ended up calling other teachers cunts on the TES site.

Anyway, that’s been my exciting week. Now I’m preparing to go down to the countryside and visit my parents. It has to be done occasionally. I’d rather just continue my debauch here but you know, they like me to visit. Not sure why sometimes, I seem to make them worried about so many things. You’d think they’d have learnt not to ask me about various aspects of my life so far, but hey ho.

Keep the red flag flying, comrades.

Rimbauer part seven – The Scab

Rimbauer paused, counted to three under his breath and kicked the door. Hard. The cheap plywood splintered into a myriad shards revealing a scene of almost Dickensian misery and squalor in the bedroom within. At first the room seemed to be empty of human life. Crisp packets and Domino pizza boxes littered the floor, a half drunk bottle of Sunny Delight stood on the bedside table next to an overflowing ashtray. Rimbauer stood, senses taught, listening. There it was, a deep breathing coming from inside the bed. It was a type of breathing familiar to Rimbauer, the type of breathing that came only from the mouth, it was the type of breathing so many of his pupils, along with their throwback parents, practised. He crept quietly to the bed and in a single movement threw aside the mattress, levelling his piece at the space beneath. There she was, not seen for over twenty days. Chardonnay Michaels. And a man. In a heartbeat Rimbauer had lifted the girl clear. Christ, she weighed a ton! He grimaced as a hernia threatened to erupt in his groin, at nine years old this girl weighed the same as a female twice her age. Deep fried pizzas will do that to a kid. The man tried to rise, speaking in some primitive language which did not register in Rimbauer’s educated mind. Some gibberish about “th’babbeh” and “f-f-fookin’ setup”. It meant nothing to Rimbauer. He broke the man’s wrist, knee and two ribs with the barrel of his automatic. The man stopped speaking and turned his attention to rolling on the floor moaning like a hippo with brain damage. Rimbauer hit him again. The mawkish décor downstairs had scarred him badly, the bastard deserved pain.

He called in the backup and was already gone by the time the police arrived forty seconds later. He never hung around, that was the rules. As he was driven back to London he watched the news roll in, horrendous footage of behemoth women in elasticated sweat pants opening bottles of tartfuel and baying like a pack of hounds in ‘celebration’ for the cameras. Rimbauer suspected the people of the estate were being kept in shot by the film crew tossing them raw meat and pornography.

The next day the Head called a staff meeting. The strike was on, the NUT had made their announcement earlier that day and the teaching world was buzzing with rumours and speculation. All but one of the teaching staff at Rimbauer’s school were NUT members. Maurice Bender was a teacher of forty years experience, more than anyone else on the staff. A good, solid teacher, a man of impeccable values and lurid tie collection. Bender didn’t believe in striking, and looked like he’d just seen someone rubbing their cock against his precious briefcase when the Head announced the strike. He muttered something about partisans and the lack of care for children, who would suffer the most. Rimbauer wasn’t so sure, he had vague memories of primary school in the seventies and some of his happiest ones were the strike days when he’d stayed at home riding his bike, playing Mousetrap and trying to stick bangers up the neighbour’s cat’s rectum. Happy days.

The Head looked up at Maurice. “You’d better go, Maurice. We all appreciate how you feel about this matter and I won’t keep you. I’ll let you know what I’m going to do about keeping the school open if the strike goes ahead.”

Maurice rose, looking sour. “Well, on your conscience be it!” he sniffed. As he left the room the Head shrugged.

“He’s not a bad guy, just a little out of date. I know you’re all NUT but please, don’t give him a hard time. He’s a NASUWT man and deserves respect.”

Everyone muttered agreement. Maurice was scathing about the NUT but no-one minded, he was a washed up old school liberal with no place in the world anymore. He was due retirement in a year and was merely counting the days. He wasn’t a threat.

“So,” grunted the Head. “What are you all gonna do then? Strike? I’ll admit that I think your union’s gone fucking mad. First all this bullshit about the army staying out of schools and now this. You know damn well they can’t pay you any more! However, the shower of pricks in government need someone to tell them to go fuck themselves and guess you guys might be the ones for the job. You’re making a whole shitheap of work for me, but I gotta admit I support you. Used to be NUT myself.” The Head took a drag on his cigarette and leaned back, exhaling a cloud of blue smoke. His eyes briefly met Rimbauer’s. Rimbauer knew damn right about the Head’s NUT days. The most militant motherfucker to ever throw a brick at a copper. But all that had been forgotten now that he was a head teacher. Forgotten by some, anyway.

A disapproving click of the tongue came from the corner of the staffroom. All eyes turned to Ms Smethwick. Smethwick was only twenty five years old but insisted on being called ‘Ms’. She’d been teaching for only two years but was already the most opinionated, born-again teacher in the LEA. Rimbauer watched Ellen grimace. It was no secret that the school secretary and Ms Smethwick detested each other. Rimbauer noticed Ellen’s chest rise and fall under her blouse, he liked it when Ellen got in a passion. For a start, it was a rare occurrence, she was colder than ice. And secondly it made her tits stick out. Rimbauer liked that.

“What seems to be the problem, Ms Smethwick?” sighed the Head. Like everyone else in the room he suspected he was about to be treated to a self-righteous monologue from the bloody woman. He was right.

“Well,” snapped Smethwick. “I won’t be striking, I think it’s immoral and I won’t be a part of it!”

Mary Parker glared at her. “You’re NUT! We’re going on strike and that means you too!”

“Well I didn’t vote to strike in the ballot,” sniffed Smethwick haughtily, “we got a better pay deal than the police you know, I don’t think it’s right to strike when they can’t!”

“That’s why we’re striking.” Rimbauer spoke quietly, and all eyes turned to him. “We’re striking for the nurses, the police, every poor fucker who’s been cornholed by Brown and Balls.”

“Well I refuse to strike!” barked Smethwick.

Dan Fletcher, a supply teacher, looked up. “Fucking scab,” he growled.

Smethwick gasped.

“Steady on people,” there was a note of warning in the Headteacher’s voice. “Ms.Smethwick is entitled to an opinion you know.”

Parker gave a sharp laugh. “No she fucking isn’t! She’s with us or against us. Change union if you don’t agree you uptight bitch!”

Smethwick leapt to her feet. “I won’t take this from…from…a pack of Marxists!” and with that she turned on her heel and stormed from the staffroom, banging the door closed behind her. The staff sat in silence, some raising an eyebrow to a colleague. The silence was broken by Ellen. “Well that’s you lot told then.” The staffroom erupted into laughter, the tension broken by Ellen. “Don’t be too harsh on her boys,” sneered Ellen. She turned her head and looked Rimbauer right in the eye, “she probably just needs to get laid. Makes a whole new woman of us.” Rimbauer tried not to spit tea down his front.

“Well, that’s the end of that I guess” said the Head. “Your union rep, Mr Pritchard, will no doubt be in touch to let me know what your union plans to do. Like I said, you have my full support. That’s it people, go home, have a good evening.” The staff rose as one and filed out of the staffroom talking excitedly about the forthcoming strike.

“One minute Rimbauer.” The Head was still sitting in his chair, indicating to an empty seat near by. Rimbauer sat. They were alone.

“Maurice Bender is a good man, an NASUWT man. He’s no problem to you lot, do me a favour and make sure the young firebrands don’t give him a hard time.” Rimbauer nodded. “Smethwick however…” the head raised an eyebrow and offered a cigarette to Rimbauer.

“What about her?” Rimbauer took the smoke and leaned forward for a light.

“Rimbauer, I’m not in the NUT anymore, and I shouldn’t really be saying this…but she’s going to be a problem for you.”

“How come?”

“I’ve seen her kind before Rimbauer. She’s not just a scab, she’s a double agent, I’d bet my ass on it.” Rimbauer waited. The Head new the workings of the unions backwards, he wouldn’t talk shit just for the sake of it.

“I was speaking to Pritchard the other day, we’re friends from the old days. I know he helped you out recently, him and that daughter of his. Anyway, we got to talking about the strike and he warned me that we’ve got a mole. I didn’t believe him at first, but he showed me the evidence. Smethwick worked for a year after graduating in the office of one Edward Balls. No kidding. I’ve been reading her emails, she’s still in touch with him. She only became a teacher so that Balls would have an agent in the trade, I’m sorry Rimbauer but you and your NUT chums have got real trouble on your hands with Ms Smethwick.”

Rimbauer looked across at the Head. Shit. It all made sense. Her slavish adherence to policy, her love of new trendy teaching methods suggested by the ministry. A fucking spy. In his school.

“Rimbauer, I just remembered something” the Head put his cigarette out in his coffee cup with a hiss. “It’s my anniversary, if I don’t get home fast the wife’ll fucking kill me. I think everyone’s gone home now. I think Ms Smethwick was planning to er…work late this evening, so it’ll just be you two. Alf the cleaner is here of course. Damn he’s a good cleaner.”

“The best” agreed Rimbauer. He got the point.

“So I’d best be going” The Head rose, nodded once at Rimbauer and made his way out of the staffroom. So that was it, the chance was there and he’d had the go ahead. Just him, Smethwick and Alf, the best damn cleaner in the business. Rimbauer rose, opened the door and knocked on the door of Year Five. He pushed it open. Ms Smethwick had barely registered who had entered when Rimbauer fired twice. The first bullet struck Smethwick in the heart, the second blew the side of her head clean away, showering the interactive whiteboard in gore. The corpse slumped back into her chair. The remaining half of her face wearing a look of surprise. Rimbauer picked up the two spent shell cases from the floor and left the classroom, wiping the door handle as he left. As he walked down the corridor he passed Alf.

“Bit of a mess in Year Five, Alf. Sorry.”

“No problem Mr Rimbauer, the boss told me there might be. Leaves ever such a mess that Ms Smethwick.” Alf winked at Rimbauer and picked up two enormous bottles of chemicals and made for the classroom. Good man, Alf. How many times had he cleaned up Rimbauer’s mess now? Five times? Six? Hell of a guy.

Rimbauer stopped by the main entrance to the school. A light was shining under the door of Ellen’s office. He thought she’d left. He slipped the gun from his holster and slowly pushed the door open. Ellen turned round to face him, she was breathing hard, smoking a long, slender cigarette. She was wearing her coat, as if she was about to leave.

“Rimbauer” her voice was husky.

“Ellen?” Rimbauer’s heart skipped a beat as her coat fell open showing she was wearing nothing but a pair of knee high boots underneath.

“Rimbauer” Ellen started forward.

Rimbauer quickly put his weapon away. Then whipped out his other one.

To be continued…

Hell women.

As I’ve said before, most of the parents of the kids in my class are fine. But as any teacher knows, there’s always a cluster of women who, frankly, are a pain in the arse. In my class there’s about five of them, and while they’re not the really bad kind (the ones who turn up drunk and try to punch teachers) they make my job just that little bit irksome. In the main their problem is that they have boys who lie. Constantly. And despite being shown evidence by previous teachers for the past two years continually believe their sons’ lies and constantly mug themselves off by storming in spouting utter bollocks on their dear angels’ behalf. This is what I had last week:

Mum 1: Came in all a-fluster as her son had claimed the previous evening that his end of term maths assessment was impossible to do as “Mr.Chipz hasn’t taught us any of it”, meaning basically that I’ve not taught them a single calculation or shown them any maths of a similar nature all year. I took her into the classroom and showed her his paper. Almost all his answers were correct, and in fact the questions were specially chosen as they were precisely what I’d been teaching them this term. Her reaction: pat his head and wonder aloud why ‘the poor boy’ had told her that. Checked with last teacher; yes, he does that all the time and mother always pats him on the head afterwards. Twat.

Mum 2: When told by myself that her son had got his knob out while changing for PE and waggled it at the class looked shocked and said she’d talk to him about it. (it was no big deal really, six year old boys do things like that from time to time, I was one myself so know the comedy value of it…you only tell them off to try to get them out of the habit, it stops being funny if they’re still doing it when they’re adults) She came in the next morning, he’d claimed at home, despite his admission of guilt to me, that it had ‘popped out of his shorts by accident’. I bollocked him for lying in front of her and she tried to make a futile defence and gave up when he admitted he had in fact waggled his knob at the class. Her reaction; give him a kiss and tell him to have a good day. The next day the same boy took it upon himself to call a passing stranger during playtime a “fat mongrel”. Mother claimed ‘it was totally out of character’. It’s not, I’ve got records of him doing this sort of thing going back two years. I wonder where he gets it from…oh yes, seen his mother grab another woman by the throat with him watching and heard her screaming abuse at various women and their children. My action: will book in a policemen to give a ‘stranger danger’ talk and make him sit at the copper’s feet. One bonus of his vibrant upbringing is that he has a mortal fear of policemen.

Mum 3: Stormed in to demand why I confiscated her little boy’s power ranger. Explained he was playing with it during a lesson. Added that he’s always bringing in toys and I’m sick of it, as he doesn’t concentrate. She demanded why I don’t tell her these things. Reminded her of two occasions when I’d spoken to her about this and once when I’d spoken to the boy’s father. She went a bit red as she had the other muppet mums in support and now looked a bit of a tit in front of them. Then told her I’d gone and lost the toy. She gave up. Twat.

Mum 4: Asked me what she should do about her brat of a daughter (the only naughty girl in my class, face of an angel but really a very poisonous girl indeed) as she’s constantly misbehaving at home. Told her I wouldn’t have a clue, as I don’t have children of my own. She then asked me if I could tell her daughter to do what mum says at home. Twat. Do your own parenting. (seen her parenting in action; she slags off the school, other parents and, in fact, everyone and everything in front of her daughter. No wonder she’s a horrid little girl).

Honestly, some of these women; absolute pillocks.

Keep the red flag flying…

 I haven’t posted for ages. AGES. Want to know why? My student’s gone. Gone I say. Won’t be back till June. The trauma of actually having to teach this week has been horrendous, I’m in shock. Bloody children, knee high to a grasshopper and a million times louder. Anyway, that’s why I haven’t posted.

The good news (as I’m sure you’ll all agree) is that my brothers and sisters from that there NUT are coming out on strike. It’s all very exciting and I’ve not taken part in industrial action before. In fact, it was more my scene in my previous life to write urgent letters to the government insisting that they turn out the troops and fire on the socialist bastards. But now that it’s my pay packet in question I’m donning my Che Guevara t-shirt, dusting off my Socialist Worker, Don’t Attack Iraq and Free Nelson Mandela badges and girding up my loins to march on the palaces on the mighty. Class war! I know in my heart of hearts you all support me in this. Oh yes you do. Our free babysitting service don’t come cheap you know. I’m just gutted we have Brown as a prime minister as I really want to wear a donkey-jacket and shout puerile shite like “Maggy, Maggy, Maggy! Out out out!!”

Ah, salad days.