Here's a brief synopsis: My 3rd grade teacher was Mrs. Nist who was clearly 400 years old and was the meanest woman I have ever met in my life. She always talked about her mother, who was obviously some sort of mummy or Dorian Gray-like creature because if Mrs. Nist was 400 years old I can only image what her mother was like. She used to make us watch Little House on the Prairie (whose educational value I still debate) and make Pop Qwiz Popcorn and let us guess what color it would be (again, lots of learning going on there.)
In 4th grade I had Mr. Szakelyhidi. He was a cool dude who regularly talked about water skiing. My classmates and I used to build these contraptions out of paper and rubber bands and paper clips to hold our erasers and notes. We would build tubes out of paper and tape them to our desk, then push pencil and eraser shavings into them so they'd drop down into a homemade garbage can under our desks. I specifically remember someone throwing up Cap'n Crunch Berries right in the doorway, so none of us could get out of the room to avoid the stench. That was a fun memory.
Ok, on to the good stuff. Check out this bad boy:
No, that is not a helmet on my head. That is my hair. My beloved bowl cut, which I held on to for as long as socially allowable by the rules of middle school. I basically looked like Where's Waldo without the striped shirt and hat... and I'm just realizing that now. oof.
My 5th grade teacher was Mr. Kline, who was awesome. He was one of those teachers that when your teacher assignments came in the mail at the end of summer you let out an audible "YESS!!!!!" when you got them.
He gave everyone in the class a nickname based on their appearance, name or hobbies. My nickname was "PA." I'm not sure why, because they're not my initials. Mr. Kline used to always say, "Hey, PA!" when he saw me. We would all sit in a circle and he would read to us from Roald Dahl's "The BFG" in voices, which were hysterical.