The failed classroom riot.

My eighth grade math teacher was this little old lady who was putting in her last year before her retirement. My friends and I were needlessly mean to her, probably only because we were assholes and we figured out that we could get away with all kinds of tomfoolery in her class.

One of my staple gimmicks for her class was to swear loudly, but leave out the last consonant of a word so that I could get laughs without getting in trouble. I usually did this when she gave an assignment, indicating my displeasure with the work load.

"The assignment for tomorrow is page 42, problems 12-36."

"Shiiiiiiiiiiihh! What the fuuuuuuuuuuhh? Motherfuuuuuuh! Shiiiiiiiih!"

Some of my friends were in her class earlier in the day, and would always ask for blow jobs in class.

"Whoever solves this extra credit puzzle first will get a prize."

"What is it? A blow job?"

The kids would all laugh, and she would laugh, too. She must have asked somebody what it meant, though, because one day they said it and she started yelling at them never to use language like that again. This was one of only two times I had ever heard of her yelling at somebody, and yelling was the worst punishment she ever gave out

The other time I remember her yelling was when my friends came up with a way to make fun of her name in a particularly juvenile way. Her name was Mrs. Berenda, and somebody figured out that you could say "Mrs. Bare-end-a" for a cheap laugh. As soon I heard that, I had to go to class and say it to her. She started yelling at me and threatening to write me up, but I don't think she ever sent anybody to the office.

I had been obsessed with the idea of a schoolhouse riot, and one day when she stepped out of the room for a moment, I figured I'd give it a shot. The room was quiet immediately after she stepped out, because we were supposed to be working on an assignment. I got up from my desk.

"Riot!" I yelled, and flipped the desk in front of mine. Everybody just looked at me for a few seconds, and then the door opened. I sat down quickly as Mrs. Berenda came back into the classroom. She saw me sitting down, and knew I had flipped the desk.

"Paul, what happened to the desk?" she asked.

"I don't know," I told her, "It was like that when I got here."

She asked me politely to put it right side up, which I did. I was really disappointed, though, because I had envisioned everybody going crazy and smashing things up, but instead I had just gotten crazy looks from the entire class.