There is a kid on my route who has an amazing habit of almost never riding the bus, and when he does, he takes several minutes to leave his house and get on. If I drove a normal route, I could just drive off and leave him, but since my route is technically “special ed,” I have to honk my horn and wait two minutes, no matter how late I already am.

This past weekend was the annual Roadeo at work, but unfortunately I didn’t get to go, since I was busy getting some much needed rest instead. I’m kind of annoyed that I didn’t go, though. I had volunteered to help move the buses back to our lot after the event, mainly to be sure that mine got parked somewhere decent. It didn’t. I spent about 5 minutes this morning searching the lot for it.

I was sitting at the school this afternoon, loading kids onto the bus (all six of them), and the principal walked over and started chatting with me a bit. He asked me how I liked the job and the kids so far, and I told him that I was really enjoying it and the kids had been good so far. He then commented on how calm and mellow I was. “A bomb could go off on the back of the bus, and you wouldn’t care, would you?

I saw a very pretty little black kitten crossing the road this morning right after I turned down a fairly main road on my route. I actually had to fully stop the bus to let him cross. Very pretty and svelte, couldn’t have been more than 8 or 10 months old and looked very boyish. After he got across the road, he just stopped in some bushes maybe 2 feet from the bus.

I don’t know how or why, but all of my kids but one rode the bus this morning. And the one who didn’t ride is one of the kids who normally rides. Very odd indeed. It was nice not to have to wait for most of them, but it also sucks because it means that I will have to take all of them home this afternoon. Looks like I won’t be getting home early today.

My roommate cleaned a bit of the apartment the other day and now my allergies are bugging the crap out of me. At least I know for a fact that it’s allergies and not actual illness, since I felt much better as soon as we left to go to the store earlier. That makes me happy, since it means I won’t miss any work. The kids on my bus have been really well behaved this week, so I haven’t had too much to post on lately.

1. What is your middle name? Joseph. It’s my dad’s first name, and his dad’s first name as well. 2. If you had been born the other sex, did your parents tell you what your name would have been? Probably, but I don’t remember what it was. 3. Do you have children and if so, what are their names? None of my own. Just the ones on the bus. 4. If you were to ever have a child or more children, what would you name them?

This morning started out with some driver talking on her radio about some child on her bus. “I have a child who got sick on the bus. Can I have someone from the school meet me when I get there?” At first, I figured that the kid had just suddenly started feeling very bad, and the driver wanted to be sure the kid got handed straight to the school nurse or whatever.