by Dan Gutman
“Oh, yeah?” Officer Spence said. “Go get her, boys.”
The guys with the sunglasses ran into the school and came back out carrying a lady who was tied to a chair. Officer Spence took off the rag that was tied over her mouth.
“Ma’am,” he said, “would you mind telling these kids who you are?”
“I’m Mrs. Sanford,” the lady said. “I was on my way to school on Monday to start the Recess Enrichment Program when that woman kidnapped me! She tied me up in a secret room in the basement of the school!”
“WOW!” everybody said.
“I did not!” said Mrs. Lizzie.
“You did too!”
They went back and forth like that for a while.
“See?” I said to Andrea. “I told you Mrs. Lizzy kidnapped our recess enrichment teacher and had her tied up in a secret room in the basement of the school!”
“Does this mean we’ve been taking recess enrichment classes from a psycho cannibal zombie who eats kids for breakfast?” asked Ryan.
“Can you untie me now?” asked Mrs. Sanford, the lady who was tied to the chair.
“In a minute,” Officer Spence told her. “I want Mr. Klutz to see this.”
While Officer Spence was putting handcuffs on Mrs. Lizzy, Mr. Klutz and Mrs. Jafee came running over.
“What’s going on here?” asked Mr. Klutz.
“Remember that crazy person who escaped from the loony bin last week?” Officer Spence said. “Well, here she is! Mrs. Lizzy is an imposter. She has been posing as the recess enrichment teacher all week.”
Mr. Klutz turned to face Mrs. Jafee.
“Didn’t you hire this woman to teach recess enrichment?” he asked.
“No, I thought you hired her,” said Mrs. Jafee.
“I didn’t hire her.”
“Well, neither did I.”
“Nobody hired her,” Officer Spence told them. “She just showed up on Monday and told everybody she was the recess enrichment teacher. She’s been teaching the children ridiculous things like how to milk goats and make armpit farts.”
“Those are important things to know!” yelled Mrs. Lizzy.
“Quiet, you!” said Officer Spence.
“And who is this woman tied to the chair?” asked Mr. Klutz.
“I’m the real recess enrichment teacher,” said Mrs. Sanford. “I was going to teach the children useful things like how to use a camera, play musical instruments, and do arts and crafts projects.”
“Did you try to escape when you were tied up in the basement?” Ryan asked Mrs. Sanford.
“How could I escape?” she replied. “I was tied to a chair! And I couldn’t yell because there was a rag over my mouth!”
“You could have made armpit farts,” I suggested. “Somebody would have heard them and rescued you.”
“Or you could have yodeled with your mouth closed,” suggested Michael. “That’s what I would have done.”
“I don’t know how to yodel or make armpit farts!” said Mrs. Sanford.
“Too bad,” said Neil. “If you had learned that stuff as a kid, none of this would have happened.”
“Are you blaming me for getting kidnapped?” asked Mrs. Sanford. “Untie me right now! I will never teach at this school again.”
“You haven’t taught here yet,” Mrs. Jafee told her. “We’ll untie you in a minute.”
“I checked up on Mrs. Lizzy,” said Officer Spence. “She’s wanted in thirty states. She goes from school to school pretending to be a teacher. But she never got a teaching certificate. She’s a phony.”
“Oh, snap!” said Ryan.
“I just assumed she was one of our teachers,” said Mr. Klutz. “I mean, she showed up every day with crazy hair, crazy clothes, a crazy hat, and crazy shoes.”
“That’s because she’s crazy!” Officer Spence yelled. “And she picked the perfect week to come to our school. Nobody noticed how crazy she was because it was Crazy Week.”
Wow! I always thought there were a lot of crazy teachers in our school, but this is the first time one was really crazy. And we got to see it live and in person.
“Good work, Officer Spence!” said Mr. Klutz.
“Just doing my duty, sir.”
We all giggled because Officer Spence said “duty.” I think he should get the No Bell Prize for figuring out that Mrs. Lizzy wasn’t a real teacher.
“Take her away, boys,” Officer Spence said.
“I want to teach! I want to teach!” Mrs. Lizzy shouted as they dragged her away. “The children must learn how to yodel. Get your hands off my worms!”
“Don’t worry, Mrs. Lizzy,” Mrs. Jafee said. “We’ll get you the help that you need, you betcha.”
“I say they should lock her up and throw away the key,” said Officer Spence.
“Why would they do that?” I told him. “Then they won’t be able to unlock the lock.”
“That’s the idea, Arlo!” Andrea said, rolling her eyes.
“They could make a new key,” I told Andrea.
“You shouldn’t throw away keys,” said Emily. “Keys can be recycled.”
We watched as the guys with sunglasses put Mrs. Lizzy and her worms into a patrol car. She was yelling something about balloon animals.
9
Every Week Is Crazy Week
I thought that would be the end of Crazy Week. But something even crazier happened the next Monday.
We were at recess swinging on the swings when you’ll never guess in a million hundred years who showed up on the playground.
No, it wasn’t Mrs. Lizzy.
I told you that you wouldn’t be able to guess. So nah-nah-nah boo-boo on you.
Just for that, I’m not gonna tell you who it was.
Okay, okay, I’ll tell you.
It was Pootie the goat!
There we were, minding our own business, when out of nowhere Pootie wandered over! It was the most amazing thing in the history of the world!
“Naaaaaaayyyyy,” said Pootie the goat.
“What’s that goat doing here?” asked Ryan.
“She must have escaped from Rent-A-Goat,” I said.
Pootie the goat was making weird noises.
“I think something’s wrong with Pootie,” Andrea said.
“Maybe she’s sick,” said Emily.
“Maybe she just needs to be milked,” said Neil the nude kid.
“Well, I’m not milking her,” Andrea said.
“I’m not milking her,” said Ryan.
“I’m not milking her,” said Michael.
Nobody wanted to milk Pootie the goat.
“I say Arlo should milk her,” said Andrea.
“Why?” I asked. “I milked her last time.”
“That’s exactly why you should milk her this time, Arlo,” Andrea said. “You know how to milk a goat. We don’t know what to do.”
“Milk the goat! Milk the goat!” everybody started chanting.
I was faced with the hardest decision of my life. If I milked Pootie, everybody would make fun of me for sure. And if I didn’t milk Pootie, well, I was afraid that she might explode and there would be milky pieces of goat all over the place.
I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t know what to do. I had to think fast. I was concentrating so hard that my brain hurt.
Finally, I decided that I would rather be made fun of than be covered by milky pieces of exploded goat. So I got down on my knees and did what Mrs. Lizzy told me to do.
I thought I was gonna die. But Pootie calmed down as soon as I started milking her.
“Naaaaaaayyyyy,” said Pootie.
“You’re good at that, A.J.,” said Neil. “When you grow up, you should milk goats for a living.”
“Oooooh!” Ryan said. “A.J. is milking Pootie the goat. They must be in love!”
“Hey A.J., when are you and Pootie gonna get married?” asked Michael.
If those guys weren’t my best friends, I would hate them.
Well, that’s
pretty much what happened during Crazy Week at Ella Mentry School. I’m gonna miss Mrs. Lizzy. She may have been crazy, but she was cool. None of our real teachers ever showed us how to do cool stuff like yodel or do fart noises with our armpits. And she made great balloon animals. My mom really liked her Mother’s Day present.
Mrs. Lizzy was right about one thing. You never know when you might have to milk a goat.
Maybe the Board of Education will cancel the Recess Enrichment Program and just let us have fun again. Maybe we’ll have another lockdown. Maybe Mrs. Lizzy will cut her hair and get earmuffs. Maybe Officer Spence will stop saying the word “duty.” Maybe a zombie cannibal psycho who eats kids for breakfast will escape from the loony bin. Maybe Emily’s mom will use a plate instead of eating breakfast in her pajamas. Maybe they’ll let Mrs. Lizzy out of the loony bin so she can finish telling us about worm poop. Maybe Pootie will go back to Rent-A-Goat. Maybe we’ll be able to talk Mr. Klutz into having another Crazy Week next year.
But it won’t be easy!
* * *
Turn the page to
explore the wacky,
screwball world of MY WEIRD SCHOOL!
* * *
IT WAS A REAL KODAK MOMENT!
You should have been there—and now you can be. Check out these priceless moments from
MY WEIRD SCHOOL DAZE!
My Weird School Daze #1:
Mrs. Dole Is Out of Control!
Everybody was freaking out because there were sparks flying all over the place. Some of the sparks were falling on the hay at the petting zoo.
“Excuse me,” I said to Emily.
“What do you want, A.J.?” Emily asked, like she was all annoyed.
“I just wanted to let you know that you’re on fire,” I told her.
My Weird School Daze #2:
Mr. Sunny Is Funny!
“Oh no!” yelled Mr. Sunny. “He’s going to hit—”
Mr. Sunny never got the chance to finish his sentence. Because at that moment Mr. Granite landed right on top of Mr. Sunny’s sand castle!
BAM! Mr. Granite crushed it! I mean, it was totally flattened! Mr. Sunny’s amazing sand castle looked like a big pile of sand again…with a pair of feet sticking out of the top.
My Weird School Daze #3:
Mr. Granite Is from Another Planet!
“Wait a minute!” Michael said. “How do we know you’re not yanking our chain? Prove you’re an alien!”
“Yeah,” I said. “Let’s see you peel off your face.”
“Well…okay,” Mr. Granite said as he put his hand under his chin….
Mr. Granite pulled at his neck, and the skin started to come loose. Then he peeled off his entire face! And you’ll never believe in a million hundred years what he looked like underneath.
My Weird School Daze #4:
Coach Hyatt Is a Riot!
Coach Hyatt blew her whistle.
“Line up!”
“Are we gonna pick up your car again today?” asked Neil.
“No!” the coach barked. “Today you ragamuffins are going to learn the most important part of football—how to do an end zone dance.”
“A what?” asked Ryan.
“After you score a touchdown, you have to do a dance in the end zone,” Coach Hyatt said.
Then Coach Hyatt showed us her end zone dance. She shook her butt, lifted a leg over her head, hopped up and down for a while, and then put her hands in the air and waved them around like a crazy person.
Coach Hyatt is a riot!
Cheer and Sing Along with A.J. and Pals
Graduation Song!
Sung to the tune of “Pomp and Circumstance”
I’m gra-ad-u-a-ting,
There’s a square on my head.
Why is there a square on my head?
Be-cause I’m grad-u-a-ting.
Mr. Hynde’s Out-of-His-Mind Rap!
Old Mr. Loring he was over the hill
So the board of education told him he would have to chill.
My name is Hynde, and I’m gonna blow your mind.
I ain’t no music teacher, I’m a born music creature.
Cause my daddy’s name was Amos, but he never became famous.
So he took me on his lap, and he taught me how to rap.
I can rhyme any line. I got juice like Dr. Seuss.
Until I hit it big, I got this teaching gig.
So sit back on your pants and dig my new break dance.
Root for Ella Mentry School’s Pee Wee Football Team—the Moose!
That’s all right! That’s okay!
We’re gonna win it anyway!
Go…Moose!
A.J.’s Guide to Yay! Vs. Boo!
Yay!
Bonbons
Summer
Recess
Calculators
Dirt bikes
Boo!
School
Crybabies
Tofu
Andrea
About the Author and the Illustrator
Dan Gutman has written many weird books for kids. He lives in New Jersey (a very weird place) with his weird wife and two weird children. You can visit him on his weird website at www.dangutman.com.
Jim Paillot lives in Arizona (another weird place) with his weird wife and two weird children. Isn’t that weird? You can visit him on his weird website at www.jimpaillot.com.
Visit www.AuthorTracker.com for exclusive information on your favorite HarperCollins author.
Credits
Cover art © 2010 by Jim Paillot
Copyright
MY WEIRD SCHOOL DAZE #9: MRS. LIZZY IS DIZZY!. Text copyright © 2010 by Dan Gutman. Illustrations copyright © 2010 by Jim Paillot. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available.
ISBN 978-0-06-155418-6 (lib.bdg.)—ISBN 978-0-06-155416-2 (pbk.)
EPub Edition © February 2010 ISBN: 978-0-06-199199-8
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
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* Lockdowns are even cooler than fire drills. Fire drills are still cool because we get to stand around on the playground instead of learn stuff. One time I hypnotized Andrea, and she went crazy and pulled the fire alarm.
* That means “What are you doing here?” in grown-up talk.
* That’s silly. Parents can’t fit in a backpack. Except for really small parents, I guess.
* If you’re reading this book with a parent or teacher, tell them to do the yodeling part. It will be hila
rious.
* Actually, you can hear a pin drop. Somebody dropped a pin one time, and I heard it.
* The difference is that you put the jelly on first.
