Monday 19 October 2009

Boarder - Day One

On Friday, my Guardian dropped me off at the Headmistress's house so that I could be taken to boarding school. The whole trip was a bit too far for my Guardian to drive, and the School Authorities refused to let me be sent on the train by myself as (in role) I am only thirteen and three quarters. Tommy mac had been ordered to report to Miss L too, as she had decreed that "two of the naughtiest pupils in the school" would be better off directly under her eye. We weren't too sure because we wanted to plot, but we had to do as we were told.
In actual fact the journey was quite uneventful. We started off a bit late cos it was decided that we should go in convoy with Mr Reamon, and he had to bring Katherine. I'm sure the three of us could have managed to travel across country all by ourselves quite successfully, it's awful when you gain a reputation! Still, we were allowed to stop at a motorway cafe and we had burgers and chicken, and tommy had something veggie and then we were off again!
The cars bowled along quite merrily, and eventually we reached the school. It's gorgeous, nestled in the country, miles away from towns, and motorways, and it was a long way from a train station so it was as well Miss L took us.
We helped to carry everything in, and had a good look round. There was that wonderful school smell of polish, and dust, and old cabbage and disinfectant that is so heady. Mr Malcolm and Michelle had arrived a few minutes ahead of us, and Prof Robertson turned up not too long after with Sarah Robinson in tow. Apparently none of our Guardians had trusted us to travel alone, even Nicola was dropped off at the school gates and trundled her school trunk along the drive.
Miss Liversausage took us upstairs and showed us our dormitories. Me, Michelle and Sarah were in the big dormitory, and Tommy Mac was in the boys' dormitory. Miss L had put Nicola and Katherine in a smaller girls' dormitory further along the corridor, I believe she thinks we are a bad influence. Can't think why. We had a quick nose around the staff corridor. It was a bit galling to find that one set of stairs from our floor opened up directly outside Mr Malcolm and Prof Robertson's rooms, and the other stairs were disturbingly close to Miss Liversausage's room, while Mr Reaman was close too. We could see that was going to cause us some logistical problems when it came to feasting.
We went back to the dormies, and changed into uniform, then went downstairs for my favourite, Shepherds Pie and vegetables. We set the tables, and just as the food was ready, our School cook and her assistant arrived, and we were all set for the term. The cook, Mrs Lovett, and her assistant Miss Todd were given the room next to ours, and we were put on our honour not to disturb or annoy them during the night. So of course we didn't, being on your honour at New Grange Manor is taken very seriously by all the pupils.
It being the first night, we had a bit of free time which we put to good use by finding an empty dormitory and hiding all our booze, erm I mean our lemonades of course, in the bedside cabinet. Sarah, michelle and I spent some time blowing up a couple of inflatable men, an inflatable woman, and a crocodile. We were annoyed to find that a couple of the things had punctures, so later on, tommy mac filled the bath with cold water and we dunked the things in there to find the holes. Tommy had brought some white plastic tape, and it made quite good puncture repair plasters! We hid the men under the spare bed, and popped the woman into the wardrobe, ready for action.
Mr Malcolm caught me trying to go out of bounds and sent me to the Staff Room. I didn't think I'd get into much bother on the first night of term, but Mr Malcolm gave me one of his skin stripping reprimands about behaviour, good manners, adherence to rules etc, then dealt with me in the usual NGM manner with, to my mind, somewhat more enthusiasm that the occasion demanded! However, you can't argue with Beaks, and I retired to the kitchen for a comforting cup of hot chocolate! Once the sting had abated somewhat, vengeance occupied my mind!! I sought out michelle, cos I knew she had several suitable toys.
Lights Out came first though. We were far too excited to go to sleep. We chased in and out of each other's dormitories, and then michelle hid a fart machine in Mr Malcolm's room, along with a couple of noise machines. We just got out of there in time, cos he came up the stairs while we still hovering and gave us a lecture about what would happen if we went into his room! We ran back upstairs, and he came along to put the Light Out and tell us to go to sleep.
Sleep was well out the question though. I'd put new batteries in my snoring teddy, Nelson (he only has one eye) , and the other two were on the edge of their beds chatting away. I'd given tommy mac one of the walkie talkies I'd brought, and we tried that out. It was fairly successful. Then Mr Malcolm came storming in. He'd had to come back upstairs cos of all the noise and he was a bit cross. However he didn't have any of his "toys" with him, so I cheeked him back and didn't turn Nelson off when he told me to....... Sadly I hadn't noticed what Sir was wearing on his feet, and I found myself face down on the coverlet, getting several swats from one of his slippers. I hopped back under the covers and pretended I was going to go to sleep.
He turned the light off again, and departed. Michelle and I gave him five minutes, then we crept out onto the landing. We could hear the Beaks and the Cooks chatting away down in the kitchen. Not clearly, you understand, we weren't eavesdropping, just listening to see when they were going to go to bed. It took a while but eventually they trundled off one by one. While Michelle kept watch, I eased myself down a couple of steps, and aimed the remote control at Mr Malcolm's door. We were rewarded by the most amazing growling fart which reverberated all round the Staff landing . Encouraged, I jabbed the button two or three times more, then scuttled up the stairs as his door suddenly opened.
This time he brought his strap upstairs with him. Suitably chastised, we did actually settle down to sleep.............
to be continued.

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