Mayor Bloomberg, as a great advocate for children, promised to rid the city of trailers by 2012. Later, he clarified this statement, explaining that he would not get rid of them by 2012. So what if they're designed to last ten years and have been up over 15? If NYC kids can deal with schools on toxic sites, and poisons in window caulking, a few dilapidated trailers here and there are small potatoes.
Every morning, when I enter my trailer, the first thing I do is go to the adjacent trailer and steal the eraser. And every afternoon, the ratfink teacher in the other trailer steals it back, thus necessitating another trip for me the following morning. Of course I could get another eraser. But if I were to do that, the kid who leaves offensive messages on my board at the end of every day will just steal it, as has happened on several previous occasions. There's no security in the trailers, and kids who use them need to just hope for the best.
Now my trailer is looking particularly bright these days, as one of my fellow trailer trash teachers has decorated it. In fact, the other day some administrators took a rare trip to trailerland, and wanted to know why the heck anyone would bother decorating a trailer. After all, the same energy could be devoted toward decorating the main building, where important muckety-mucks may actually see it.
There's a lot of controversy in one of the other trailers. One teacher has complained that it's filthy and smells kind of funky, and now the administration is investigating to find out precisely who's responsible. Is it the teacher who complained, the teacher the teacher complained about, or is it some other teacher who's neither complained nor been complained about? Or is is some vile substance that's taken root is the trailer? Personally, I have no idea.
On the positive side, in our trailer bathroom the custodians have removed the mold and rust-encrusted soap bars that no one was hardy enough to touch without a ten-foot pole. Rather than filling the soap dispensers that have sat empty for ten years, the custodians simply installed new ones. To ensure that they remain full, the custodians have cleverly stopped providing paper towels. Thus no wasteful hand-washing will occur, and it may never be necessary to refill the soap dispensers.
This frees up valuable funds for sports stadiums, and it's another win-win in Mr. Bloomberg's New York.
Related: Check out this other trailer.
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