As I have mentioned before, I drive a school bus for the district I live in until I start school in the fall. Actually, my last day will be the last day of school cause they obviously won't need a lot of drivers over summer break. Anyway, Friday I am finishing the grade school kids, most of them are off the bus, and a dispatcher comes on the radio asking me to call them when I get a moment. The next stop was out of the way, so I have a place to park the bus for a few minutes and I call on the cell phone.

I get the dispatcher on the phone and she asks me, "Are you cussing at the kids on your bus?"

"Of course not, why?"

"I have parents calling telling me you are telling the kids to 'get the fuck off the bus!'"

After I finish my hearty laugh, and the kids that ARE on the bus stop mocking me, I say, "No, I'm not telling them to 'get the fuck off the bus!', but if there are mind readers on the bus, then it's possible one of them heard it."

"Ok, I thought so, but I have to check cause there was a complaint."

That, as I said, was Friday. Yesterday I called dispatch after my last run of the day for something, and the same dispatcher gets on the phone.

"I'm glad you called cause I have to talk to you."

"Really, what did I do wrong now?"

"I had parents calling me again saying their kids are telling them you are still cussing."

"Well, I guess in order to prove I'm not you are going to have to question them individually to see if their stories jive."

"We don't think you are, but I have to ask."

I thought about it on the way back to park the bus, and made a decision. Since this route has some rowdy kids on it, they installed a camera on the bus and it's been there a while. I've never used it, but I looked at it after parking, and found a 30 minute tape inside. The camera worked, I checked it out, so after taking care of dinner and things at home I had me a shopping trip to Wal-Mart. I bought four 90 minute tapes, and a VCR adapter for them. I wanted 90 minute tapes cause the morning and afternoon runs for these kids is over 45 minutes combined. Yep, today I ran the tape on the bus for the grade school. Now, when they call say I've been cussing at the kids, I'm going to ask politely that someone make it official and put it in writing.

The students on the bus aren't particularly thrilled with me driving their bus, because I try to insist they sit properly. Apparently nobody has required this of them before, and it's obvious they find it extremely difficult to comply. I had a student tell me over his shoulder, after I asked him to turn around and sit down, "Shut up, I'm busy!" Yep, his exact words. He was sitting in the front seat for a couple of weeks after that.

I asked another girl, a 1st grader, to go to her seat and sit, and she looks me right in the eye and tells me, "No!" I had to put a stern look on my face and tell her to comply before she did, begrudgingly.

This is why drivers don't get paid enough, because they have to put up with shit like this.....