I'm catching up on newsletters very late but felt I had to share how deeply moved I was by this as a fellow cubicle luncher. (Tbf I can't tell if I'm being sarcastic or real with this comment.)
Nothing worse than a taunt that’s not even canonical!!! Also ET is just the cutest little thing and everyone cries when he goes away - that lad was all over the place
I was going to joke "Well, at least you haven't been on anything recently where you might need to appeal to an figure you might admire" but you beat me there yourself!
Also you eating in the school toilet did make me wonder if perhaps a similar story had befallen the Mr Kipling Angel Slice (still packaged) or 'toilet kipling' as I now refer to it, that I once found atop a shelf in a public toilet. Toilet kiplings are a mysterious entity. How did they come to be there? No one knows. But perhaps now we have a potential solution.
Fellow bullee here. (Not bully, bullee.) Dude scared the living s*** outta me in 5th and 6th grades, and basically anytime I'd see him through middle school. Never knew what his problem was with me, but he'd give me stink eye stares and threaten to "get me" and beat me up. I'd have to beg the teachers to let me stay inside during recess so I could eat lunch with them. Just me and the teacher, the rest of the kids outside playing. I'd say this suited me, being a teacher's pet and all, but at the same time, I lived in a state of constant adrenalized fear.
Flash forward to our high school's 10-yr class reunion. Who walks right up to me as though we're best friends? Same greasy black hair, same lisp, asking how I've been, what I've been up to. In my mind, I was thinking, "Does he not remember? Did it have no impact on him whatsoever?" I'm not sure what the moral of the story is, except I no longer think about him, because he doesn't think about me. He seemed like he desperately wanted to befriend me, which after all the incalculable psychic hurt he inflicted on me, made me pity him.
Hard relate, except that I'm not on Taskmaster, and the teachers at my school were less observant so I didn't have to use an out of order sign when I ate my lunch in the loo.
My pals at school used to sing ‘woah I’m an alien… I’m a little alien in New York’ and a whole story about a little alien living in NYC. So maybe you were just at the wrong school 🤔 …
I’ll let you decide for yourself if we were also bullied.
Oof. I was bullied to DEATH in secondary school (surely secondary school is the definition of hell? People who say school was the best time of their lives...how?) and I remember wanting to be a Hollywood actress (I know, I know...) just to Show Them. Well, I know now - not by becoming a Hollywood actress, alas - that Showing Them doesn't work. They won't care. They won't even remember who you are, tbh. But the urge the prove yourself - ugh, been there.
I was labelled "Frankenstein" by some lads in the year above because I had grown a bit taller than the rest of my year and was clumping around clumsily in big shoes. I got my revenge though when everyone caught up with me and I became average height. Haha. That showed them!
Also, whilst your drawing may not be an accurate Van Gogh, it IS a spot-on cartoon of a sore tooth 👏.
Love this! My lifelong school nemesis is Penny Sheen, who used to carry a small yellow calorie counting book (this was pre-internet) and produce it from her bag whenever I ate anything. She was like a grim bespectacled My Fitness Pal.
At least the hamster got to experience the joy of flight before … well… death
The joy of backwards flight. God that poor guy aghhh
I'm catching up on newsletters very late but felt I had to share how deeply moved I was by this as a fellow cubicle luncher. (Tbf I can't tell if I'm being sarcastic or real with this comment.)
I strongly believe one can be both real and sarcastic so both!! Why not
Why not indeed!!!!!!
Very relatable. Why do people insist on telling kids that schooldays are the best days of their life?
I remember hearing some adult say that and thinking “I CANNOT LET THAT BE THE CASE”
Great read as ever, Stevie!
I can relate. A lad decided I looked like ET (which wasn’t too far off the mark when I was a teenager tbf) and would shout, “ET, go home” at me.
One of life’s regrets is that I never corrected him
and said, “Ok, fine, it’s a solid observation but… you’ve got the line wrong - it’s actually ET, PHONE home.”
Anyway, I’m completely over it now, so that’s good.
Nothing worse than a taunt that’s not even canonical!!! Also ET is just the cutest little thing and everyone cries when he goes away - that lad was all over the place
This was an iconic read. I particularly loved the pit bit.
🕳️
The kicker made me CACKLE on an absolutely rammed 38. Brb, just telling the confused lass sat next to me about your newsletter. xxx
Hahahaha oh I’m so glad this is my true aim. To bring people together. While proving myself ofc
The email to the school 🤣🫣 my butthole could not be clenching any tighter. But honestly, we can all relate. Also, fuck Iain Dickens
So funny.
RIP hamster.
I was going to joke "Well, at least you haven't been on anything recently where you might need to appeal to an figure you might admire" but you beat me there yourself!
Also you eating in the school toilet did make me wonder if perhaps a similar story had befallen the Mr Kipling Angel Slice (still packaged) or 'toilet kipling' as I now refer to it, that I once found atop a shelf in a public toilet. Toilet kiplings are a mysterious entity. How did they come to be there? No one knows. But perhaps now we have a potential solution.
It was me I put the toilet Kipling there
Fellow bullee here. (Not bully, bullee.) Dude scared the living s*** outta me in 5th and 6th grades, and basically anytime I'd see him through middle school. Never knew what his problem was with me, but he'd give me stink eye stares and threaten to "get me" and beat me up. I'd have to beg the teachers to let me stay inside during recess so I could eat lunch with them. Just me and the teacher, the rest of the kids outside playing. I'd say this suited me, being a teacher's pet and all, but at the same time, I lived in a state of constant adrenalized fear.
Flash forward to our high school's 10-yr class reunion. Who walks right up to me as though we're best friends? Same greasy black hair, same lisp, asking how I've been, what I've been up to. In my mind, I was thinking, "Does he not remember? Did it have no impact on him whatsoever?" I'm not sure what the moral of the story is, except I no longer think about him, because he doesn't think about me. He seemed like he desperately wanted to befriend me, which after all the incalculable psychic hurt he inflicted on me, made me pity him.
Hard relate, except that I'm not on Taskmaster, and the teachers at my school were less observant so I didn't have to use an out of order sign when I ate my lunch in the loo.
My pals at school used to sing ‘woah I’m an alien… I’m a little alien in New York’ and a whole story about a little alien living in NYC. So maybe you were just at the wrong school 🤔 …
I’ll let you decide for yourself if we were also bullied.
Oof. I was bullied to DEATH in secondary school (surely secondary school is the definition of hell? People who say school was the best time of their lives...how?) and I remember wanting to be a Hollywood actress (I know, I know...) just to Show Them. Well, I know now - not by becoming a Hollywood actress, alas - that Showing Them doesn't work. They won't care. They won't even remember who you are, tbh. But the urge the prove yourself - ugh, been there.
I was labelled "Frankenstein" by some lads in the year above because I had grown a bit taller than the rest of my year and was clumping around clumsily in big shoes. I got my revenge though when everyone caught up with me and I became average height. Haha. That showed them!
Also, whilst your drawing may not be an accurate Van Gogh, it IS a spot-on cartoon of a sore tooth 👏.
Love this! My lifelong school nemesis is Penny Sheen, who used to carry a small yellow calorie counting book (this was pre-internet) and produce it from her bag whenever I ate anything. She was like a grim bespectacled My Fitness Pal.
Until today I hadn’t realised how much Van Gogh’s head looked like a potato in almost exactly the same shape as Africa.