Gasps and concerned looks filled the sidewalk next to North’s glass staircase as an inconsiderate student fully ran over another student with their skateboard. The two students lay tangled on the ground as every surrounding student considered whether to help or keep walking. 

   My high school years at WO have been filled with the utmost amount of college, career, and life readiness. But, with successful academics comes crazy interruptions.

    I’ve decided that I want to share some of my crazy experiences here at WO so everyone can share my laughter and pain.  

Projectile Vomiting Into the Lost and Found Bin

This first story was the most recent one. Sr. Sidney Hogan and I were walking around North one morning to get student responses for a What’s Up At WO (WOBN). We saw a student approaching us, but then they walked away. I assumed that the student saw our microphone and didn’t want to answer a question. But whoa, was I wrong. We continued our trek towards Instructor Dave Drnek’s classroom when all of a sudden we saw the student walking towards the Lost and Found area. The next thing we know, we heard a giant “SPLAT” and saw the student projectile vomiting right into the Lost and Found Bin. I looked at Sidney with a huge surprised look on my face to see Sidney making the same one directly back at me. After our shock, our fight or flight responses kicked in and we both decided: flight. This was definitely something neither of us were expecting to witness, especially at 8:30 am.

Dog Poop Extravaganza

One day in the lovely room where all West Ottawan articles are made, (Instructor Ken Strobel’s room), we were peacefully writing our amazing articles. One student glanced at the floor, only to notice a significant amount of dog poop. The student then alerted Strobel. At this point, the dog poop fiasco caught everyone’s attention. Questions of “What is that?” “Where did that come from?” “Did somebody drag that inside?” filled the room. After we all checked our shoes to see if one of us was the culprit of dragging it in from outside, we discovered that none of us were the culprits. We concluded that the poop had to have been dragged in by somebody from first hour. The dog poop on WO’s campus can be blamed on the owner who takes his dogs on walks around campus and never cleans it up. COME ON DUDE! Strobel soon took it upon himself to clean up the dog poop with some paper towels and desk cleaner leftover from 2020. “I didn’t sign up for this,” Strobel said as he was cleaning it up off the floor and off of the bottom of some chairs.

Who Needs the M-STEP?

It was testing week. I was a junior. This week was a rough one, because juniors have to take the SAT, Workkeys, and the M-STEP Test all within three days. Out of all three of these tests, the M-STEP is definitely the one of least importance for college; most juniors are aware of that fact. I had barely gotten through two questions on my test when I heard a Chromebook close. “How on earth could he be done already? Is there something wrong with his computer?” I thought. Forty five minutes later when everyone had finished, I heard the student say, “I finished the M-STEP in one minute and thirty seconds. I timed myself. I just clicked random answers.” Everyone who heard him couldn’t help but laugh because it was just insane.

Dog Poop Extravaganza…AGAIN!?

This story is one that also includes dog poop – yes, dog poop likely from the same dogs from the second story. Soph. Lauren Espy walked into WOSWE one day with dog poop on her shoe. After having a panic for a few minutes, Espy asked Instructor Erin Stier to clean the dog poop off her shoe. Somehow, Stier agreed. Once done with the cleanup, Espy somehow went home, showered, and came back to school all within 15 minutes. Espy lives only 2 minutes away from the school, but still. What??? When Espy came back, it came to our attention that none of us realized she had even left in the first place. Lauren: 1 WOSWE: 0

Don’t. Cut. Through. The. Choir. Doors.

It was another normal day in WOSWE. Everyone had gotten to class, and we were waiting for the bell to ring. Everyone who is in choir knows that the two doors on the side of our class that lead to the outside are only allowed to be used by choir students. In other words, this is not a shortcut for non-choir students to enter. Before class, the door is usually propped open so that people in our class who are coming from North can be let in quickly. But, sometimes other students see the door propped open and take advantage of it. On this day, many students decided to start walking through the doors and Stier suddenly yelled, “WHAT ARE YOU DOING?” These students quickly became guilty and tried to walk through Ms. Stier’s office to an exit. “WRONG WAY!” Stier yelled even louder leading them to run towards the actual exit. This specific occurrence is not the only time that’s happened either.

I Really Don’t Know

It was a sad day in journalism because Strobel was out for the day. We had a guest teacher that none of us had seen before. I was sitting with McKenzy Hogan when the guest teacher came up behind McKenzy and started reading her article. The next thing we know, we were sucked into a five minute rant by the guest teacher about a multitude of different things that neither McKenzy nor I can recall well. “I have a friend who’s in (insert some kind of crime field),” was one of the first things she said. Five minutes later, she somehow landed on the topic of, “Some people think that they’re as powerful as God.” Neither me or McKenzy could even try to respond to her if we wanted to because she just kept going. There was even one moment where McKenzy tried to reply to something the guest teacher said, but the guest teacher immediately cut her off and kept talking. Once the rant was over and the guest teacher walked away, McKenzy and I gave each other the most wide-eyed look and cracked up laughing. The funniest part about this story is that no one remembers her name and that we’ve never seen her since then. She vanished.

Junior Takeover Week…

It was a different kind of week at West Ottawa, junior takeover. Lots of chaos ensues this week since juniors get to ride on scooters the whole week. I was on the sidewalk in the middle of North and South during passing time when it happened. I heard a very fast scooter approaching behind me when all of the sudden, the student riding it went airborne and flew over the handlebars of their scooter. Unfortunately, just like the barfing story, my fight or flight response kicked in and I just kept walking quickly. Moral of the story: Be careful during junior takeover week.

Use Your BRAIN

This story also takes place during passing time. I was peacefully on my way to South when I saw a student trying to skateboard through a crowd of students on the narrow sidewalk. To my not-surprise, the student riding the skateboard fully knocked over another student. As everyone around gasped and jumped away in shock, the two students lay tangled together on the cement. A continuous “I’M SORRY” could be heard from the skateboarder as the victim desperately tried to stand up. I walked away with silent laughter. This was just another normal day at West Ottawa.

Who Let The Dog In?

This story is short and sweet. One freshman year school morning before the chaos of covid, a random dog walked into the South building. To this day, no one knows where it came from. As quickly as the dog came in, the dog was escorted out. 

Don’t Climb Trees At School

One day during the two-week Vocalaires Holiday Tour, I was walking to South with Sr. Jose Rodriguez to prepare for our upcoming performance. As we were walking and talking, we heard some students yelling and laughing by the nearby trees. We continued walking in confusion and heard a loud “CRACK” followed by a “THUMP.” Me and Jose quickly turned our heads to see a fallen student and a giant branch on the ground surrounded by laughing friends. We couldn’t help but start to laugh super hard. Why was the student in a tree in the first place?

HORROR.

The final story of this article deserves the “Best For Last” spot. On another day close to the last story, I returned from a Vocalaires Holiday Tour Performance and headed to lunch. I was absolutely starving after singing all morning. I was so excited to eat lunch this day; my creamy alfredo, buttery breadstick, and refreshing applesauce all looked extremely appetizing. After finishing my alfredo and breadstick, it was time to eat my applesauce. Not expecting anything strange, I opened the lid of my applesauce to a giant jump-scare. “UHHHH?” I exclaimed in horror to my friends. We all stared in horror at the giant spot of mold in my SCHOOL applesauce. West Ottawa school lunch had betrayed me. How did this even happen? I will never be the same again.

   As May 25th approaches and I get ready to graduate from West Ottawa, my crazy past school memories will undoubtedly be joined by even crazier ones. My advice to everyone reading this is: Live in the moment. You never know what’s going to happen at any given moment. Also, be cautious when approaching the horror of school applesauce.