Calvin and Hobbes by Bill Watterson for September 29, 2015

Calvin, our enthusiastic little pyromaniac.

Yet another C & H which wouldn’t be run today. That one where he imagined bombing the school from an airplane was one that absolutely wouldn’t stand a chance of being printed in a regular newspaper today.

You’re just a fun little Munchkin, aren’t you!

@RSR—-Where is the (THO1) bombing the school from an airplane one today? The one I see is about a fire drill.

In some of today’s schools, you don’t want to shout FIRE!

I remember the last years of “duck and cover.” They had us sit on the floor with schoolbooks over our heads. Yeah, that’ll work. They stopped doing them when I was about seven. Hardly surprising.

Sorry Calvin, they don’t pass out gasolines at fire drill. They hand each kid a FLAMETHROWER!!

He must keep it in a safe!!

@sudipta_C&HAnd you thought dodge-ball was bad!!

We didn’t have duck and cover. Our drills had children going into the school’s hallway and leaning against the wall with our coats over our heads. Very effective against nuclear attack.

I simply love Calvin. He always leaves me laughing to start my day!

I recall two different drills, circa 1963. This was a one-story school building, brick but with 4 foot high windows on the outside wall of each classrom. The inner walls separating the classrooms from the corridor were brick, with about a foot of glass at the top.

So for tornado drill, we filed into the corridor and sat against one of the brick walls, or against the lockers that lined much of those walls. That’s about as good protection as you can get without a basement, but that bit of glass between the wall and the ceiling could have been a problem.

For civil defense drill, we got under the desks in fetal position, hands covering the back of our necks. This can also be described as “bend over and kiss your rear goodbye.”

yes, today the fear of “something” is more powerful than the right to anything else. Big Brother lives.

They actually get told when there’s going to be a fire drill? We were never told about those. In South Bend we were told when we’d be doing a tornado drill, but they only did those once a year. It was more just a one-time practice in case a tornado warning happened at school. They’d do several fire drills. And I hated the alarm we had in South Bend for those. It made everybody jump up from their seats and it was this loud buzzer. I was always left shaking after that went off. I prefered the clanging bell that we had here.

I considered very hard if I should answer to your comment. – A safe is a safe place! It’s not always good to let out the fire, sometimes it is better, to close it tight in a safe place!!- Ill not answer again such one!!

Thank you!!

Smart move!

No I’m wondering what I missed in Leading Edge’s earlier post……..

After tightening up the “dress code” in my jr high, there was a spate of fire drills – about 30 in a 2 week period. They could never find the one person doing it, because many were. Funny thing, the school administration loosened up on us after that – I guess we won.

No, Calvin, you got it wrong. You will need a 3/8" bit on the drill (It’s in the garage at home)

Is this where the term “Degrees Calvin” came from?

Okay, okay… I know it isn’t a very good match!

I was fortunate. Our school district never conducted the stupid duck and cover drills. I guess the superintendent and the others running the district were smart enough to understand that if a nuclear bomb went off, our desks weren’t gonna protect us.

Growing up in Florida in the 50s and 60s we were certainly aware of the potential for “bad things”. The whole state was covered by Navy and Air Force bases, and Cuba had the audacity to be only 90 miles away. We did duck and cover drills, of course, and my Dad’s company had a fallout shelter. Man, those where the days…..

I’m just too young for the “duck and cover drills”—or many of the other staples of Baby boomers (remembering the death of John F. Kennedy, or going/not going to Woodstock, among others).

We did have fire drills—semi-anounced, but not to giving the day. (In fact, the local school leases some rooms from us, so we again have annual fire drills. . . .)

Maybe they should call it a “fire escape” drill. Too much left to the imagination just saying fire drill. ☺

When Russia was hit a few years ago by a meteor, many children were hurt by flying shards of glass. The kids could have profited from these techniques if there had been a scintilla of warning, which of course, there wasn’t.

At my Work Placement we test the fire alarm at 1pm every Wednesday. I’m only in on Tuesdays and Thursdays so I miss out all the fun.

Haha.

xxx

I think Calvin is going to be sorely disappointed.

wait how old is he? 6 right?

These days a “fire drill” would be where you practice what you’ll do when you get a pink slip. A must for schools that wish to fulfill their mission to prepare their students for life in the real world.

If you want the whole school to burn down. Then I’m not surprised you said that.

I’ve got the marshmellows!

I think my expectations in life were about as disconnected from reality as Calvin’s at his age. When I was a kid the air raid sirens went off, and people were scared. Some mice got into the wires. The Cold War, the H-bomb, the drills hiding under our desks, what a strange way to live. The fire drills, we all just left the building.

New York City. We did “shelter drills” in the hallway. But we all knew that we were totally safe – NYC was a prime target, so we’d go quickly and painlessly . . .

XDDD That’s what you totally NEED to do for a fire drill, Calvin!! >:D