Corridor Duty!

Corridor duty is not all bad. It gives you lots of time to reflect…on when last the carpet you are sitting on was vacuumed! We were there to do a job though - keep the battle of the sexes lines well defined by the patterned carpet running along the hotel wing we were in, girls rooms on one side and boys all opposite.
There was only one small unfortunate incident where I got caught up in a prank…but after that I behaved. Yep, it all started innocently enough, I noticed two girls entering a boy’s room with a key card and went to investigate. The boys whose room they were in had hidden their shoes and it was payback time. I stood helplessly by as they began to dismantle their beds! Of course I had to tell them that there were better ways to do things, soap on the toothbrush being one of my personal favourites. Unfortunately I got caught up in the moment and next thing the boys were trying to get into the room and I was hidden in the bathroom where of course I was discovered, the boys got a rather big fright to see me there, oh dear not a very good example, but extremely funny…
After that little hiccup I took my task more seriously and settled down to carpet scrutiny with the other four on my ‘team’.
We decided to let the kids all sit in the corridor and socialise as it was the easiest way to keep an eye on EVERYBODY. Sadly this did not work out very well and a very angry night manager came upstairs to find 29 kids, linen pillows and five adults hanging out in the corridor, OOPS. Unfortunately ONE of the rooms on our floor was occupied – typical. After that everyone was sent to their own rooms and we continued supervision from the corridor and played lie dice. I discovered that I am NOT very good at it. I also learned to play backgammon and think that perhaps adding another board game to our alarmingly big collection may be necessary.
At 02h00 three people went to bed, and I was NOT one of them. Dave and I heard the kids trying to peak under the door (looking for feet) and I hatched a cruel and evil plan...we left shoes outside every noisy room. I guess as a mother of two girls my instinct to keep things in order was too strong. and we prowled the corridor, listening out for stirring and sneaking about noises. At one point I went into one of the girls room just in time to here a thump on the window. I went and flung it open, peeped outside, looked left and right and discovered why the rooms had quietened down - they were all hanging out their windows for flow of conversation purposes! At first they mistook me for one of their own so it was very difficult keeping the laugh out of my voice as I roared for all of them to get into their rooms and go to bed. Somehow I managed though because 5 heads disappeared at alarming speed.
Next we confiscated the handset from the phones as every couple of minutes our hopeful 'it has been quiet for a while' would be shattered by the ringing of a phone in some or other room.
Finally it got quiet - 03h00.... Dave and I lay in the corridor on our pillows and he slowly drifted off to sleep and then I heard a cell phone alarm! I jumped up and stood at the door of the room and listened carefully, some rustling and then silence. I hid around the corner and took in the sight of Dave gently snoring in the corridor with telephone headsets strewn about and had a fit of the giggles. At 04h15 I woke Dave and we finally got to spend a little time in our rooms for some well earned shut eye. In the morning the kids discovered all the shoes and were absolutely flabbergasted that we had such foresight - the cheek of them! They actually commented that they did not think we were clever enough to come up with a low down dirty trick like that!
They forget....that once upon a long time ago I was one of THEM.