Class snobbery. Grin.

I remember my boarding school has a very interesting take on volunteering. Yes it did. I heard a little while ago about that lovely spot where people's sat nav systems try to steer them off the edge of a cliff, all in the name of putting a new spin on reaching ones final destination. This reminds me of back in the day, when we (ie, a select few) were roped into helping out with the school Open Day. I think there were about three of these hallowed events a year; the whole school would go into lockdown - all vaguely inappropriate posters would be torn from walls by irate masters, the hilarious Six Inch Rule was firmly enforced, and miscreants would be forced into penal servitude.
Just in time for this particular open day, we (select few, again. Sigh. Do we have to do this everytime?) got caught drinking. Scandal, you might well say. We acted as buffer for the usual tirade, then, perhaps noticing our eyes glazing over as result of somewhat tedious repetition and gin swigged straight from the bottle, were enlisted for the Open Day grounds team.

Fuck, was the universal (sigh. Select few) concensus.

The next two days were spent scrubbing *hilarious* notes off of the inside of toilet cubicles and pretending to be hard at work peeling gum from the bottom of desks. Ick. We were very hard worked. Much absued. This was somewhat unaccustomed exertion. The afternoon before Open Day officially commenced, us select few were given the job of arranging cones around campus, from the school gates that were only ever opened so invitingly wide for these occasions where prospective parents would, ideally, decide to fork out upwards of twenty grand a year into the coffers of the school, to the designated parking areas. We were a little bit drunk again by this time, that having proved to be the only way to come through the indignity of going against all our years of training into being good at exploiting the exploits of others and claiming it as our own - such is basically what we were taught. And how to carry such theft off with grace and aplomb.
Essentially, physical work was, is, whatever, something of a task for the lower orders.

We decided to move the cones from the pre-ordained path, carefully drawn in pink highlighter on the detailed maps of the school grounds that were given to each of us. Casting these aside with nary a guilty thought, we, shielded by the rapidly falling dusk, moved the cones so they lead prospective investors on a very round-about to the lake. And no further.

We actually got away with it. Which made a bloody nice change. Vandals! was the cry in the corridors, as pupils rushed about measuring their own skirts (this os clearly the girls. You didn't think members of boy and girlkind slept in the same dorms, did you? Heathens *smirk*) and applying make-up in a way we all excelled at; perfecting the art of putting on make-up so subtly thats nobody can tell you have any on. Us select few over slept quite drastically, missing breakfast, but not oversleeping enough for our nocturnal activities *grin* to become apparent. And, lets face it, this is me. I have never been good at getting up before lunchtime.

As we shuffled out, blinking, into the light, we were greeted with the cheery sight of one long traffic queue, tailing back out of the gates and lost to view. We walked around a bit, trying to look like we'd been there the whole time, honest, and confused. Confused was a look we all mastered back in our first term. Turned out, one of the parents had actually driven his car into the lake; the collective thought was, is it normal to put quite that much faith in external things?

And then it occured to me, Isn't that exactly what they were doing sending their kids to public school?

So, anyhow, what I'm wondering is, that sat nav thing. How close to the edge were these people before they decided the system must be wrong?