Back to Ghoul: The Adventures of the Bailey School Kids #03: Santa Claus Doesn't Mop Floors

Okay so technically this is a Christmas book, but, you know, Christmas in July and all that. Yes, I did promise I wouldn't wait until Christmas to finally cover this one, so why not smack dab in the middle of (WOO!) Party Summer month? Let's see what's really up with this sanitation Santa as Santa Claus Doesn't Mop Floors. What, does he get Mrs. Claus or the elves to do it, the jackass?

So this book predates The Santa Clause, but I swear somehow John Steven Gurney travelled into the future, saw the movie, returned to his present time and decided to draw a very Tim Allen-faced Santa. That should have been a book. Time Travelers Don't Illustrate Kids Books. Debbie Dadey, Marcia Thornton Jones, you ever want to revive the brand, there's a freebie for ya. As for the cover itself, it's decent. You have a decent gamut of faces with Melody's being more shocked, Howie's being more quizzical and Eddie being a chucklehead as usual. Our janitor Santa is a great design. Something about him wearing shorts and sneakers, casual as all hell, really sells the question of is this the real deal or are the Bailey School Kids about to bother another normal adult?

The story starts with Mr. Dobson, the school janitor, in a rage. Someone (Probably Eddie because Eddie sucks) took peanut butter from the school food drive and smeared it all over the railings of the stairs. This Peter Pan pilfering and plastering is enough for Mr. Dobson to quit just before Christmas. It seems that Mrs. Jeepers has been taking some time off with a substitute teacher, Mrs. Ewing, taking over. Ever since then, the kids have returned to their prankster ways, which makes sense given they don't have a maybe vampire as their teacher. And I was right about Eddie, and technically Howie was also responsible as Principal Davis finds the peanut butter jars still in the classroom. They may be pranksters, but they're not good at covering their tracks.

So now the kids are forced to clean up the mess, while Principal Davis goes to get a new janitor to replace Mr. Dobson. Melody notes that Mr. Dobson now doesn't have a job during Christmas, but Eddie just says that Christmas is for losers. In case you didn't need a reason to hate this kid more. Suddenly, a large man shows up behind them. This man being the new janitor, Mr. Jolly. A man with a long white beard and a big belly. Whether it jiggles like a bowl full of jelly is up in the air. He also smokes a pipe which, I mean I know this is the 90s but, like, he better be Santa to get away with that. The kids, glad to be done of janitor work, head outside and have a snowball fight, all while Mr. Jolly is watching on, writing something in his notebook. Okay, now he had damn well better be Santa to get away with spying on children.

Some time passes and things seem pretty normal. Then they notice that Mr. Jolly is talking with a short man dressed in all green. Being the nosy nogoodniks they are, they decide to eavesdrop. The man, Eli, refers to Mr. Jolly as "S.C." and notes that he shouldn't be spending his time mopping floors when there's work to be done on Christmas. But Mr. Jolly says that he's needed here, to mop the vomit of bratty schoolchildren. He also notices the little snoopers and again writes in his notebook. The next day, the kids are freezing and ask Mr. Jolly to turn the heat up, but he says that it's warm enough as it is. Of course, the second Mr. Jolly leaves, Eddie turns up the thermostat. Later, he heads out of class and dunks Melody's head in the water fountain because his "little shit"-ometer must have been low today. He ends up bumping into Mr. Jolly, who is sweating from the heat. He also again writes in his notebook before turning the heat all the way down again. Reader beware, you're in for hypothermia. 

Now Eddie is determined to send this janitor packing like he did the last one. He takes rolls of toilet paper and throws them around the teacher's lounge, while again turning up the thermostat. We're about halfway through this book and I just hope the ending is Mr. Jolly smashing Eddie over the head with a bag of coal. However, the heat goes back down and the toilet paper is nowhere to be seen. Also the food drive is full of peanut butter jars to tie us back to the start of the book. Liza and the others begin to suspect something's up with Mr. Jolly, as if he's Santa Claus or something. Given that he looks like Santa, is always writing in his list, conversion with little green-clad folk, is used to cold weather and seems to have magic cleaning powers. Of course, Eddie is a skeptic to all of this because of course he is. 

Eddie's next plan has him and Melody spray whipped cream all over the walls, because I guess Melody can also be awful as well. But, just like before, the mess is cleaned up before anyone else can see it. Eddie is also sick from eating so much whipped cream and goes home early, after talking with Mr. Jolly. Eddie says that he doesn't believe in Santa or Christmas or anything, given that he didn't get something he wanted for Christmas. The next day, the food drive is filled with whipped cream cans. The others are still convinced Mr. Jolly is Santa, but of course Eddie remains the skeptic. Later that day, they spy on Mr. Jolly, and notice him carrying a large sack with the words Ho Ho Ho on them. They again get caught by Mr. Jolly. The kids try to get him to say he's Santa, but he still won't, but notes Eddie's lack of Christmas spirit. This angers Eddie enough to try yet again to get rid of Mr. Jolly. 

But Howie stops Eddie and tries to say that if this is Santa, clearly he's been trying to get Eddie to believe in Christmas again. We learn that Eddie's issues with Christmas come from his father not believing. And so long as his dad doesn't believe, neither does he. The next day, Howie is ready to see Mr. Jolly again, only to learn that he's gone and Mr. Dobson will resume his role as janitor. Eddie had wanted to thank Mr. Jolly as because his dad is actually going to stay home for Christmas, it must finally mean that Santa is real and gave him the Christmas he wanted. I mean all the crap he did in this book doesn't really equate to him deserving one, but a happy ending is a happy ending.

This book is decent, but I will say that given I've read four of these so far (if you're reading in order I feel for you, pal) I do feel a sense of repetition to the plots. This one especially. That being Eddie is a constant instigator of pranks and awful stuff that has to be brought down to earth by the maybe-supernatural being of the book. In this case our Maybe-Santa. Because of that, this one does feel more sluggish than the others, but still moves at a brisk enough pace for a short book. Also, the mystery doesn't feel as ambiguous as it was with the last few. No extra beat to not make you think this isn't Santa. Everything he does and the coincidental yet still plausible ending makes it feel like yeah, this was Santa Claus. Who seemed to make it his goal to turn Eddie's life around and make him believe in Christmas again. Why this rotten kid and not a bunch of others who deserve it more is beyond me though. Characters feel the same as the other books with Liza again being the least utilized. 

But, I still liked this one. Even if it's my least favorite of the four I've covered for the blog so far. It's a cute little Christmas story, but lacks something to really give it that Christmas vibe other than it's December and this Santa-like figure is here to set a kid straight. Still a worthy recommend and still a case where Bailey School Kids hasn't lost its step in terms of quality. Redundancy, maybe it's slipping into that territory, but they're still fun little reads. And a nice cool breeze on a hot July. Santa Claus Doesn't Mop Floors gets a B-.