Wherein We Ruin Many A Christmas

[Becks]

Eeep, now you're reminding me f one of my HS teachers -- Whenever anyone asked "Can I go to the bathroom?", he responded, "Well of course you can"....When the student got up, the teacher invariably interrupted him with "Wait! You didn't ask if you may..."

I didn't mean to, and your teacher was a jerk.

[Jay 2K Winger]

Can I join you when you do that?

Eeep, now you're reminding me f one of my HS teachers -- Whenever anyone asked "Can I go to the bathroom?", he responded, "Well of course you can"....When the student got up, the teacher invariably interrupted him with "Wait! You didn't ask if you may..."

You beat me to it.

[dalesys]

..."Wait! You didn't ask if you may..."

And that's when I pissed on his desk, Your Honor.

[EricKei]

I didn't mean to, and your teacher was a jerk.

No offense taken, but, at times, yes ^_^ and prooooud of it.

The way he did this came across more of a smartass thing, as he always had a shit-eating grin when he did so. If the asker didn't say "May I...?" within a few seconds, the teacher just chuckled and tossed the poor kid a hall pass.

If all of this makes him come across as one of those people who's too smart for his own good....that was true, too As in, he spoke at least 7 languages well enough to teach them, including ancient Latin, ancient Greek, Spanish, and...for some reason...Tagalog; he could get by in half a dozen more. Aggravating at times or not, he was an interesting fellow.

[Jester]

Yeah, I have to ditto what XCashier said...it just hits too close to home for me at the moment. But maybe someday...

As someone who has thankfully never worked retail, but understand the woes they go through, I am capable of doing this without any problem.

Aggravating at times or not, he was an interesting fellow.

Sounds like my high school chemistry teacher. One of the most arrogant, obnoxious, and toughest teachers I've ever had. Also beyond hysterically funny, and classes were definitely not as dull as one might expect a chem class to be, by any stretch of the imagination.

I mean, shit, I'm still talking about the guy 25 years later, aren't I?

(And how the flying HELL was that 25 years ago? What the fuck happened to all that time, Alice?)

[EricKei]

I mean, shit, I'm still talking about the guy 25 years later, aren't I?

18 years later for me...and I still speak of this (late) gent. Ditto my (presumably living) English teacher that I somehow managed to land in his classes for my last three years of HS -- Memorable in part for the one actually deserved detention I got from him...when I corrected his grammar, aloud, in class. (It's been too long, I no longer recall the exact context or the grammatical issue at hand...I just blurted it out)

He was not amused

I later manned up and went to his office to apologize to him (post-detention) and just talk, and we ended up being friends afterwards because of it. Note that, at no time did he ever actually suggest that I was wrong, just that I shouldn't have said anything out loud, in class.

[Jester]

I actually once corrected my economics professor. Out loud. In class. And it's even more amusing than it sounds, because I was correcting him on an answer for a test he had given, and he had the wrong right answer, and I pointed that out. More amusing yet when you realize that I was a broadcasting major who mostly skipped my econ class and took the tests from reading the book and buying notes....and actually did better on the tests the more I skipped class.

But I didn't get in trouble for it. Once he realized I was right, he said that EVERYONE would get than answer right. And thanked me for pointing out his error. And everyone in the class loved me as a hero.

...For about five seconds. Then they all promptly forgot about me. That's the life of an econ hero, folks.

[mharbourgirl]

I mean, shit, I'm still talking about the guy 25 years later, aren't I?

(And how the flying HELL was that 25 years ago? What the fuck happened to all that time, Alice?)

Same reason I'm still talking about my Grade 11 Physics teacher 26 years later. He was a NUT. It was 3 months into the year when someone finally got around to asking him what that weird, white, knobbly stick he stirred his coffee with. It was about 8 inches long. Noone was happy with the answer.

Did you know that the males of certain large mammals have a long piece of cartilage to support their external reproductive organ? We didn't.

That's right - my science teacher was stirring his coffee with a bear's penis bone. That's not something you EVER forget.

[XCashier]

Yeah, I have to ditto what XCashier said...it just hits too close to home for me at the moment. But maybe someday...

It isn't that so much as the fact that I'm always working on Black Friday! After an eight hour shift of lunatic customers, the last thing I want is to watch more lunatic customers.

Now, if I wasn't working in retail and actually had the day off, I might consider watching the idiots work themselves into a foaming fury. Maybe bring a video camera to film the biggest jerks and post it on YouTube.

[Jay 2K Winger]

I actually once corrected my economics professor. Out loud. In class.

I too corrected teachers when they slipped up, if someone else didn't beat me to it. I could be pretty snarky at times (only if the teachers had a sense of humor, though) as well.

One aggravating correction, though, came from a class with an otherwise awesome history teacher that I still remember fondly. Mr. Duffy would casually insult us (all in good fun) and had hilarious lectures. He also had interesting assignments, at times. One that he did was to identify public figures by their nickname. He gave us a big list of nicknames, and we had to identify who the person was by that. Some of them were historical figures, others more contemporary (example, one entry was "Suge" -- as in Suge Knight).

But one entry was "The Gipper." Naturally, I put down George Gipp.

Mr. Duffy refused to give me credit for it, stating that the nickname was for Ronald Reagan. Didn't matter that I protested that Reagan only got the nickname for playing Gipper in the movies and that Gipp had it first, I didn't get credit for it.

[BeenThereDoneThat]

But one entry was "The Gipper." Naturally, I put down George Gipp.

Mr. Duffy refused to give me credit for it, stating that the nickname was for Ronald Reagan. Didn't matter that I protested that Reagan only got the nickname for playing Gipper in the movies and that Gipp had it first, I didn't get credit for it.

That's just wrong!!!

I had a teacher like that...I think it was senior year history. We had an open book test but the information in the book was blatantly wrong. A friend and I both put the correct answer on the test, but we got marked off because we didn't follow the book...and the teacher KNEW it was wrong. Grrr. (He was great otherwise.)

[Jay 2K Winger]

That's just wrong!!!

What made it worse was that Mr. Duffy admitted that I was right, but it wasn't the answer he was looking for.

I mean, the whole thing was just for extra credit in any case, but it just burned me up that I didn't get that one.

[Jester]

But one entry was "The Gipper." Naturally, I put down George Gipp.

Mr. Duffy refused to give me credit for it, stating that the nickname was for Ronald Reagan. Didn't matter that I protested that Reagan only got the nickname for playing Gipper in the movies and that Gipp had it first, I didn't get credit for it.

"So you're saying that the correct answer is the person who PRETENDED to be The Gipper, and the wrong answer is the person who actually WAS The Gipper?"

[Jay 2K Winger]

"So you're saying that the correct answer is the person who PRETENDED to be The Gipper, and the wrong answer is the person who actually WAS The Gipper?"

I found that sheet, and saw that I ended up getting half-credit for it. So I guess I pestered Mr. Duffy enough about it that he threw me a bone to shut me up about it. Which I'm satisfied with.

Come to think of it, I should have found out if he re-used those nickname sheets the following year or since, and if he had corrected his stance on it.

But probably not. This was before the advent of Wikipedia, purveyor of all transient knowledge. Nowadays, it'd be way too easy for students to come up with answers for all this.