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My
Favorite Student Excuse
Over
the past few years, I've gotten hundreds of excuses from students
concerning why they simply couldn't turn in whatever it was
they were supposed to turn in on time. Most of these excuses
have been very lame. Some were less so. A few were
even inspired. One or two of them may have even been true.
This excuse is special, standing head and shoulders above any
other excuse I've received to date. I didn't believe it,
but it was so good, I let the author turn in his papers late.
Why
You should accept the above papers late
Having received
two papers (attached to this sheet) extremely late, you are
no doubt wondering either a) Why the hell did he bother turning
the research paper in two weeks late without even including
a bibliography and with a somewhat strange format, b) what the
most stylish way to write "F" on a gradebook is, or
c) What the hell happened to a fairly decent writer of late.
Now, seeing as
I must assume a or b are the more likely choices, I’d like
to describe my somewhat mitigating circumstances for the court
(judge, jury, and executioner) in a humorous anecdote that will
at least let me vent and might get a minute bit of mercy or
at least a good laugh out of my undoubtedly somewhat annoyed
or indifferent teacher. The following are excerpts from this
author’s mental diary:
Monday, April
13th - Having completed his Nobel-winning, best-selling,
undoubtedly unbeatably brilliant piece of writing which he was
to turn in for World Cultures that Wednesday, the author placed
said paper in a folder containing a) a floppy disk copy of said
brilliant research paper, b) the cure for cancer and AIDS which
the author had been researching for the past 5 years, and c)
his french paper which was also due on Wednesday. The understandably
tired and content author put said folder in plain sight on a
table in his computer room, and went to sleep.
Wednesday, April
15th- The author returns to another day of academic
growth at the University of Evansville, heedless of the fact
that he has forgotten his folder on the computer room table,
and reminds himself to return the next day with his folder and
turn in the assignments (including the extra credit project
of the panacea for cancer).
Thursday, April
16th- The author gets up and goes through his normal
routine, retiring to the computer room to pick up his prepared
packet of information to take to school. Much to his befuddlement
and consternation, the folder is missing, and the room appears
somewhat more barren than it was before. The author goes to
school, attends his classes faithfully, and returns that evening.
Upon entering the door to his humble home and inquiring into
the whereabouts of his folder, his father greets him with a
blank look and admits ignorance to its location. The author
desperately tries to ascertain what might have caused the sudden
disappearance of the folder.
Friday, April
17th - The author awakes with a long list of suspects.
Quickly, he catches the family dog, Scrapper, anesthetizes it,
and dissects it to ensure, in fact, that his dog had not in
fact ingested his homework. Remains of what suspiciously reminded
him of a 7th grade history paper were unearthed,
but no trace of paper or diskette. Author attends school, and
is forced to visit the doctor to ascertain that he is indeed
nursing the Mount St. Helens of all ulcers. Author gets a prescription
for some extra-strength Zantac, and returns home. Attempted
to repeat dissection procedure on little sister, to ensure she
had not ingested the homework, but was successfully evaded (for
the moment).
Saturday, April
18th - The author manages to get hold of his mother,
who works overtime at the hospital quite often, and not having
seen her for three days, inquires as to where his folder went.
He is informed, with no lack of vicious verbacity, that said
mother had cleaned said computer room Wednesday midday when
she was home, and had maliciously thrown away all of the papers
that had been present at that location. The author promptly
keels over of a minor stroke, and awakens 3 hours later lying
on the floor of his room, muttering "Man, am I ever f***ed..."
The author, with a stroke of genius, immediately sets out to
search the computer room trashcan for its contents. Half an
hour into this endeavor, he is also told that his father had
indeed taken out the trash the day previously.
Sunday, April
19th - The author awakens with one bitch of a headache,
and decides he can indeed recall all the details of his research
paper which he had so carefully constructed the week previously.
The stroke, ulcer. and general maladjusted health due to stress
prevents the author from recalling the details of his paper.
His cure for cancer, also, is lost to the world forever by the
perfidiousness of a mal-timed cleaning of a random room of the
house.
Monday, April
20th - The author attends his usual classes, and
after all of them are over, decides he will either finish the
research paper that night or kill himself trying. 6 hours (and
2 pages) into this suicide mission, the author keeled over from
exhaustion, waking up somewhat later with 2 pages of somewhat
garbled information and approximately 65-70 pages of space caused
by his head depressing the keyboard during his somnolence.
To make the rest
of a somewhat long and arduous story short, the author is beset
upon all sides by lesser forms of life, including one little
sister, an agent from the Humane Society looking for Scrapper,
and the pack of aliens that stole all knowledge of any use from
his head in an evil experiment, delaying a second attempt at
completion of said research paper. It all goes to show, cleanliness
isn’t all that its cracked up to be. Not to mention the
fact that aliens can be real assholes sometimes.
Regardless of
whether or not this affects your decision in regards to my grade,
I hope it at least amused you. Knowing your bemusement at lame
excuses I found this quite a fun exercise to accomplish.
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