Failing

I hate professors that "encourage" questions in lecture. Mostly because then all those dumb morons in the class feel like they have the license to ask the most idiotic questions ever and waste class time. I used to hate this phenomenon more, but now with the advent of wireless internet and texting, I can easily be entertained within those 5 grueling minutes of idiotdom by making fun of them via modern communication tools.

Then there are those that appear to be the royal species of the idiot genus. I mean, have you ever sat in class and then that particular idiot stupidly waves his/her hand, hoping to score a few brownies points with the professor by asking a question, and it ends up being a question that basically tells everyone (including the professor) that you are going to fail (but the waving idiot doesn't realize it?). For example, today in Virology class, a class the employs advanced molecular genetics, a woman raises her hand. The professor's voice goes completely flat and dull when he sees it. "Yes, Veronica?" Not like this was a tip off to this Veronica woman already. "What is an operon?" she proudly asks. Ok for non-science people, this may not sound like a no brainer. But imagine sitting in a graduate level public health course and asking what "E coli" is, or taking a political science class and not knowing what a democracy is.

In that moment, I wanted to pour my hot McDonald's coffee over my head so that I could induce some kind of psychological trauma that would make me forget that the question was asked in the first place. Luckily, I restrained myself. All I KNOW is that I'm going to sit as far away from Veronica as possible from now on. I don't want her idiot fumes to infect me with a rare case of stupidity.