(It is the first day of my college class on classroom management. The class was supposed to start at 10:30. It’s now 10:40. Our school has a policy that if the instructor doesn’t show up after fifteen minutes, the students can go home, so everyone is starting to get antsy. A student in the back is particularly concerned, and has started asking other students what to do if the teacher is a no show. He approaches our group.)

Concerned Guy: “Has this ever happened to you guys before? What are we suppose to do?”

Classmate #1: “I know that after fifteen minutes, we’re allowed to leave if the teacher doesn’t come to class.”

Concerned Guy: “But won’t we get in trouble if he comes later?”

Classmate #1: “No, I don’t think so. Teachers know the policy.”

Concerned Guy: “Should we write him a note or something? I don’t want him to be mad if he comes to class.”

Classmate #1: “I mean, I guess, if you want to.”

(The concerned guy goes to the front of the class and starts writing on the whiteboard; he turns around.)

Concerned Guy: “What should I write?”

Classmate #3: “I don’t know, write something like: ‘Hey, can you send out an email of what we missed from the first class? We left after twenty minutes. Thank you.'”

(The concerned guy turns around again and writes: ‘Welcome to class!’ He turns back around.)

Concerned Guy: *revealing himself to be the actual professor* “HA! I got you guys GOOD! Finally, students who are my age and will believe this!”

(We are asked to list five things we would take with us if we had to leave the country.)

Classmate #1: “My dog, my fiancé—”

Classmate #2: “Oh, you’re good… I just took the ring!”

(I am filling out an order form for artwork for my department. One of the questions involves smoke alarms. I look around and do not notice any noticeable some alarms, although I do note a certain feature in the ceilings.)

Me: “Hey, [Coworker], is that knobbly thing a smoke alarm?”

Coworker: “I don’t know. There are two knobbly bits.”

(We both stare at the ‘knobbly’ fixtures until a student decides to intervene.)

Student: “Yup, those are smoke alarms. So are these.” *points to more ‘knobbly’ fixtures*

Me: “Well, I’m glad our students who don’t work here know our systems better than we do…”

(A professor for one of my classes has a very unique teaching style: he tells bad jokes and random facts related to what we’re talking about, in addition to the lessons themselves. We all love him. He has just told us one of his random facts.)

Professor: “And this kind of stuff is very useful to know. You can tell it to your friends, like I did when I took this course. Of course, they all called me a nerd.” *the class chuckles at this* “But I won. They’re all working at [Local Grocery Store Chain], and here I am teaching you guys. I tell a bad joke, 140 people laugh. That’s power, right?”

(He was absolutely right.)

(In English class, we are having a discussion on how to pick up visual clues from pictures to write an analytical essay. Our lecturer shows us a poster from The Avengers, which has Iron Man, the Hulk, Captain America, Hawk Eye, Thor, and the Black Widow all posing in a fighting stance.)

Lecturer: “If you could be someone from this poster, boys, who would you be?”

(The boys answer.)

Lecturer: “Now, girls, there is only one female in the poster, so if you could be ANYONE, ignoring genders, who would you be?”

Me: *without hesitation* “Iron Man.” *I pause* “No, wait. I take that back. Loki!”

(The girl seated next to me chimes in.)

Girl: “Loki’s wife.”

Me: *to her* “Ooooh! Yes!” *loudly to whole class* “Loki’s wife!”

(The girl and I high-five. The lecturer tells us to choose based on the poster only. Later on, he asks us who we’d be if we didn’t know the characters, based on the way they are standing only.)

Lecturer: “Remember, poster based only. NO Loki.”

Girl: “Yeah, don’t bring Loki in on this. He’s on a WHOLE other level.”

Me: “Yup! He’s practically a god!”

(We high-fived again and burst out laughing.)