If I didn't want to shoot myself in the foot before, I do now.

Some conversations make my brain hurt. Like literally hurt. It's as if someone is taking a needle and sticking it into my ear, but really it's just the sound waves emanating from their being slowly gnawing away at my sanity.  

After writing that last sentence, I was curious if sound waves "emanated." A page titled "The Propagation of Sound" thinks it does.  They used the words sound waves and emanate together in the following sentence: "Two sound sources are available: a spherical source, in which initial sound waves emanate uniformly in all directions; and a planar source , in which initial sound waves emanate in a single direction." If you are interested in knowing more about emanating sound waves, go to http://www.jhu.edu/virtlab/ray/acoustic.htm.  If the creator of this page sees my "shout out," he/she should reward me. Monetarily.

Back to the original premise of this post: Some conversations are so bad that I want to shoot myself in the foot so I can be taken to the hospital and be away from the person who is continuing said conversation with me.  While this is only a temporary solution, it is still a much needed and appreciated reprieve.

Take this following conversation for example.  In the example, I will be T (teacher) and the other person involved will be S (student). This is because typing out teacher and student over and over feels unneccassirly redundant and time consuming.  And since I am a strong believer in being precise and quick in my daily activities, I will only write T and S instead of teacher and student.  If you are a strong believer in avoiding redundancy and unneeded time consumption, you probably shouldn't have read this paragraph.  I apologize.

S (from across the room, he wasn't even sitting near me, which made the whole conversation even that more annoying): If this classroom was the United States, which state would I be?
T: What does that even mean?
S: Well.. if this was a map of the United States... which country would I be?
T: Why are you asking me this? Have you completed your writing assignment?
S: Well... Kind of.
T: Then I will kind of answer your question... I have NO idea which state you would be if this were a map of the United States. I have no idea which state I would be either, so please do not ask.

At this point, the student worked for approximately five minutes on his assignment.  And then he continued the conversation, which I was hoping he would have forgotten about.

S: Ok... You would be Hawaii. If you were Hawaii, which state would I be?
T: So... you mean that Tommy would be California, since I'm Hawaii?
S: I guess so.
T: Then you'd be Florida.
S: What if I moved back one desk?
T: I don't know. I teach English, not social studies... I guess you'd be Georgia or something.
S: Hmm... Where would North Dakota be?
T: Alannah.
S: But why Alannah? Seems it'd be closer to your side of the room than that?
T: Is this conversation really taking place?  Nathan, can you hear this conversation right now, or is this all happening in my mind?
N (short for Nathan; once again, conserving energy): It's definitely taking place.
T: Wow... Ok. Trevor (also known as S), I'm sorry, but this is a really strange conversation. Please do your work.
S: What about when I'm done?  I was kind of wondering what color of the rainbow I'd be if you were red.
T: If you'll quietly finish your assignment, I will have a discussion with you on which Power Ranger you'd be if I was the pink one. Until then, please be quiet.

This happened. No joke. No lie. This exact conversation took place in my high school classroom.  And what makes it even more priceless: the student was dead serious the entire time.  Why? I have no idea. Probably for the same reason he accidentally knocked everything off of every possible surface in my room with his backpack on a daily basis.


You may also ask yourself why I engaged myself in this conversation any in the first place.  To which I would respond, "I have absolutely no idea."  Perhaps after he asked the first time, I began mapping out the states via students in my classroom, pretending I was a great explorer, like Magellan (cool name).  I'm not saying that is what happened... But probably.