Q

You know, there is no end to stupidity of my fellow man. They are too gullible for their own good. Freshman year I took some boring history class, like world civilization or something. Anyway, the teacher was one of those people that looked like he should be in a really bad 70s movie. His mustache was always lopsided, and his hair stuck up in a ridge along the middle of his head. Anyway, I digress.

While studying the Middle East, he remarked that "their language was 'weird', with words that have silent Q's and K's."

"My name is spelled with a silent Q," I remarked casually.

"Really?"

"Oh yeah, P-A-Q-T. We just spell it with the more conventional spelling most of the time so people don't bug me about it," I lied, layering the bullshit on heavy to bring on some laughs, trying to break the monotony of his boring class.

"Wow, that's interesting." He deadpanned. Right there I thought it was over, but just for kicks I started writing my name on all my papers as "Paqt Adams". All the time I was doing this, I was convinced that he knew and was just playing along with it, maybe just patronizing my the delusions of my little world. But I was wrong. He seemed to genuinely think that was how my name was spelled. Near the end of the year, he was calling the class up to the front of the class to see their grades in his grade book. I wasn't too impressed with my B-, but the long line of 100's and 0's made me laugh. I either aced his assignments or I didn't do them. Not exactly a grueling curriculum. As I was turning around to go back to my seat, I saw my name. He had scratched out the typed name, Pat Adams, and had penned Paqt in its place. Even then I was not convinced. After all, no one would be stupid enough to believe that an all-American family has a child with a very unconventional spelling of a very mundane name. But then the final straw was thrown. My English teacher, a very sweet if not slightly overweight woman that was like a mother to me (she once sent me to the counselor because she thought I was suicidal... How sweet), confronted me about my name. Apparently, my history teacher had been talking about me in the teacher's lounge, which I later found was a normal conversation topic, as I appear to endlessly amuse or annoy teachers. She thought it was funny that I had been spelling my name with a Q all year in his class, but she was a little dismayed at my taking advantage of the mentally infirm. While it's really cool to hear one of your teachers refer to another one as mentally infirm, it doesn't say much about our education system, since some of the educators will believe anything.

Oh well, I may have took advantage of his gullibility, but it was just retribution for putting me next to the chalk board where he would lecture standing right next to me. I don't mind being close to the action, but this was a little too close, as he had an annoying habit of spitting huge wads of oozing saliva when he talked. More then once he had to stop his lecture in order to apologize to me for giving me a shower. The day after one particularly wet lesson, I brought in an umbrella, which I sat under the entire class. He thought it was so funny that he excused the next homework assignment that I did not deem necessary to do.

That was one of my more interesting high school classes. I don't think I learned a damn thing about foreign cultures, but of human stupidity? I understand that much better now. And this understanding is all based around the letter Q, which I find rather fascinating. A whole lesson in life derived from the letter Q.