Professor Bob the Scion (10/25/05)

I had two exams last week, one in Econ and the other in Research Design. My two least favorite classes. RD was self-scheduled and was supposed to be on Monday. Now my usual plan of action with these things is to pull an all-nighter and cram everything into my head in one shot. Problem was, if you recall, I had a busy weekend with not a lot of sleep due to a certain guy. So here I am at midnight trying to start studying when I really haven’t had a decent night’s sleep in 3 days, and there HE is online, so inviting to have a conversation with him instead of study. So yeah, I postponed the exam. C’mon! All signs were pointing to that and you know it.

Econ exam was Wednesday and as we’ve previously established, I suck. Thank God he grades on a curve so I’m just praying that the rest of the class sucked too. Well when I went to finally take the RD exam on Friday, there was a sign on the department door saying to see Prof. Bob. Gulp. Prof. Bob is a really nice man (I think) but lacks social skills and is highly intelligent and I think a little OCD. I think he wants to be cool and popular but doesn’t know how to and so he sorta stands on the outskirts looking in at everyone with a sad puppy dog expression. I kinda feel bad for him but not enough to want to interact.

So I go in and knock on his open door and he turns around with this look of utter confusion on his face. He totally knows who I am too; remember the hand joke he made? So I said I was here for the exam and he pauses then goes, “Oh, right. Right. Here you go.” As I’m leaving, he says to give it to this other girl if he’s gone when I finish, so ok. I find a cubicle in the Computer Lab and just start sitting down when I realize that my fly is down and I’ve been flashing poor Prof. Bob! No wonder he was so perplexed when he saw me. The poor man! To me, I just laugh things like that off and don’t get embarrassed but the poor man was probably so mortified he couldn’t get me out of his office fast enough.

Then when I was done with the exam he was just leaving the building so I had to hand it to him and then walk out with him. He tried, he really did, to make normal conversation. “Oh, was my exam or Amy’s harder?” etc, etc. But you could almost see him sweating as he thought of the next thing he should say in the conversation. So as I was walking to my car after I left him, I decided to name my car after him. I drive a Scion Xb, which people either love or hate, and I’ve been trying to pick the perfect name for it for months. Then it hit me: It really is just like him. Economically wise with a nerdy exterior. And it just wants to be loved but sometimes it tries too hard and comes across as awkward.