"But he's an idiot"

I've promised more stories from my high school days at St. Rocko's (school motto--We have our own cemetery)

And here is another absolutely true tale.

Back when I was in school, most of my school chums referred to me with the very non PC term "idiot savant." As this was the beginning of the movement to PC, they tried, and often dropped the very offensive "savant" term. At least, I'm pretty sure that's what they did.

St Rocko's was very competetive, and, well, I'm sort of, not. Oh, I like winning stuff, and getting awards, but I don't particularly like working hard for them. I'm friggin lazy an underachiever.

Fortunately, I have a really good memory, so I never had to study, or at least did so minimally. Which fit in perfectly with my overall philosophy of life, "do as little work as possible."

One classmate in particular, let's call him Bob, although that wasn't his real name, was the exact opposite of me. Student council, jazz band, sports, French Club--you name it, he was on top of the situation and deeply involved. He worked feverishly on every assignment, studied hard, and I'm sure today is running a Fortune 500 company, unless he has died from a heart attack or been killed by pissed off underlings.

For some reason, I wound up in almost all his classes for 3 years, a near impossibility.

And he struggled mightily as he worked to turn in such epic term papers as "The complete history of jazz, and its place in American music and entertainment: the myths, the legends, and the socio-economic impact with its roots in slavery." And that was only the title. Meanwhile, I turned in the classic, "I like my fish tank."


And so it continued through freshman, sophomore, and junior year. And then, late in junior year, it was time to take the SATs.

Everyone anxiously awaited the results. We all got them about the same time. And, because PC was not really in vogue, one teacher, I forgot which class, asked us to give our scores as we went around the room. Bob proudly gave his score. Everyone ooohed and ahhhed. I forgot what it was, but it was sufficiently high enough that Bob was smug. And the score giving continued around the room. And then they got to me.

I gave mine, which was higher than Bob's. Immediately, Bob spun around, and declared that I was lying. The teacher came and looked at my paper. He chuckled as he told Bob that it was indeed what was written on the printout. Bob exclaimed, "But he's an idiot."

Note Bob completely forgot the savant part again.

I said, "Maybe so, but apparently I'm smarter than you. Scary, huh?"

Believe it or not, we all took the test again.

This time Bob did better on the test. He scored 1200, which back then was a very good score. Again, the same teacher did the same around the room thing. Bob was happy as could be. As it became my time, Bob sneered at me, expecting me to be humbled by his awesome score.

I dutifuly reported my score as 720 a precipitous drop. Bob was thrilled, until the teacher said, "Even for you, Joe, that's pretty low."

Then I said, "Oh you wanted the combined score?"

I gave the combined score, and let's just say, Bob was really upset. I did pretty well, with, you know, being an idiot and all.


Enjoy the savant-like funny at:
http://www.humorbloggers.com/
Tell them "Joe sent you" for a better seat.