me vs. the senile astronomy professor
 I had two basic modes of scholarship when I went to college. I either didn't try at all and flunked out, or I studied ridiculously hard and became the abnoxious, class know- it-all nerd.
One of the times that I became the know-it- all nerd was in an astronomy class at USF. I suddenly decided I wanted to become a professional astronomer (as if there was giant and lucrative job market for that) and I studied for hours and hours every day and memorized every fact and minute detail of my astronomy book.
Unfortunately, my astronomy professor was at the end of a very long and distinguished career. In fact, he was so old that his mind was starting to go--or was mostly gone, really--and he regularly misstated facts, or got whole planets and galaxies mixed up and totally wrong.
Of course, I would always throw my hand up immediately when he was wrong and correct him. I must have pointed out his egregious mistakes a half dozen times per lecture, and each time the poor old astronomy professor would kind of stammer and scratch his head and try to play it off like it was a slip of the tongue or something.
The other students didn't really care because they hadn't read the book and had no idea who was right or wrong. All they knew was that some overzealous, nerd was constantly embarrassing this old professor in front of the whole auditorium.
If I had had any respect or sensitivity for the pride and dignity of this once great professor I would have just let it go and kept my mouth shut. But day after day I just shredded the old professor and exposed his dementia.
6:25:01 PM 
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