You know what really grinds my gears?

There is a group of students in my classes that are starting to piss me off. Each one in this particular group behaves in the same manner (hence referring to them as a “group”) – each of them have the same frustrating social dyscrasia that makes them similar to each other. They dress exactly the same in one of two outfits that the group seems to coordinate between days. On Monday-Wednesday-Friday it’s a dress shirt and tight – look at me, I can show you what my balls look like with out dropping my pants – slacks. On Tuesday-Thursday it’s a WWF tee shirt with stone washed jeans circa 1984.

I can get past 10 guys walking, talking and dressing alike; I can even see humor in it (believe me I’ve laughed). It does bother me however, when they disrupt class by talking to them selves and then blurting out wrong answers. Its even worse when they give wrong answers in unison – it sounds like an auditorium right before they tell everyone to be quite and pay attention... murmmor, murmomor, mmmmurmorrr.

In contrast, when you have a one-on-one conversation with them they stand to close and (take into consideration how close they’re standing when I say this) talk below the audible decibel range.

Obviously if there were such a group of people that you had to deal with everyday you’d have come up with a nick name for them. If anything just to make referencing their actions to others easier. It makes sense. Moreover you’d pick a name that highlighted their similarities as a single entity. Basically, something like: “The Wrestling Fans” or “Team Tight Pants.” Shame on you.

I lovingly refer to them as “The Indians.” It was a natural choice for me as in addition to their aforementioned parallelisms they are all of Indian nationality.

All racism aside about the way they smell (even though the stereotype holds), I wouldn’t label them as “The Indians” if they all were not of the same nationality, and I wouldn’t be writing this rant if there wasn’t something they did as individuals that pissed me off.

Today we had a quiz. I was done quickly – not the first done but nonetheless admittedly fast. So I had a chance to sit around with nothing to do but observe those who were still working. When the professor called time and picked up the remaining quizzes it appeared as though most students stopped on queue and handed 'em in, some even uncompleted. The Indians kept working.

The prof asked again, “Quizzes? Hand them in.” He paused. “Ok, I have all the quizzes?” He then began to go over the solution on the chalkboard. At this point, one by one, the Indians would stand up and sneak in their quiz papers into the pile at the front of the room or something to the effect of working on it some more and then trying to hand it in after the solution had been posted. Point being they knew they were in the wrong they were sneaking. Sneaking!

Finally, the prof who now seemed upset (and rightly so), flat out stated he was NOT going to accept ANY more. And at the brink of yelling he said: “I realize there’s a language barrier here but you guys need to be way more responsive to the things I ask. When I say turn them in now, I mean NOW.”

A good 2 minutes later the last one turns one in.

To conclude this rant I’ve got some anonymous comments I received after doing some pre-blog venting:

Sent at 4:59 PM on Wednesday
********: Well, don't call Dell for help, they'll send you to a call station in India where the mother fucker on the phone knows so little English its really just to piss you off to the point that whatever was wrong with the machine seems moot.


Sent at 10:44 AM on Wednesday
******** ******: Yeah, there were tons at my school. They used to hang out all night in the computer lab and the whole place reeked of ass and curry.
They changed the chairs out my senior year, and suddenly the computer lab didn't stink. It was real gross, those chairs were vile.