Campus

8 Reasons You Submitted That Reading Response Late

It happens to the best of us, but more often to the worst of us: you glance at the clock and suddenly feel like a sinkhole is opening inside of you as it becomes apparent that, in a matter of minutes, you must read 50 pages of text, come up with a strong and supportable opinion, and argue it in a single-spaced page. As this cold, cruel reality sets in, your brain fills with adrenaline and formulates, instinctively, the oldest and most useful kind of statement in the English language: an excuse.

1

Which really sucked because I actually had all the work done on time…

1. It’s due at noon on the day before class?!

2

What does that even accomplish?

2. It’s Tuesday already?!

3

I could swear it was Sunday just a few hours ago.

3. I was in Ebola quarantine after traveling back from Liberia and only got out this morning.

4

Don’t blame me, blame poor healthcare in West Africa.

4. I had the flu.

9

Highly contagious. Wouldn’t want you to catch it.

5. I got high.

5

So basically… what happened was…. [wait] …..

6. Reading is a construct, and so are response memos, and so are deadlines.

6

I should teach a PHIL class on procrastination.

7. I thought I was gonna get a booty call but then her 76-year-old aunt had a fall and ended up in the hospital so she had to go back to Pennsylvania and I was so disappointed and lonely that I was physically unable to read or write.

7

WAI SOE ALoNE ALWAYZ

8. Futile attempts to assert my emotional independence resulted in me shirking all of the work I had last week, because you don’t own me. (You just own my GPA and my law school application and my future income and PLEASE FORGIVE ME

8

By far the most realistic depiction of what happened before the deadline.

Excuse formulation is, of course, quickly followed by a more quantitative mental calculus: figuring out how many A’s you need to get to make up for the shiny new 0% in your average.