"No, Maitre d'! I said "Well done" not "Medium rare!"

Even though I was going to school to be an LPN, I took several RN courses.  My Anatomy & Physiology was an RN course.

This class was divided into 2 parts:  A classroom and a lab portion.

I *horribly* flunked EVERY test I had in that the lab portion of that class (17 tests), and I flunked all but 2 tests in the classroom.  We had to learn the the function of EVERYTHING in the fricken human body - down to the cellular and chemical level.

We were graded on a curve. Several other students in this class kept telling me, "Stop it!  You're making the curve impossible for us to get a good grade.!"

Considering that I flunked (an F grade) 32 of 34 tests, I still managed to get out of that class with an "A".  Can you imagine the grades of the other students in that class?

The secret:  Until the last day of this class, not a single student knew that this instructor graded solely on your interest, your class participation - and your attendance.

(In the lab, 100% of our work during the entire semester was dissecting a CAT.  Yes, a 'meow!  meow!' cat!

This class (God forbid!) was "Anatomy & Physiology I", and it was a starting point for many types of degrees, including those going into medical law, PhD's, nursing, and much more.

A young lady, a pre-Med (PhD) student sat across the table from me in the lab.  On lab days, our class was 2 hours long.  Two hours of sniffing a formaldehyde-soaked cat.

The young lady that sat across from me seldom spoke.  She was very quiet, shy and demure.  She had long, flowing beautiful dark hair and she always wore tea-length skirts, heels, etc. I could tell that she 'came from money', and good money, at that.

After the first hour of every lab class, our instructor would come to each table and 'take our cat away' to his desk, grade our work (pins stuck strategically in important parts with labels stuck to each pin), and he would being our cat(s) back to our table so we could continue to work the the last hour of each class.


This was 'back in the day' when John Wood Community College was in the former and VERY brief Lincoln School, the old 'pod' building located at 48th & Maine Sts, Quincy, IL (now the home of The Crossing Church).  This original pod structure did not have windows that opened, and there was no way to circulate classroom air.

Mr. Instructor took Ms. Demure PhD Student's cat away, graded it, and brought the poor thing back to her.  He plopped the dissection pan down in front of her.  With a very uncharacteristic cackling laugh, she suddenly threw her head back, letting her long hair swirl out of her eyes.

Then she told him, with a delightful squeal, "No, Maitre d'   I said "Well done" not "Medium rare!"

I fell off my lab stool, and I honestly was in a tight ball on the floor, laughing until I thought I was going to wet myself.

The instructor suddenly turned on his heel, got the attention of the entire class, and said, "That's it! From this point on out, we will take a 10 minute break OUTSIDE so you won't loose any more brain cells to the formaldehyde fumes!"

- Michael