The Humorous Happenings of NSA
May 16, 2020
The Humorous Happenings of NSA[edit | edit source]
by Tirzah Hopkins
Students connected on FirstClass for a long time. With Teams, they can still connect. And where there are people, there is humor. NSA is definitely no exception. In this article, we’re going to reveal some of the funny moments and stories, given to us by a number of NSA students. While they probably aren't the funniest, they certainly are funny. So let’s get on with the humor, shall we?
StuCo President Cody Johnson said that he was invited to the Sadie Hawkins dance within a month of coming to NSA and his date stood him up.
When Brooke Foster discovered the secret of making secret messages on FC (if you don’t know what those are, ask a FirstClass veteran), she was sworn to secrecy, and threatened with a potato gun were she to ever break her oath.
Brooke Foster also wanted to start a new thread, so she asked the High Schoolers of NSA which Marvel hero they would have for the StuCo positions. It was suggested that Captain America be president and Iron Man be vice president (which Tirzah Hopkins strenuously protested). It was also suggested that Loki be the janitor, Black Widow be the secretary, or secretary of sandwich making, Hulk would be class treasurer, and Spider-Man would be ninth grade or elementary representative. Ant-Man got SPC. Some people thought that Iron Man should be faculty advisor and Black Widow would be vice president. One person suggested Drax for middle school rep and Groot be communication’s director.
One of the students declared that he was running for absolute dictator of NSA, but immediately got called out on his mistake of running for dictator instead of staging a coup.
One evening, frantic NSA Student Tirzah Hopkins was trying to find funny NSA stories and started scouring Teams. Unfortunately, Teams is a lot harder to scour than FirstClass, so it was extremely difficult to find anything. However, it is under debate as to whether this is a funny story or a tragic one.
Alexis Tuyo has been the lifeguard of people who lol for over a year now. She’s announced that she’s resigning this position (in her own words, “I’m not gonna save Samuel anymore”).
Mrs. Meyer tells a funny story:
“It started out like any other Thursday. I did my whole morning routine: fix my oat bran, wake up the girls, check my emails, and just generally get ready. I wish it would have continued on like an ordinary day, but when I started my EVP live session, it didn’t.
First thing, the chat was not working, which could completely throw me into a dither because then I don’t know if my students are understanding a word I’m saying or if they are even still in the class. But on top of that, I couldn’t access the attendance log to let them use their microphones or webcams. I was starting to think that this was probably the worst live session I had taught so far. Oh, well, I just had to power on.
But things can always get worse; am I right? I started to smell smoke--not like the nice leaf-burning smoke, but like the my-house-is-on-fire, stinky smoke. What do I do? Do I try to say something like, “Um, I just need to check to see if flames are coming out of my house? I’ll be back in a second.” How could I tactfully slip that in while explaining sonnets? So I just kept on explaining rhyme scheme.
Then my youngest daughter burst into my room. Now, she knows that while I am teaching, she shouldn't interrupt me. She gave me an odd expression, turned, and left. Oh, no, did she come in to tell me the house was burning down, and they were all going to follow the predetermined exit strategy out of the house, but she knows I can’t be interrupted in a class, so she is going to let me burn?
I might have started talking faster about the test review at this point in time. I wonder if in the recording I sound panicked. I tried to reason through the situation. If the house was on fire, really on fire, I would hear the fire alarms going off all over the house. That would be a slightly embarrassing interruption to my students. And wouldn’t my husband make sure I was out of the house? I think so. I try to calm myself.
Well, my reason says that I should continue on. So somehow, I explain phrases and clauses. Since my students can’t chat to tell me they have any questions, I wrap up the class to the best of my ability, promising to answer any questions they might send me in an email. Live session is finished.
I run into the hallway. It is not filled with smoke; that’s a good sign. I see my husband and ask, “Is the house on fire?”
He looks a tad bit sheepish. “No, well, but I think I need to open all the windows to air everything out. My clothes are pretty smoky, too.”
Come to find out, if a person is not thinking about what he is doing and he puts a bowl of oatmeal and raisins in the microwave while forgetting to add the milk, the microwave will burn the raisins and billow with smoke. Now we know. The house did not burn down, I did not embarrass myself in front of my students, and my evening class went just fine.”
Tirzah Hopkins has been at NSA for about two years. She lives in Indiana, USA with eight of her eleven siblings and mom and dad. She has recently started writing for the Navigator. She enjoys spending time with family, hiking, karate, writing, and playing with babies.