Get OFF

Saturday was graduation. Therefore, you now know how the weather was on that day in these here parts. Two weeks earlier, the Emerald City's news-rag declared the region "Colder Than Siberia." Yet, the moment I throw on my academic robe, heavy in the felt department and just plain heavy, the mercury shoots to the top of the tube. Figures.

Anyway, I am still tickled when I see the faculty all dressed up in their regalia. I love the colors. This year The T attended graduation and we were hanging out in the student union while faculty filed in to don their robes. All of a sudden these smart people become retarded and cannot dress themselves. The T quickly became The Official Faculty Fitter, or OFF. Since my robes are relatively new, I still have the directions for how the hoods should hang in the pocket (and that slip of paper shall stay in the pocket for the duration of my career). The T began circulating and adjusting hoods, sometimes by request, sometimes unknown to the wearer.

The part that frosts my chickens was the number of times I heard someone say, "Oh, I can never get this. There must be something mathematical to it." Shoot me now. Why is it that because someone cannot do "it," then by default "it" must be mathematical in nature? Perhaps this comment was just a by-product of the pre-ceremony small-talk and deemed appropriate because both The T and I happen to "do math" but it still irked me. We all figured out how to tie our shoes when we were five. Are you now telling me you can't learn how to don a hood in your 50s? Yeah, let's blame your math skills.