Finals are over and the requests begin. Students who have not got the grade they want come in and start asking me to raise their grade. It is easier to ask for forgiveness than to ask for permission, and it is easier to claim a litany of hardship than to study.

"I came down with a bad case of cancer, and while I was in the hospital my mother was murdered," one claims, "An A- rather than a B+ would make all the difference."

It seems legitimate. Some students claim that their house is haunted, or that their chauffeur gambled away their textbooks, but cancer is not something that one would lie about. It is, after all, the disease of the gods.

"All right," I relent. "But you are going to have to do an extra assignment. I can't raise your grade past other students grades without a reason."

"I'll do anything."

A student once made this plea during my first year teaching at Emory. His plea was dripping with such inappropriate glee that it haunts me every time I hear the words.

"Fine." I say. "Go clean the toilets."

"Yes sir!" he says, "Thank you sir!"

He backs out of my office, the background music rising in tension, low D-chords, and a rumbling of percussion.

When he leaves, I lean over, picking up the phone, and push a single button. The secretary picks up immediately and I say, to crescendo-ing percussion. "Stop what you are doing. The student that just left my office, he's going to have to have an accident." The camera draws in on my face. "Yeah," I continue, into the phone, "that kind of accident."

Cut to commercial.