Today I have two classes taking midterms. The classes seem quite strong, and I'm feeling my tests are maybe too easy. But I've already printed them off.

"Oh well." I say to myself, a sigh of resignation. "I can just blast the shit out of them on the final."

But then outside my window I see a group of construction workers sharing a smoke. And, of course, that is the seed I need for a cunning plan.

I run to the convenience store to buy a pack of smokes. They don't sell smokes on campus, it is an apparent affront to academic morality, so I have to go to across the street to get some.

There are lots of cigarettes to choose from, but I buy a pack of the best ones. The longest ones. "Give me a pack of your longest cigarettes, my good lady!"

"Mou ra go?" she charmingly pretends she doesn't understand English.

"Cigarettes. The long ones." I say in Korean, then in English: "My good lady."

Pleased with this interaction, she hands them to me with a smile. Enough of that nonsense, I remind myself. Back to my cunning plan! Paying, I explain to her as I run off: "Sorry, no time for smiles, I have some cunning to do."

I find the smoking construction workers and approach them cunningly.

They look at me with a mix of sincerity and bemused interest.

"Hello --" I start.

"Oh Hallow!" one starts, "Where are you from?" As cool as he looked smoking with his pals, the fellow cannot carry that cool into interactions with a foreigner. "Hallow, niced to meet you please to meet you what time is it?" he finishes off.

"It's not about that today, my good man." I wave my hand, letting the man know he has nothing to prove. His fellows are clearly impressed by this. "You know that pile of slag in the back of the building?"

"Sure do..." he says excitedly, the companions reflect his excitement.

"Do you think you go throw that around for the next few hours?"

I reach my hand to my pocket to pull out the longs for a bribe, but before I can, the spokesman eagerly offers, "That's exactly what we have planned for today!"

"Well, my good man," I say, very ready to have to offer my bribe, "Can you make it clang and stuff."

"Of course," he replies, "There is no other way to do it."

A little present for my Number Theory class. Anyone can find a GCD, but the student that can GCD amidst the cacophony of hurled cement and steal, that student stands out in a tight job market.

I don't have to now, but I give them the smokes anyways.

"Wow, the long ones!" says one handsome construction worker in the back, shining a magnificent grin.

"Sorry, no time for smiles." I say to him, but give him one anyways as I walk to the building to go back up to my office.

The lady from the convenience store shows up as I am going in, and yells: "What's so cunning about that!?!" But she catches sight of the handsome construction worker mid-yell, and flashes her eye-lashes at him coquettishly.

"No time for that for me!" I yell back at them as the building door closes. But I hope to all that is holy that she doesn't Yoko Ono the scheduled concert.

Turns out she didn't. My number theory class got the concert they wanted. Or perhaps they didn't want it. Either way, it looks like next week we are going to have to work a bit more on 'proving under pressure'.