It’s a tale as old as time itself…a kid is running late and he or she makes up a ridiculous excuse to his parents or his teacher.
Most of the time these excuses are total bulls**t, but sometimes the kiddos aren’t lying at all, really crazy things actually happened to them.
You just never know!
AskReddit users shared their stories.
1. This is bad.
“Hmmm, I had a student whose father had died and had not done any homework or prep for the geography class, from what I heard the teacher scolded him for not doing so but the student didn’t want to say anything (presumably sensitive issue) so his best friend shouted at the teacher “DONT YOU HAVE ANY SHAME, HIS FATHER DIED LAST NIGHT” and the teacher said “I don’t care”, there was an audible gasp and I was in the next room.
Needless to say that teacher is no longer employed here.”
2. Holy s**t.
“Not a student, but one of my Teaching Assistants when I ran a pre-school in West Philly… ‘sorry I missed yesterday, my friend shot my mom’.
Naturally, I’m a little speechless… ‘oh no it’s ok, he was AIMING FOR SOMEONE ELSE’.”
3. That’s weird.
“A guy in my college class missed class one day.
The next day he came in with his eye covered up and medical paperwork in hand.
Apparently he got pecked in the eye by a chicken.”
4. Are you drunk?
“Told me he got pulled over by the cops for wobbly driving on his bike and they thought he was drunk.
Turned out he was just dodging all the slugs on the street.”
5. That is acceptable.
“I had a six year old turn up late to her lesson and blurt out “sorry I was late, I had to colour in a bunny!”
Seems fair.”
6. Live a little.
“MTV paid me $50 to fill my backpack with cement and carry it around for the day.”
I accepted that excuse.
Student later regretted it, as a replacement backpack and college textbooks far exceeded $50. But he got his moment of fame and I didn’t penalize him for his tardy. Gotta live a little.”
7. Well, isn’t that something?
“I’m Pink”
A fair-skinned student (age 10) went with a friend to the Holi festival at a nearby Hindu temple where she was covered with red powder and dyed bright red from head to toe.
Her mother, another teacher at the school, had made her sit for hours in the bathtub to soak it off, but even after another round of early morning shower scrubbing, she arrived at school a pleasant shade of pink. (Technically, she wasn’t late, but she stayed in her mother’s classroom until the bell rang).”
8. Damn tourists.
“Not me, but one of my good friends:
She went to the Royal Military College of Canada, where they wear their uniforms and there are often tourists visiting the campus.
Apparently, it was completely normal to be waylaid by tourists looking to have their photos taken with students in uniform that all they had to say when they walked in late was “tourists” and the professors would let it slide.
She always wondered how many family photos she was actually in over her time spent there.”
9. All was forgiven.
“Taught a group of seniors first period. It was towards the end of the year.
I had a class of around 30 and only 5 were there when the bell rang. Halfway through class the rest of them show up.
They went out to Cracker Barrel for breakfast and brought me some back. All was forgiven.”
10. Driving all over the place.
“She had to take her sister to school and drive her mom to rehab. She was always late to class because her mom just wanted to sleep in.
Problem was if the mom was late or did not go she would have violated her probation and gone to prison. I never marked her late.
If she missed anything important she could come in at lunch or after school to make it up.”
11. Wild turkeys.
“Flock of wild turkeys in the road. Not always school, but this happened more than once in my life.
For those of you who have never found yourselves in this situation: there is no way out of it.
Wild turkeys will move when they damn well decide to do so, and only then.”
12. Go home, kid.
“Literally today, child missed my first hour class, notes said car accident on the way to school and would be coming late.
Kid comes for 2nd hour, has pictures on his phone of the ROLLOVER accident! WTF, kid, go home. Rest. Take care of yourself.”
13. Nature called.
“A kid missed my first period class one morning, but was in school later that day.
When I asked him why he hadn’t arrived in time for my course, he said his cow was birthing its calf that morning, so he’d picked being in the barn over English.
Made sense to me. His essays weren’t going to win any ribbons at the county fair, but his calf could.”
14. Heard about those chickens.
“When I was student teaching, I was late because there was bunch chickens in the middle of the road. They wouldn’t move at all. T
his is in the middle of a city of 200,000 people. Freaking chickens.
I finally get to school and profusely apologize to my mentor teacher and I told her why I was late thinking it sounded ridiculous.
She said, “yeah, those chickens are f**king a**holes, they surrounded my car in the McDonalds parking lot last year. Dont worry about.” “
Those were quite enjoyable, if I do say so myself.
Okay teachers, we want to hear from you!
Share more of these kinds of stories in the comments with us, please!
