The Danes v. The Dutch

I was instructed by some friends yesterday to include more stories about people on my blog. As in, more of my anecdotes about running in to silly people, or having embarrassing interactions with people.

In pondering that, I was thinking...what should I share? It probably shouldn't be with people's real names, because that seems to get me into trouble - see Hawkeye Rachel and AD Trivia Night with lame Kyle. And, it also shouldn't be too obviously about someone with whom I am acquainted, who could potentially stumble upon it, so I'll try to shelter the guilty (or rather, mocked) unless they REALLY deserve it. (I'm talking to you, Kyle.)

I narrowed down my potential story for you to two, both relating to my new job as a sub, one in which I was a COMPLETE and TOTAL moron, and one in which everyone else in the room was. Which do you think I'm going to share??

I was sitting in a high school level classroom with two other instructors and about a dozen kids, when one of the other instructors asked what language people speak in Denmark. One of the students said, "Dutch." And so I had to hop in and say, "Actually, in Denmark, the people speak Danish." The student and the third instructor said, no it was Dutch. I'm REALLY trying not to be such a know-it-all-jerk-wad, but it was a situation where these people were just wrong, about a fact, that could be easily researched. So I suggested they look it up on Google. I said that people in The Netherlands spoke Dutch, along with French and German.  Another student said that he thought the Dutch lived in Holland, and I said, "well, Holland is in The Netherlands. Holland isn't a country." After a little Googling it was proved that Danes speak Danish and Dutch speak Dutch. Shocker. Then, the first instructor asked me where The Netherlands was, she couldn't find it on the map. Sure enough, it was right where Europe had left it. That's right, you read correctly, that this was a high school class.

OK, fine, I'll tell you about how I am an idiot too, lest you think I don't know that I am. Last night I got a call to sub for someone. I listened to the times, the school, the job and name of the person, but when I showed up to that school this morning, it was pointed out to me that I failed to listen to the date of the assignment. I'll head back to that school this Thursday.