Out of the mouths of babes

So last week was my birthday.

Which is always good for me, but can never be good for my wife. Or my kids. Because they had the chore of buying me a gift. And this may come as no surprise, but I'm not an easy person to shop for.

You see, I'm not one of those people who collects things. Those folks are easy. You buy them a clown painting. Or a glass eyeball. Or a 1942 Joe DiMaggio baseball card. And you're done with it.

I'm not a hobby guy. I don't play golf every free moment of my life, like my brother. I don't fly model airplanes. I haven't immersed myself in kickboxing. Or Muay Thai. I try to swim everyday, but I can't expect my family to buy me a pool. Or even a Speedo.

And believe it or not, I'm not a fashion hound. So buying me a sport coat or some expensive shoes costing more than a hundred dollars would have made little sense.

The truth is, I don't really want, or have a need, for much. It's not like I'm a Zen Buddhist. And have no appreciation for material things. I'm just simple minded man who likes to keep things simple.

Perhaps that's why I was so delighted when my daughters sprung Richard Beason's book, F In EXAMS on me.

It's a collection of the very best totally wrong test answers. They are hilarious, real responses from high school students who realized that they had no hope of answering a question correctly, and decided to have a little fun instead.

I happen to love these. Not only for their apparent silliness. But also because they make a collective statement about the state of education in America and our failure to promote creative thinking.

Here's one of my favorites, for instance:

This student clearly meant to say monogamy. But if I were the teacher, I wouldn't be so quick to mark the answer incorrect.

The book is brimming with hilarity. And I'd gladly post some more, but the truth is I had to take a picture of this with my iPhone and send it to my blog.

Maybe next year my daughters will buy me a scanner that works.

A pox on you Hewlett Packard.