In which I am apparently very retarded

so, i have this class on thursday nights--lit 511, literary criticism. i won't call the class boring, but i will say that there is an awful lot of at-least-some-what-boring reading that we have to do each week.
still, it's worth it, because the texts we're reading virtually compose the entire history of literary theory, which i hear is important to know if you're trying to get your MA in literature.

today i went to that class in very high spirits, because the professor of said class had just emailed me a rather glowing recommendation letter for a graduate assistantship, and i was feeling all happy and smart-like.

then i got to school.
and when i was there, the teacher asked us to hand in our first papers of the semester.
and i didn't have one.
because i am retarded.
very, very retarded.

the paper assignment was given out 2 weeks ago, and that night i came home and did some preliminary work on it--you know, fleshed out the ideas that i would want to discuss.
and then i promptly forgot all about it until it was time to pass them in, tonight.
and my retarded self is sitting in a graduate seminar, with only 9 other students, very obviously without a paper.

i know it sounds cliche, but i really wanted the floor to open up and swallow me. or at least for a tasty vodka cocktail to show up, and help me ease my embarrassment.

instead, i just had to keep sitting there for the entire three hour class, hating myself, and wondering how--after this entire, very very long, educational career--i could all of the sudden forget that i had to write a paper.
and i mean just flat-out forget. i did not think of it even once, until he asked for us to pass the papers in.

oh, and did i mention the fact that he had just an hour ago written a letter about how fantastic and responsible i am?

sheesh.

the good news is, i've had this professor 2x before--so he knows that i didn't blow it off, and that i work a lot outside of school, and so he took pity on me. and i still get to use his glowing letter, which i obviously in no way deserve.

the bad news is, i am retarded.
but i guess you already knew that.