Excuses, Excuses

Student Version: Why I Didn't Do The Homework 
(from this site)

1. I didn’t do my history homework because I don’t believe in dwelling on the past.
2. I didn’t want the other kids in the class to look bad.
3. A sudden gust of wind blew my homework out of my hand and I never saw it again.
4. Another pupil fell in a lake and I jumped in to rescue him.  Unfortunately, my homework drowned.
5. Our furnace broke and we had to burn my homework to keep ourselves from freezing.
6. I’m not at liberty to say why.
7. I wanted to frame the detention letter you’re about to give me.
8. It was destroyed in a freak accident involving a hippo, a toaster, and a bag of frozen peas.  You don’t want to know the details.
9. I have a solar-powered calculator, and it was cloudy.
10. I made a paper plane out of it and it got hijacked.
11. My mom used it as a dryer sheet.
12. My agent won’t allow me to publish my homework until my movie deal is finalized.
13. It’s against my religion to do any homework.
14. I was abducted by green-skinned, three-eyed, pig-snouted space aliens, and they incinerated my homework with their death rays.
15. I felt it wasn’t challenging enough.
16. My parents were sick and unable to do my homework last night.  Don’t worry, they have been suitably punished.
17. We had homework?!
18. I see your lips moving, but all I’m hearing is “blah, blah, blah.”
19. I didn’t want to add to your already heavy workload.
20. I spent the night at a rally supporting higher pay for our hard-working teachers.

Teacher Version: Why I Didn't Grade The Homework
(by TeacherMommy)

1. A draft circulated through my room from the vents, and the friction caused by all those papers rubbing together resulted in spontaneous combustion isolated to my desk.
2. I had to go to the ER to treat the blood loss sustained from all my paper cuts.
3. I started reading the essays and suffered a brain aneurism.
4. I fell asleep on the papers due to exhaustion and got ink poisoning.
5. My children mistook the tests for scrap paper and used them for their latest art projects.
6. My cat mistook the tests for kitty litter and...well, littered on them.
7. The military has been taking up all my time having me train their best interrogators in the proper use of The Look. Soon they will be ready to add The Eyebrow.
8. I strained my back carrying my laptop and bag of papers and had to go to the chiropractor.
9. Oh, they're graded, but the computer hates me and won't let me enter the grades.
10. It was the craziest thing. I left my room for five minutes to use the copier, and a miniature wormhole opened up over my desk and transported all the papers to the Gamma Quadrant.
11. My nemesis in A pod papernapped all the essays. I'm negotiating for their release.
12. I'm trying to get my Procrastination Badge. I've been working on it for years, but the organization keeps putting off the final test.
13. I looked at the essays and decided I can't cure stupid.
14. Next week is Spirit Week and I'm too busy trying to decide what to wear on the theme days.
15. Did you know that Gmail chat suddenly works in the building?
16. I'm very busy practicing my blogging writing skills.
17. Since our salaries and benefits are likely to get slaughtered in the next contract negotiation, I've decided to start charging per paper. I'm waiting for my students to cough up the moolah.
18. I'm staging a protest against the needless slaughter of squids by refusing to use ink.
19. Sometimes it's just better not to know what is and isn't in those kids' heads.
20. I have a life.