My English skills, last seen defending the word "misanthropy" against a literate freshman's doubts, finally came in handy again today when Prof Ryckman asked for a word to classify incorrectly stated idioms, a hobby of his wife's.

His example: "To wear one's kidney on one's cuff."

He asked if that was a spoonerism, then corrected himself and asked what a spoonerism was. The stupidest person in class—someone must fit that description, after all, and this is my best guess—proffered a homemade definition of "spoonerism" which I've already forgotten.

I do remember sitting there and getting frustrated, because it was wrong. I reluctantly blurted out something to that effect and volunteered the real definition of "spoonerism", using "Frocolate Chosty", the name of a band I'm not sure even exists anymore, as my example for some reason.

The second-stupidest person, a naif with a big heart and a bigger voice, then returned to Ryckman's problem and labeled the Prof's wife's idiomatic mistakes "malapropisms." This is closer, but still a stretch from the real definition of "malapropism", unless you understand it in a way only very loosely related to its original sense.

And here's where my real reluctance came in. I'd come to class late, bumbled to the back, and to make myself even more conspicuous I'd already somewhat harshly corrected a class regular who wanted to sound smart. Now I squinched up my eyes, grimaced, and prepared to do the same again.

I couldn't help but choose to defend the language I love against the forces of the Illiterati, after all.

Everyone in class turned around at that point.

Including the guy who writes our staff editorials, who'd gotten an email from me last night after I'd decided myself against allowing sentences like "It is also beyond our ken to see whether this is a benign vicissitude or a self-inflicted wound" to be printed in The Lawrentian without a good/ironic reason. I'm probably going to get a reputation for my copy-editing power trips.

[Update: At the moment, it seems like my more iron-fisted staff ed corrections won't be implemented anyways. Also, Miss Bates found an error in the (admittedly casual) email I wrote to the editorial guy, which, as per Lawrentian policy, was forwarded to all the editors. Authority diminished.]

Back to class. With everyone still looking at me, I blurted out (I did a lot of blurting today) a workable definition of "malapropism" and sent Prof Ryckman back to square one.

We never found a word for what Ryckman was talking about, and I doubt there is one. The important thing is that I'm smarter than everyone else.

Well, actually the important thing is that I might be able to major in philosophy after all. I felt I should come to class and talk—even if it meant coming late and convincing some that I'm the third-stupidest person there—so that I could get on my Prof's good side again.

Because I figured out a way to get the last of my required classes: writing for credit.

Ryckman said we'll work something out; the second-stupidest person tried to warn me about writing for credit, but he's lost a lot of authority in the classes I've had with him and I no longer value his input.

And even if this is hard, if it's the difference between a major and a minor I should probably do it. Well, we'll see if it actually works out.