There are probably very few adults out there who had perfect attendance and never missed an assignment deadline in school. For the rest of us… well, you’ve probably used an excuse or two in your day.
Most excuses seem fake. And they are. But every once in a while, they aren’t. When the teachers of Reddit were asked, ” what was the best excuse for being late that turned out to be true? ” they had some pretty crazy responses.
“My auto teacher let me practice removing and adding the tires on his vehicle.” – ethnicjello
The question may have been posed to teachers, but some students had some pretty crazy stories, too.
“The next morning it was about 20 minutes into first period and no sign of him.”
“He comes running into the classroom out of breath and his hair is all messed up.”
“He points at me and says, ‘YOU!!!! What is a torque wrench used for???’ I respond with, ‘I don’t know.’ He says, ‘I know you don’t know!!!’ Turns out one of his tires came off while driving down the highway.”
Oh… my… word…
But wait, wouldn’t he have checked before leaving the day before?
“Told me he got pulled over by the cops for wobbly driving on his bike and they thought he was drunk.” – Fortisvol
“Turned out he was just dodging all the slugs on the street.”
I honestly think this is a really good reason to be late for anything. Too bad he got pulled over for it.
“One of my organ students told me he was late arriving for his lesson because he got stuck behind a lengthy funeral procession en route to the cemetery.” – Back2Bach
“I knew he was telling the truth because I had played the organ for the service earlier that morning and the church was packed.”
What a strange and sad coincidence. Totally sounds like an excuse, though.
“Kindergarten teacher. One of my students is just a very, very heavy sleeper.” – WolfMoonRabbit
“They often arrive late, and miss our first class.”
As strange as that is, I’m kind of jealous of that kid’s ability to sleep so much.
“After nap time, they will remain asleep no matter what we do.”
“Music, tilting the bed slightly, asking them questions, even gently standing them up, nothing… Nothing medical, just sleeps like a rock.”
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I’m also jealous of the fact that the kid gets nap time. But wow, is that ever wild!
“I’m an English professor, and one year a pretty good student showed up without one of his 2 major term papers.” – kidnuggett606
“He explained that his safe had been stolen by a contractor who was working on their house. His laptop was in the safe, and that’s where his paper was. I genuinely believe him because he been a really good student.”
Strap in, because this is a wild story.
“Then over the next few weeks, he started to show up to class looking very tired.”
“He said that he was on a hunt for the person who stole his safe, and he was spending late nights with his cousin driving around looking for the guy because they knew his van.”
That must’ve really sucked, but I guess it had to be done.
“Now, the student and his cousin were both recently back from tours in Iraq and had seen combat experience.”
“They wanted to find the guy to beat the **** out of him and get the safe back because his wife’s wedding ring was in the safe as well as a bunch of cash.
“He rewrote the paper and turned it in, apologetic that it wasn’t up to his usual quality, but he still kept coming to class looking like he hadn’t slept.”
“After a little while he came very happy to my office hours…”
“…and he reported that he found the guy after a long search that involved breaking into a meth den shaking people down with baseball bats and even bribing some [sex workers].”
“I read in the news that he had in fact done a citizen’s arrest and stopped the guy at a Taco Bell…”
“…and that they ended up calling in the Secret Service because he used the cash that he stole from the safe to buy a bunch of counterfeiting equipment.”
“…It all turned out to be true.”
“He got the ring and the laptop back. I gladly accepted his original paper, and it got a much higher grade than the rewrite.”
I think the most amazing part about this is the fact that he managed to take down a huge crime operation and got a good grade. Not the story I was expecting, but I’m so glad OP told it.
“I teach psychology online to international students.” – psychgamer2014
“One semester, I had a student from Finland that submitted an assignment late. His excuse? ‘My grandmother got hit by a reindeer while getting the post.'”
I can’t be the only one who thought of the song as soon as I read that, right? (P.S., really hope the grandmother was okay after that).
“A student of mine this year found out an interview she gave was quoted in an article of TIME.” – 111roar
“That seems like a good reason to go tell everyone on your way to class. I let it slide.”
Hey, good for that student! That’s kind of a big deal, after all.
“For a few weeks my bus routinely dropped us off at school 10 minutes late.” – FriedeOfAriandel
“It was a constant argument in the high school office every morning as to why we didn’t make it to class on time and shouldn’t be punished.”
I can’t believe the bus driver didn’t step up and explain anything. That’s pretty rude, actually.
“I was one of about 20 kids who were late to school.” – AusPB90
“We showed up at the school office as a group and when questioned why we were late, we said, ‘The school bus blew up.'”
This already seems super unbelievable.
“They questioned ‘So the engine blew up?'”
According to OP, it was a lot more serious than just the engine…
“The kids: ‘No, the whole bus, in flames. It blew up.'”
“There was much conference between the teachers, all of them thinking we embellished the story.”
“Next thing you know, one of the admin staff has the news website open, very obvious image of an entire bus on fire with a bunch of kids in our school uniform standing in front of it. Our late slip for class read ‘School bus blew up.'”
To be honest, as unbelievable as it is, why would they think 20-odd kids would make that up?
“I’m not a teacher but when I was at uni I was really late because I had a dream that my lecturer phoned me and told me that the class was cancelled.” – [deleted]
“I told her and she laughed, but because it was so ridiculous she knew I wasn’t lying.”
It sounds like OP was manifesting a day off, and didn’t really get their wish.
“Thought it was Saturday.” – garmento1944
I appreciate the fact that people had some insane, hard to believe stories, and this person’s student literally just thought it was Saturday. Happens to the best of us, I guess.