Byzantium's Shores: chronicling the misadventures of an overalls-clad hippie

Out of Lascaux should be back to normal posting, I assume, now that Alexandra's done with her math test. But reading her update, just the phrase "Factoring of polynomials" is enough to send me into shivers. My high school algebra teacher was a nice guy, and he really was a pretty good teacher. But he had one odd failing that manifested when I choked on polynomials at the outset: he assumed that my sudden tanking on a couple of tests meant that I wasn't doing the homework, and proceeded to impose a daily checking of my homework under threat of detention if it wasn't done. I had been doing it, but for me, polynomials were one of those things that upon first encounter is rather like Roy Neary's first encounter with the alien spaceship in Close Encounters, without the sunburn on the right side of my face. It was his personal attention and help with the subject that got me up to speed (and once I got there, I was fine), not his Draconian "You're a slacker!" bit.

I'm not sure I had a point here, but there it is. I report, you decide, if you haven't nodded off first.