My Genetics professor had told us at the beginning of the semester that he’d be away this week and next (in Mexico, apparently, studying fish) and that we would have a series of guest lectures in his absence. I’d forgotten about it until yesterday, when we had our first guest speaker, who is one of the other professors in the department. This morning in lab, everyone was talking about how much more entertaining his lecture had been, and bemoaning our luck that he wasn’t our regular professor.

While I’m a little vexed with our normal instructor myself (the second midterm comes to mind), I feel bad for the guy. I used to do some babysitting and tutoring in high school, and it wasn’t uncommon that the kids I’d be watching would express the desire to have me stay forever instead of leaving them at the mercy of their nefarious parents. It wasn’t that they had bad parents, it was that I didn’t have to put up with the little bastards twenty four hours a day - when you have the option of giving a shrieking second grader back to her parents at the end of the evening (and you get paid in the process), it’s a lot easier to have patience with her. Of course they thought I was more fun - I was just there to play Mortal Kombat with them and make Tollhouse cookies and help out with Spanish homework or whatever. I never had to make them do their chores or go to the doctor or whatever.

I think it’s kind of the same thing with guest lectures. Of course the professor you only deal with for an hour is more engaging than the one whose midterms and grading policies you’ve suffered through for two months already. That doesn’t mean our guest speaker wasn’t eloquent and entertaining, but I’m sure the novelty would wear off if we had to take his final.