Yelling at the Football

One of my students said to me today, "Miss...you know a lot about outside. Listen to this!" And he proceeded to tell me a story that happened during morning football practice. I'll hit the highlights:

Student: "There was this giant bug on the football, and it was just sitting there. I waved my arms, and it wouldn't move. I started yelling, Hey, bug! Get off my football! but it wouldn't leave. It was so scary looking, and nobody wanted to get near it. You know, we're afraid of outside. Anyway, it looked like a grasshopper, but it was a lot bigger, and it was, like, black, but kinda like a cockroach. I don't know what it was, Miss, but it wouldn't listen!"

I was trying to figure out why a freshman in high school was a) scared of a bug, b) scared of the outdoors, c) yelling at the bug and expecting it to decipher ghetto English and actually understand and disappear, and d) why they didn't just kick the football so that the bug would have no choice but to vacate its roost.

Then I began asking questions about what kind of bug it could have been, to be that big and so scary that a teenage boy wouldn't even confront it. After several questions and answers, I finally figured it out.

It was a cricket.

Me: "Oh, so you mean it was a cricket on your football, right?"

Student: "A what? What's a cricket?"

Me: "..."

These are the types of students I have: students who don't even know what a fucking cricket is, even though they've been exposed to them their entire lives. *sighs*