That's definitely not a "Yes, of course!" kind of thing!

I got suckered into co-sponsoring the reading club. Actually, I'm always a sucker for a student who comes to the English teachers and begs for a reading club where she can, "read books and write about what we've read." She actually asked to do more reading and writing...IN ENGLISH! Yep, I'll get behind that.

Anyway, today was the first day the reading club met so it was a get-to-know each other kind of day and getting our feet wet.

The highlights of the meeting include:

My co-sponsor: Welcome to the reading club. Just as a warning, if you don't like to read, this is not the club for you.

Student: Wait...we're actually going to READ?!

My co-sponsor and I both looked at her, dumbfounded. Then she finally cracked a smile and said, "I'm joking, I'm joking!!" I am so excited to have a club member with a great sense of humor.

The highlight of the club meeting, though, didn't come until the end. We'd read a short story and were discussing it when another one of the students bust out with this doozy: "I once had a cat with...what's it called? ...Autistic?"

"...your cat was autistic?" I said with a chuckle.

"Yeah! That was it."

"What do you mean your cat was autistic? How do you even prove that a cat has Autism?"

"I don't know!" she said, throwing her hands up. "That's just what the doctor said. He said he put my cat in a room with a bunch of other cats, and my cat didn't like it. He just wanted to be alone. So he must be autistic."

The fun didn't stop there. Somehow the topic of travel came up and someone mentioned her cat's passport.

I kid you not.

"I'm sorry. Did you just say your cat has a passport?!"

"Yes! Of course!"

"This is definitely not an 'of course' kind of thing! Why would your cat 'of course' have a passport!?" I said, perhaps a little too incredulously.

"Because, when I travel to Turkey and I take my cat with me, she has to have a passport!"

How could I be so silly?! Duh! The cat has to have a passport! "What do you mean, you take your cat through immigration and she gets a stamp?"

"Yes!"

I couldn't believe what I was hearing. "Stop it! You're kidding! What, goes on a cat passport!?"

Judging from the faces around the room, the questions were just getting stupider and stupider. "Her picture, her name, her last name, her mother's name, her father's name..."

"I'm sorry, did you just say that there's a picture of your cat on her passport? And her mother and father's names?!"

"Yes!!"

The whole thing was too comical! The mental picture of taking your cat to get her passport photo taken is just hilarious. I still can't believe it's true.

I've asked for physical proof.

Vicariously yours,