TMI Thursday: I fell asleep while writing. And then sold the notes.

So this is kindof an embarrassing story.

I had a special gig when I was in school to provide notes for the entire class of Intro to Microbiology at the University of Maryland, a class that had so many students -- 300 -- that even the cavernous lecture hall reserved specifically for it still burst at the seams.

There were two businesses in town that each paid me $10 for my typed notes that they then sold to students. Their business philosophy was to provide notes for those who had missed class or just wanted a backup.

Is this even legal?

I have no idea. Maybe not, because neither place is still in business.

But I needed to eat, and so I eagerly tapped away after every class.

Both places told me they normally like to have a few students from each class and also typically do not hire the same person -- they want the students to have some variety. You know, in case the notes suck or something.

They made an exception in my case and thus I became the sole provider of notes for the entire class.

Awesome. I needed the money. I was working 2 other jobs and this was now a third source of income. Sweet.

Now, this happened to be the worst semester of my entire life. I was the most sleep-deprived I'd ever been. (Well maybe except for the time I was a counselor at a sleepaway camp, which is a complete misnomer if I've ever heard one, but I digress.)

I was up until the wee hours almost every night typing up reports and papers and notes after long exhausting hours at work and I dunno, something had to give, right?

I fell asleep one night right in the middle of typing. Sitting up. Fingers still tapping away.

No, my head didn't loll, my fingers didn't fall away from the keys, my shoulders and arms didn't drop. I just kept typing. I fell asleep typing, woke up typing, and continued to type until I was done and then collapsed. I never re-read the notes and so I never knew I'd fallen asleep. I handed in my notes, got my $20 and went my merry way.

Then, months later, the night before the final, I pulled out the notes. I'd thrown out my originals (what was good enough to sell was good enough to study) and saw the following:

Sleep-writing. (Click to enlarge.)

1. Transformation
2. Conjugation
3. Transduction

artificial protoplanst. Fusion and electro poradion and gun & micro injection. Profus kindks memeebrane stick and DNA transfer, elec open pores in cell sideface, gene gun -- coat projectile w/DNA & shot into cell. & hiccp injection pucure cell walls.

Know the basis of how genes are transferred (figure 9.16, pg. 261 for example).

WTF?

I typed this?

How did I not realize I'd fallen asleep? What was I trying to say?? I couldn't even make sense of it using the book.

Two o'clock in the morning and I just discovered the world's most jumbled notes ever. (Along with 299 other poor slobs, all of us probably banging our heads in a hellish synchronized solitude within a 10-mile radius from campus.)

I took the exam and got a "B" -- not bad for screwing up an entire essay question on artificial protoplansts. But is it any wonder that I still don't understand this concept?

And I owe about 300 students a beer.

. . .

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