I started out by trying to be the easygoing candy civilian instructor — “No, just write your name anywhere, pen or pencil is fine” — answering all the questions, and then a couple of the jokers decided to tweak things a bit more: “Sir, cursive or print?” And I couldn’t not be the smartass in response, and failing to take into account the fact that they’d just had two months of military training, I sarcastically replied, “Morse code, Cadet.”

And I’m sure you know what the mock-dutiful response was, with stifled smirks all around.

“Roger that, sir.” And they started to do it.

And seeing those stifled smirks was all it took for me to realize I was about to receive a section’s worth of portfolios with names rendered in dots and dashes, so I tried to one-up: “Cancel that, Cadet. I want your names in Braille.” —Mike Edwards —Professionalism Lost (Vitia)

Great story.