Re: [HAPS-L] Stuff our students remember...

[Ken Saladin <ksaladin@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Good for a Monday afternoon chuckle, Chet. Did you independently verify
that type A just to be sure they weren't telling you what they thought
you wanted to hear?  ;-)

I tell my students a similar story about my redheaded daughter. Neither
my wife nor I am a redhead, but our next-door neighbor at that time was.
I hasten to add that so were my wife's father and my grandfather, but now
that you bring up this blood type story, I wonder how many of my students
have gone away with the impression that I've been raising my neighbor's
daughter as if she were my own?

Ken




> I just finished a summer session
> and had this interesting conversation with a colleague who was teaching
> biology at the same time I was doing my Intro. to Human Anatomy. 
> She was discussing blood types when one of her students says:
>      "Did you know that Dr. Harbut has a son
> that really isn't his?".
>       "What?" says my colleague
> (Connie) incredulously .
>       "It's true" says the
> student.   "Last semester Dr. Harbut told us that one of
> his kids is type O and he's type AB and there's no way that kid is
> his"
>
> The rest of the story:    After going through all the
> blood types and the genotypes that produce each I tell them how when my
> first one was born I asked the pediatrician what his blood type was and,
> after looking through her files, she says, "He's type O". 
> I pause and then respond "He can't be", and then proceed to
> tell her that I'm type AB.  I can still see her trying to remember
> her genetics.   I then act as though we're back in the recovery
> room (27 years ago) and tell my class that we didn't have a pool or a
> pool cleaner, no milkman, and besides, she (my wife) wasn't going to find
> anything better than me anyway...at least, not in those days (What's the
> line frrom Camelot?  "Humility is for the humble?"). 
> Anyway, I then proceed to tell my students that they RECHECKED his blood
> type and sure enough he turned out to be an A.  That of course, is
> where the student probably stopped listening and was certain that I'd
> come home with a kid who really wasn't mine.
> I've been telling that story for what, maybe 25 years now, and as Connie
> said, just think of of all the former students out there who came away
> with the same impression as her student.
>
> The son in question is now in grad school at UPenn ("Pharmacology,
> drug interactions, etc., not Pharmacy" as he hastens to add). 
> I must admit however, that given his brains I sometimes wonder if he
> really is my kid.
>
> Just thought you might enjoy this story.
>
>
> Chet Harbut, Ph.D.