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Let’s face it—almost every single one of us has ended up being late to class at least once or twice. It can be pretty easy to panic over how to excuse yourself for not being on time, and teachers are always ready to deal with a white lie. Whether it’s imaginary appointments with the dentist or sudden and unexplainable stomach aches, there can be no end to students’ creativity.
Yet, some stories can be so ridiculous, people can’t help but question whether they are real. User minecraftplayer48 decided to ask the teachers of Reddit, "What was the best excuse for being late that turned out to be true?" As of this day, the thread has collected more than 9.7K comments full of examples of how people didn’t make their wild stories up.
From getting pulled over by the police to assisting with births, Bored Panda has collected some of the craziest answers from this thread. Check them out down below and, if you’re up for it, share your own experiences in the comments!
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#1
I apologize that I'm writing this on mobile, so there might be errors. I'm an English professor, and one year a pretty good student showed up without one of his 2 major term papers. He explained that his safe had been stolen by a contractor who was working on their house. His laptop was in the safe, and that's where his paper was. I genuinely believe him because he been a really good student.
Then over the next few weeks, he started to show up to class looking very tired. He said that he was on a hunt for the person who stole his safe, and he was spending late nights with his cousin driving around looking for the guy because they knew his van. Now, the student and his cousin were both recently back from tours in Iraq and had seen combat experience. They wanted to find the guy to beat the s**t out of him and get the safe back because his wife's wedding ring was in the safe as well as a bunch of cash. He rewrote the paper and turned it in, apologetic that it wasn't up to his usual quality, but he still kept coming to class looking like he hadn't slept.
After a little while he came very happy to my office hours, and he reported that he found the guy after a long search that involved breaking into a meth den shaking people down with baseball bats and even bribing some prostitutes. He said that they found the guy's van at a Taco Bell after getting a tip from a prostitute, and they cornered him and waited for the police to come.
I read in the news that he had in fact done a citizen's arrest and stopped the guy at a Taco Bell, and that they ended up calling in the Secret Service because he used the cash that he stole from the safe to buy a bunch of counterfeiting equipment. Secret Service apparently investigates counterfeiting, so the whole investigation happened because this guy who I dub "the white Shaft" tracked the scumbag down through the bad side of town late at night to get a wedding ring, some cash, and his research paper back. It all turned out to be true. He got the ring and the laptop back. I gladly accepted his original paper, and it got a much higher grade than the rewrite.
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#2
Middle school boy was late because he watched his dad become a citizen.
#3
This happened to me as a pupil; a very quiet, unassuming kid in our class came in to German with about five minutes of the class left.
We went to a Catholic school and the teachers were all quite strict and intimidating. Classes were usually silent, especially in junior school. When this boy came into class at the end of the lesson that day, the door flew inwards with such force that the teacher gave an audible gasp.
It had been raining heavily outside, his hair was plastered to his forehead. His blazer was dripping and sodden. He had mud caked into his trousers up to his knees, and he was breathing heavily.
The teacher exclaimed, ‘Brendan! What happened?’ We all stared up at him in shocked silence. This quiet, unassuming little boy let out a big sigh and just said, ‘I took a shortcut.’ And went straight to his seat.
That line became iconic in our school for years afterwards.
#4
"Sorry Bohemian Rhapsody came on just as I parked." - My art teacher when he was about 5:55 minutes late.
#5
A kid missed my first period class one morning, but was in school later that day. When I asked him why he hadn't arrived in time for my course, he said his cow was birthing its calf that morning, so he'd picked being in the barn over English. Made sense to me. His essays weren't going to win any ribbons at the county fair, but his calf could.
#6
Former student here.
"Sorry, boss, my stepdad tried to [take our lifes] last night and I had to deal with the cops".
Professor just looked at me for a moment and said "....dude do you want to like, go grab a drink and talk about this after class?"
Man, my English prof was a bro when I was in college.
#7
When I was student teaching, I was late because there was bunch chickens in the middle of the road. They wouldn't move at all. This is in the middle of a city of 200,000 people. Freaking chickens.
I finally get to school and profusely apologize to my mentor teacher and I told her why I was late thinking it sounded ridiculous. She said, "yeah, those chickens are f**king a**holes, they surrounded my car in the McDonalds parking lot last year. Dont worry about."
#8
Told me he got pulled over by the cops for wobbly driving on his bike and they thought he was drunk. Turned out he was just dodging all the slugs on the street.
coleby worthen 2 years ago
I took the shell off my racing snail thinking it would make it faster, if anything is made it more sluggish…… I’ll see myself out
#9
When I was in college, my psych professor told us that the only excuse for being late was a funeral procession. Any other reason, you wouldn't be allowed to come in.
A few weeks into the semester, I was headed from one building to another, which involved crossing the main road. Lo and behold, there was one very long funeral procession going by. I got a short video of it as proof, then stood on the sidewalk to let it go by.
Unfortunately, the procession made me five minutes late to class. I knocked on the door, and the professor came over to start to tell me off. I showed her the video.
"Well I'll be damned, c'mon in."
#10
She had to take her sister to school and drive her mom to rehab. She was always late to class because her mom just wanted to sleep in. Problem was if the mom was late or did not go she would have violated her probation and gone to prison. I never marked her late. If she missed anything important she could come in at lunch or after school to make it up.
#11
Hmmm, I had a student whose father had died and had not done any homework or prep for the geography class, from what I heard the teacher scolded him for not doing so but the student didn’t want to say anything (presumably sensitive issue) so his best friend shouted at the teacher “DONT YOU HAVE ANY SHAME, HIS FATHER DIED LAST NIGHT” and the teacher said “I don’t care”, there was an audible gasp and I was in the next room.
Needless to say that teacher is no longer employed here.
#12
Not me but in my class.
This was in College, a student turned in work late after not showing up for two classes. Two classes amounted to a full week so it was noticeable.
Professor looked at him and said "I hope somebody passed away for you to be this late"
"DOES MY DAD COUNT????"
Honestly I've always heard you can hear a pin drop and never really thought anything of it, but yeah you could hear a f**king pin cut through the air after that.
Andy Acceber 2 years ago
Professor is just asking for trouble. Who would say something like that?
#13
This one happened to a classmate when we were in college training to be teachers. She missed a really important class, came for just the last 10 minutes or so because her neighbor knocked on her door while in active labor asking for help a little while before she was supposed to leave for class. Classmate walked back to neighbor's house with preggo neighbor and delivered her baby in the living room while on the phone to 911. Paramedics came and mom and baby were fine, but classmate needed to go home and shower/change first because she was covered in blood.
#14
Had a Sociology prof in college who was never late for anything. One day, we showed up for class and he wasn't there. After five minutes or so, we are reading the handbook to find out what level of Professor he was and found that he was an Associate professor and entitled to ten minutes wait. A few seconds before his time expired, a voice came from under his desk saying "Today we are going to discuss withdrawn personalities." He conducted the whole class from under his desk.
#15
Kid was late to school and had to miss a very important football game. The reason? His fat Pug fell asleep on his phone. The pug’s fat rolls muffled his alarm.
#16
I was one of about 20 kids who were late to school. We showed up at the school office as a group and when questioned why we were late, we said "The school bus blew up".
They questioned "So the engine blew up"
The kids "No, the whole bus, in flames. It blew up"
There was much conference between the teachers, all of them thinking we embellished the story. Next thing you know, one of the admin staff has the news website open, very obvious image of an entire bus on fire with a bunch of kids in our school uniform standing in front of it. Our late slip for class read "School bus blew up".
Susan Bosse 2 years ago
Don't you think the school would have been well aware before these kids even reached campus? I mean, they would have had to send another bus or some mode of transport to get them to the school from the site of the bus explosion.
#17
I had a six year old turn up late to her lesson and blurt out "sorry I was late, I had to colour in a bunny!"
Seems fair.
#18
My auto teacher let me practice removing and adding the tires on his vehicle. The next morning it was about 20 minutes into first period and no sign of him. He comes running into the classroom out of breath and his hair is all messed up. He points at me and says "YOU!!!! What is a torque wrench used for???" I respond with "I don't know." He says "I know you dont know!!!" Turns out one of his tires came off while driving down the highway.
#19
Student told me he couldn’t do the work because he was delivering oil from 3PM until 11PM. In middle school. He wasn’t lying. Dad has broken his both of shoulders and one clavicle so his grandma and pregnant mom were “switching off driving” (pretty sure he was doing most of it at night) and he was hooking the tanks to the oil. I called all his teachers and had his work load lightened and got permission for him to come in an hour late each day as he was providing the only income for his family of eight, as he was the oldest. Tutored him so he could pass seventh grade. I paid cost of oil only for years until I moved out of the area.
Evil Little Thing 2 years ago
What kind of oil needs to be delivered, and what are these tanks that need hooking up?
#20
Not a student, but one of my Teaching Assistants when I ran a pre-school in West Philly... 'sorry I missed yesterday, my friend shot my mom'. Naturally, I'm a little speechless... 'oh no it's ok, he was AIMING FOR SOMEONE ELSE'
#21
Not a teacher, but a kid walked I to my class one day and literally just said "sorry I'm late, I didn't want to be here". He wasn't wrong I suppose.
#22
A kid came in late from lunch, but handed me a half dozen fresh tamales from his family’s tamaleria, and I was 9 months pregnant, so obviously he didn’t get in trouble.
Oopsydaisy 2 years ago
Tamaleria. I did not even know that was a thing. My spell heckler certainly doesn't know it's a thing. Great word!
#23
Bear in the backyard. No access gate. Animal control had to tranq it from the room and drag it through the house. Made the news. Got to retake the test I missed after sending her the news article.
#24
I was the student...my neighbor had a really social goat, and she figured out how to escape her pen in order to come over and hang out. She escaped and followed me to the bus stop, and when the bus came, she tried to follow me onto it. I couldn't actually get on the bus without her being right behind me, so I had to get off, bring her home, and call my dad to bring me to school.
#25
Had a college algebra teacher show up late or no show almost every class. The other students thought it was hilarious because if there’s no teacher for 15 mins you can leave. So we had no class a huge chunk of the semester and it really aggravated me. This is preyoutube and I was not understanding the math at all and the girl trying to tutor me didn’t speak English well and my grade for the first time ever in my life was suffering (and I’m paying for the class)
One day, teacher showed up about 20 mins late and I’m one of the few people who didn’t take off early and he angry walks in, slams his briefcase on the desk and says “I apologize for this semester. I have cancer. I’m dying” and then left.
8I
..I don’t know what happened to him tbh
Samantha Lomb 2 years ago
This is the fault of the college for not putting him on sick leave and getting another instructor
#26
Not teacher, but pupil. I was in a car crash on my way to school. About 5 cars involved because some jerk decided to overtake us since we slowed down coming to a turn. So a trip to the hospital to get checked, and then school 3 hours late. I had small cuts all over my face from glass flying everywhere and had a really sore shoulder, but my teachers wouldn't believe me until police showed up because they forgot to get a statement from me. Apparently some of the other involved people died and the jerk got 8 years in prison.
Oopsydaisy 2 years ago
I would have just gone home. Shock makes you really tired. Poor kid probably needed to sleep.
#27
A guy in my college class missed class one day. The next day he came in with his eye covered up and medical paperwork in hand. Apparently he got pecked in the eye by a chicken.
#28
In my hometown if you walked into anywhere late and said the phrase "Sorry, grain train" you were never challenged. It was extremely common for 50+ carriage trains to run through the middle of town.
Two_rolling_black_eyes 2 years ago
My middle school was on railroad tracks with the main building on one side and all of the sports fields, parking lots, etc on the other. "I had gym last period" was an accepted excuse to being late to classes because it was quite common to get caught by a train. They built a pedestrian tunnel under the tracks after I graduated HS. Side note - its hard to learn with train whistles going off because there's a school sidewalk crossing the tracks.
#29
My best story ever! I taught in a hard core inner city school. My student comes in at 10:30. I was like, dude, where were you. Oh, my bus was late. Yah, no. Why would your bus be three hours late. Well Miss, there was a drive by shooting. OMG are you okay? Someone shot at the bus? No ma’am, a kid shot a gun out of the bus. We got pulled over. The cops had to search everyone. The kid with the gun was literally the last kid to be searched. True story, you can’t make this s**t up.
#30
We had an exam in my class and the teacher got a message from a student saying that he was going to be late because his car had a flat tire (the student was known to party), the teacher didn't think it could be true, so as a joke the teacher asked him to bring the tire back. He brought the flat tire back in the middle of the exam. Needless to say, the professor didn't expect that.
#31
Obligatory I'm not a teacher. My Dad, who was a teacher , was late himself because his car got surrounded by sheep and he couldn't get out. Joys of living in Wales.
Kira Okah 2 years ago
Also live in Wales, rurally. Had this happen before too, and sheep crossing (that road has railway crossing type lights for that one), loose sheep delaying the bus, late for class because of cow blocking the road, sheep on the rail line made me miss my train connection in Cardiff. Places get used to that one, it's so common it's rarely a lie.
#32
Flock of wild turkeys in the road. Not always school, but this happened more than once in my life.
For those of you who have never found yourselves in this situation: there is no way out of it. Wild turkeys will move when they damn well decide to do so, and only then.
#33
When I was in HS our apartment in Brooklyn, NY was broken into. Thankfully nobody was home, but all of our electronics were stolen. My computer (had a desktop with a big screen at the time) was also stolen which was connected to the same outlet as my alarm clock. Reset the time and went to bed not realizing I needed to reset the alarm too, showed up to my Sat SAT prep about 2 hrs late, explained to the teacher what happened, and she met with me during the week to go over materials. She was a rockstar
#34
I taught college English. A student suddenly stopped showing up and wasn't responding to emails. I googled him just to make sure he hadn't died or something, and I found his mugshot. He was in jail.
#35
A kid’s apartment burned down overnight. He was a little late, but still came.
Andy Acceber 2 years ago
Sometimes, kids don't know how to handle trauma. There was a horrible situation at the middle school my mom worked at where a mom died. Her son went to the bus stop and went to school anyway. He didn't know what else to do.
#36
One of my organ students told me he was late arriving for his lesson because he got stuck behind a lengthy funeral procession en route to the cemetery.
I knew he was telling the truth because I had played the organ for the service earlier that morning and the church was packed.
Vanta Black 2 years ago
How long was that procession if the teacher was able to make it to the lesson on time after playing at the funeral but the kid was late?
#37
Taught a group of seniors first period. It was towards the end of the year. I had a class of around 30 and only 5 were there when the bell rang. Halfway through class the rest of them show up. They went out to Cracker Barrel for breakfast and brought me some back. All was forgiven.
#38
The child missed my first-hour class, notes said car accident on the way to school and would be coming late. The kid comes for 2nd hour, has pictures on his phone of the ROLLOVER accident! WTF, kid, go home. Rest. Take care of yourself.
Aileen Grist 2 years ago
Sometimes just carrying on as normal is the best way to deal with trauma for children (and adults)
#39
My best friend and I used to roller skate to school and one day we both forgot to put our shoes in our backpacks. So we skated to the vice-principal’s office and got to skip first period to go home for shoes.
We stopped at Taco Bell on the way back for breakfast, because we figured we were already excused.
#40
“MTV paid me $50 to fill my backpack with cement and carry it around for the day.” I accepted that excuse. Student later regretted it, as a replacement backpack and college textbooks far exceeded $50. But he got his moment of fame and I didn’t penalize him for his tardy. Gotta live a little.
Edit: someone found a newspaper article on this. Turns out it was $200. He “earned” $100 for the first day and $100 when he returned the next day. I remembered $50, but it was 19 years ago. So ha, I was RIGHT to believe him! He still lost all his stuff (thanks cement), and I remember him telling me it wasn’t worth it.
What do you think ?
Adrian 2 years ago
Me. I had a very important exam at uni. I was late drove into the car park, out of the car, slammed the car door, raced off to the exam. Realised I'd left my notes and text books in car and its an open book exam. Damn. Raced back to car: its locked and keys are in the car. Root around in nearby garden bed and find decent sized rock aiming to break the cheapest and smallest window, the triangular one on back door. Whack! no good so whack harder. It works window breaks but I'd done it so hard my hand with the rock went through too and badly gashed my thumb and back of my hand. No time to lose. I race into the exam room dripping copious amounts of blood. Examiner races over and tries to find first-aid kit - can't find one. Strange as this is also the sports hall, but got a heap of paper towels and wrap that around my hand. Works for a while, but eventually blood starts oozing out and getting smeared all over the exam paper. Professor was so shocked I was allowed to sit exam again.
Jo Choto 2 years ago
I was part of a program to try and help young students (12-15) with issues (legal, behaviour, drug/alcohol, non-attendance, etc.) make it to graduation. One girl just kept not showing up and when she did, she would fall asleep. Turned out that her mother was a night sex worker who had previously been jailed for leaving her minor daughter unattended all night every night. So she took her daughter to work with her every night, which involved standing on the streets all night. Kid was exhausted. It was so, so sad.
Adrian 2 years ago
Me. I had a very important exam at uni. I was late drove into the car park, out of the car, slammed the car door, raced off to the exam. Realised I'd left my notes and text books in car and its an open book exam. Damn. Raced back to car: its locked and keys are in the car. Root around in nearby garden bed and find decent sized rock aiming to break the cheapest and smallest window, the triangular one on back door. Whack! no good so whack harder. It works window breaks but I'd done it so hard my hand with the rock went through too and badly gashed my thumb and back of my hand. No time to lose. I race into the exam room dripping copious amounts of blood. Examiner races over and tries to find first-aid kit - can't find one. Strange as this is also the sports hall, but got a heap of paper towels and wrap that around my hand. Works for a while, but eventually blood starts oozing out and getting smeared all over the exam paper. Professor was so shocked I was allowed to sit exam again.
Jo Choto 2 years ago
I was part of a program to try and help young students (12-15) with issues (legal, behaviour, drug/alcohol, non-attendance, etc.) make it to graduation. One girl just kept not showing up and when she did, she would fall asleep. Turned out that her mother was a night sex worker who had previously been jailed for leaving her minor daughter unattended all night every night. So she took her daughter to work with her every night, which involved standing on the streets all night. Kid was exhausted. It was so, so sad.
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