Foresight minds wide magic imagery

I don't do foreign languages. That includes algebra, french, shorthand, anything which bascially isn't English.

Today Tooli sat Advanced Higher Mathematics... suffice to say that I can't understand one tiny bit of this paper, not even the written English bits, especially the bit which says, "Hence and otherwise...." Because I don't know what the rest of the sentence actually translates as.

When I was a college, way back in the 80's, study was difficult, not least because we had to squeeze our big shoulder pads, and high hair into quite small classes.

I took Shorthand as one of the 8 subjects I covered in each of my first two years. Yes, back in the day, we worked hard!

After a couple of months, my Shorthand teacher referred me to the Optician, my transcription of shorthand symbols was so awful that she thought perhaps I was having trouble with my eyesight. Optician sent me back to class with a note. "No problem with eyesight, just really bad at shorthand".

She hated us. Especially after a translation of "Fair wear, and tear", as "far, waar and tar". One day we sat in class, awaiting the arrival of Herr Bruek as we called her, (Apologies Ms Bruek - but you terrified us), but she never turned up.

After 15 minutes, of waiting in strictest silence, my exuberance at not having to face her distain at my efforts got the better of me and I leapt into Herr Bruek mode, and complete with Ministry of Funny walks frog march took the class.

Yelping instructions of consonant sounds in a German accent, "kayyyyyyy vayyyyyyyyy hayyyyyyy yaaaaaaayyyyyyyyy, You Vil Do Ze Lines Now" I insisted the class do "ze work", and amidst giggles, the class turned silent, and turned, and there was Herr Bruek, at the door.

I have no idea how long she had been stood there, but I slunk back to my seat and hid behind my transcription book and prepared myself for a couple of months of hell.

But weirdly, as she settled into the class, I swear she there was a smirk on her face, and classes lightened somewhat, and finally by the end of the year, I was able to read a line of her shorthand and it made sense!