She's still gunning for me

At the start of the class, Karen came over to ask whether I'd been all right after saying goodbye to them last week and to tell me not to get stressed. We both went up to queue at Joan's desk at the same time, and Karen asked me about work and mayoral duties. That had Joan asking whether I was the Mayor's son; she'd noticed my surname was the same. Nicki and I both did our Databases mock exams tonight, then made a start on the real exam. As Joan was printing the real exams for us, I innocently asked her whether time allowed was 3 hours.

"No, two and a half!" she said with some heat. "You're trying to finish me off, aren't you?"

As we've always been told not to hand in an unfinished exercise, I then asked whether we were to take home the print-outs we did tonight. Joan was appalled at the very mention. "No, this is the exam! All papers do not leave this room! You are trying to finish me off."

In the 35 remaining minutes of class, I actually got the whole exam done with over five minutes still to go. I handed it in to Joan, and she said she'd give it back to me at the top of next week's class for me to check.

On the way out of the college Karen and Di ribbed me about how I was flying through the course at a faster pace than them. I remarked that when Joan had been giving them their briefing (they started on Databases tonight) Mariana had apparently been winding her up. "She was asking questions," grinned Di. "Joan hates being asked questions." I shared the experience of that I'd had; Di and Karen both had similar tales to tell.