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"You cannot be Sirius!" said the astronomer who pointed his telescope in the wrong direction. From the British Physics Journal, Physics Education, July 1996.

There were two students who were taking chemistry and who were doing pretty well. In fact, going into the final they had solid A's. These two friends were so confident that the weekend before finals week (even though the Chem final was on Monday), they decided to go away skiing with some friends. They had a great time; in fact, such a good time that they didn't make it back to campus until Monday afternoon. They went to the chemistry professor and explained to him why they missed the final. They told him that they went away for the weekend and had planned to come back in time to study, but that they had a flat tire on the way back. They said that they didn't have a spare and couldn't get help for a long time and so were late getting back to campus. The professor thought this over and then agreed that they could make up the final on the following day. The two were elated and relieved. They studied that night and went in the next day at the appointed time. The professor placed them in separate rooms and handed each of them a test booklet and told them to begin. They looked at the first problem, which was something simple about molarity and solutions and was worth 5 points. "Cool" they thought, "This is going to be easy. "They did that problem and then turned the page. They were unprepared, however, for what they saw on the next page. It read: