How to Know Everything: Dan's Guide to Unlimited Knowledge

I am a substitute teacher.

What? When did this happen?

Recently, my friends. Recently.

Anyway, I enjoy it quite a little bit. It can be very stressful, especially since I often don't know what I'm going to teach until 10 minutes before I have to teach it.

On my very first day, the regular teacher forgot to leave a lesson plan, so I had to ad-lib off the cuff, if you will. It was like "whose line is it anyway?" except not funny... So, basically like "whose line is it anyway?" In short, that first day was a disaster, but I learnt me some important things that have made every subsequent day great.

I realized the secret to success in teaching (at least 50% of which is literally just showing up), and I am going to share it with you all. Are you ready? Here it is: when you are searching for a fact and it is alluding you, make something up. That is the best way to know everything about everything. I have come up with facts like these on the spot:

1. Only 3% of the earths water is drinkable.
2. MLA formatting was invented by the Holy Roman Empire in response to a plagiarized heresy
3. Wikipedia is a reliable source for information
4. Piracy laws don't exist, it is just a scare tactic
5. 90% of success is just showing up (i.e. substitute teaching... this one might be true)*
6. The People's Revolutionary Party (which may or may not actually exist) is currently in charge of the Ukraine
7. Most plants reproduce asexually
8. Pennsylvania went for Taft in 1876
9. Plants communicate using complex bio-chemical interactions

Some of the facts above may happen to be true, but I'm not really sure which ones. However, if you say them with confidence, the children will believe.

*If you read this and thought to yourself, "wait, did he just use the same joke that he used a few sentences earlier?" No. I didn't. You misread.