/lit/ - Literature

>Participating in a student symposium
>don't really want to but someone told me that it will help my grad school application if I have experience in this
>Get up to read my paper in front of a room full of professors and students
>start reading, someone yells "SPEAK UP!"
>the host gives me a lavalier microphone to put on my shirt
>start reading my paper
>everything seems fine
>get to the question/discussion period
>no one really has anything to say
>a couple professors ask some easy leading questions but I can't think of anything to say because I think I fucked up somehow
>say "uh" a lot and don't even answer their questions, just sort of trail off...
>the moderator/host plays me off as gracefully as he can as I go to sit down before the audience has started clapping
>have to get back up again because I realize I didn't take off the lavalier mic
>afterwards my professor comes and says that I read my paper too fast and mumbled so no one actually understood what I was saying
>I will forever be known as "that" undergrad


Sorry for the blog post but this is probably the only place that can empathize with the academic suicide I just committed.