When a moron is in charge

Tim Torkildson is a lot more sanguine about his firing than I would be in his place. Heck, he's a lot more sanguine about it than I am.

This week I was fired for writing a blog about homophones for an educational website.

“I’m letting you go because I can’t trust you” said Clarke Woodger, my boss and the owner of Nomen Global Language Center. “This blog about homophones was the last straw. Now our school is going to be associated with homosexuality.”

As Torkildson noted in his blog, homophones have nothing to do with homosexuality. Nothing. Really. Look it up.

But maybe the greatest (?) part of the story is that the boss didn't act precipitately. Oh, no.

“I had to look up the word” [Woodger] continued, “because I didn’t know what the hell you were talking about. We don’t teach this kind of advanced stuff to our students, and it’s extremely inappropriate. Can you have your desk cleaned out by eleven this morning? I’ll have your check ready.”

Yup: he investigated the matter, then unjustly fired Torkildson.

Woodger owns a school that bills itself as "America's English Language School", yet he doesn't know what a homophone is. Worse, even after he supposedly finds out, he still thinks it has something to do with homosexuality.

If you know a student at that school, you might want to advise him or her to reconsider his or her enrollment. After all, the guy running it doesn't sound terribly conversant with English.

In fact, he sounds like a moron. Which is not the same as sounding like another word but having a different meaning, which is what homophone means. No, Woodger sounds like a moron because, well, he might be one.