Why I should not be allowed to speak in discussion classes

My Asia in Motion professor probably already thought I was weird, but today was the first time it actually disrupted his class for extended periods of time. From the time he walked into the door until class was over I kept interrupting him and turning the conversation away from the topic quite by accident.

For example. I raised my hand at the beginning of class because I didn't see him walk in with a stack of midterm papers to ask if he's managed to grade them. Unfortunately, his back was to me for three minutes, so he was already starting into the intro portion of his lecture when he finally turned around and noticed I was there.

So we talk about the paper, and why he's been so busy, and then I assume he's headed back into his lecture, so when there's a pause I yell out the word he started class with.

"SOJOURNING!"

He stares at me. "What?"

"...sojourning..."

"Oh. No, we're going to talk about your next paper instead."

>.<; Everything goes normally until we get into a conversation about language, and why different regions speak slightly differently, and Maddo makes the point that languages are subject to trends: if an important person uses a certain word or phrase, it becomes popular. (For example. Old king of Spain used to lisp, and now Spaniards can't pronounce their own language. >>;) She then likens it to trends in cars. Sometimes rounded is in style, other times square.

"Personally, I can't wait for the fins to come back in style." A few people giggle.
The professor blinks at me. "...Why?"
I blink at him. "Because I like them." A few people giggle harder. Unfortunately, one of those people was raising her hand, so the professor, in a desperate attempt to move on, called on her.

She bursts into laughter. "I can't even remember what I was going to say!"

The professor flounders, then doggedly moves ahead. I feel bad, apologize to the girl, and spend the next two minutes shaking quietly with laughter and trying not to make eye contact with anyone.

Not five minutes later we're discussing communication problems, and Maddo relates an anecdote where she and her roomie got in a fight because of a pair of "slippers." In Hawaii, that word meant flipflops. Here, they are houseshoes. I had a similar story, so raised my hand. "We'll let Wren have the last word," said the professor. (Big mistake.)

"Where I grew up, we called flipflops thongs. When I moved to Hawaii, that did not fly." Class busts up laughing. Girl two rows to left looks at me and goes "me too!" "I would say it, and underwear wouldn't even cross my mind" I replied. She nodded.

The professor, standing up in front of everyone, muses quietly to himself: "This is the first time in my teaching career underwear has been a topic of discussion."

And that is exactly why I should not be allowed to participate in discussions.