Would this be easy to trigger without destroying yourself from the glass explosion? It might be hard to argue spontaneous pickle combustion. Hmmm. To the explosives storage to find out! Anyway, this leads us into . . .

THE NEW HOMEWORK: In 40 words or less, what is the most elaborate AND realistic excuse you can come up with for your failure at an extremely mundane task? Your task can be anything realistic and mundane, but it must be clear what you failed at in your forty words.

Your answer can be visual or written, but it must consist of no more than forty words - anything else will be deleted. Email your homework in with your name and location with the subject line "HOMEWORK: EXCUSES" to be received no later than Thursday, 1/5, at noon ET. Best answer wins and will be posted here next Friday (with the following week's assignment to be handed out then). Enjoy.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
THE LAST HOMEWORK: Based on the 'happiness and you' comic, the assignment was: "Your assignment is to write two memoirs for yourself - each consisting of exactly six words. One memoir should be purely idealistic. One memoir should be purely realistic. Both should capture you and your life for others to read and understand. What are your two memoirs?"

The memoirs were both heart-warming and heart-wrenching, and many splashed a much needed dose of humor into them (and many - surprisingly - had a dose of dinosaurs). There were far too many to compile, but you can check out the assortment of excellent homework answers to get a sense of the best. After heavy consideration of them all - and it gets harder to choose each time - I felt the best answer came from Richard in Aberdeen:

I took the road less traveled.
I starved to death while lost.

Which is which is left up to you to decide. Well done, Richard! You will receive a small prize from me. Thanks to everyone else for submitting a speech. Enjoy reading through the many great answers.