Upbringing is heavy in how a person develops. Could turn into a smart person. Or an idiot. Case in point.
Our roommate in college was absolutely relentless about giving us unsolicited advice throughout the day, whether it be going to class or staying at the dorm chilling or even, dare I say, at the party with a group of broads. A brief example before the major one that I will tell you in a moment, is that all of us one semester had a class together based in economics and finance. During each class, this guy would raise his hand, and when good old man professor Jacobs called on the sucker, guess what. This kid would profess about money and investing and which companies were good until the cows came home.
I distinctly remember him being heckled by a guy who sat below him (we were seated so you had to climb stairs to sit in the desks, as it was a lecture style class). He looked down on the guy, gave a slight grin, and I kid you not looked at the professor square in the eyes and winked. It was a wink that said, "I'm about to do justice and set Tex here straight." He spoke for a solid fifteen minutes, pontificating over how important it was that the guy he was looking down on, staring down and not for a second breaking eye contact should be careful to stop telling "these kids" bad investment advice, as it would "hurt their chances of succeeding in the real world."
It was absolutely astonishing. Professor didn't care whatsoever. Dare I say, he took advantage of the situation to work on his paper, researching and taking notes for it and moving the ball forward. Probably in the professors mind, our roommate was putting points on the board for him. Good ol' roommate had his fun setting this guy down. He put it down, and professor just looked up after a brief silence that seemed like forever, ten or so seconds, than looked up and said, 'yes very good roommate, good work'. Don't get me wrong, professor was good, he just didn't care what our roommate had to say. Reasonable man, why care what his dumb students thought was right or wrong. Come exam time, we'd be judged by the exams. And judged our roommate was.
You see, while we were studying in the room and getting stuff done, our roommate would not stop talking about how we would 1). be doing it all wrong and 2). how we should be doing it. He would get us to all stop what we were doing, and then we'd look up and listen to him. This happened the first study session. We didn't want to leave him out. Maybe we should have. But instead, we tolerated it, and let him stay, but we agreed we would just ignore him and continue studying. As if he wasn't even there. We thought he would get the message. He didn't. He keep talking and talking, doing stupid stuff like on one occasion he took the pencil from my quest friend who was also in the class's hand, wrote some half-processed calculation on it, and broke the pencil. Didn't even bother sharpening it again, just gave it back. I had to apologize to my friend.
Test day. Exam day. Finally here. We all sit down. I'm absolutely sure I would have gotten an A+ instead of an A, because we all had to study harder thanks to this armchair economist spouting his 'masterful confessions' on us over how the economy and finance were 'what he pined for since' he 'was a stout young lad.'
He played it very, very casually, but I knew his test score did not come back to corroborate his 'masterful confessions.' I could tell because I had been sitting a few seats over. At one point I looked up and he had this look of downright indignation. I don't know what he was thinking, but it could have been contempt for the professor's 'short-sightedness of teaching his students the basics, and not subjects of higher capacity.' Yeah. Sure bra. Near the end that's why he was sweating. The girl sitting next to him was disgusted, because I have to admit he did have a musk at times, due to him not showering. Said it was a waste of time to him. Apparently, it mattered to her though dipshit.
On and on this went, until the end of the semester, when we learned he passed. I never told my other roommates, but he thought we wouldn't be back after Thanksgiving so soon, as he stayed to do 'extra studying for the final crusade of finance'. His tests were on the table. F. C-. D. He didn't know I was there when I got back, as I was quiet and I am sure he was watching lots of stuff on his computer in his room. I can't say that he was watching girls do the nasty, but I can say that the sounds were not of a finance seminar or action flick either.
We finish the semester. He says that he'll 'take me under his wing to learn from the master' and show me how to buy silver. I knew it wouldn't be good, but whatever, I played along. Keep in mind this was at at time when there was a silver bubble, sometime along 2012, if you remember. Well, we go to a pawn shop to buy silver, as per his spectacular suggestion. And spectacular it was. He pulled out slightly over $1600 cash that he had saved up for three years, and bought silver bullion coins, as he said the economy would not be doing well and it would be good to have silver in case tough times 'were a comin'. In exchanging the cash for the bullion, he took it out and waved it in the store slowly so that everyone could see. He specifically made it in $20s instead of $100s at the bank when he withdrew it so that it would look like a fatter stack of cash when he pulled it out. I was like what the fuck.
So was his advice or elaborate financial forecast any good? Well, you guessed it, not even a few days later the price dropped from around $40 per silver bullion coin to around $12. He said that the economy is hard to figure out but that he had made a technical mistake in reading his charts and that 'as captain the brunt of the effort is upon his mantle'. To this day I do not know what he was thinking, but what I can say is that it was both the stupidest thing I have heard anyone say, or do, with money.