…get distracted by the chalk squeak and forget the lecture.

...GET DISTRACTED BY THE CHALK SQUEAK AND FORGET THE LECTURE.

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You’re there, deep in the heart of a packed lecture hall. The air hums with intellectual energy, the professor is dropping knowledge bombs, and your pen is flying across the page, trying to capture every gem. You’re fully immersed, dissecting complex theories, making connections, feeling that exhilarating rush of understanding. Then it happens. A sudden, piercing, unbelievably loud squeal from the chalk against the board. It’s like a record scratch in your brain. Your focus shatters instantly. You physically wince, maybe even shudder. For a solid ten seconds, your entire mental landscape is dominated by that awful sound. And just like that, the thread of the lecture is gone. You snap back, blinking, trying to recall the last five words spoken, frantically scanning your notes to see if you missed the pivotal concept. You glance around, a silent acknowledgment passing between you and the person next to you, a shared moment of auditory agony and intellectual derailment. This wasn't just a minor blip; it was a total system reboot. If you didn’t spend a significant chunk of a core lecture wrestling your concentration back from the tyranny of a rogue chalk squeak, did you truly experience the unique chaos and concentration required to thrive here? It's these tiny, absurd, perfectly human moments of distraction that often define the journey, etching themselves into our memories long after the theorems fade.