One storied afternoon, Vona was trekking downtown on The Trusty Steed (his Chevy Cavalier) to do smartsy-fartsy curriculum schtuff for the county when his phone rang. The caller id revealed a bad omen in itself: Ms. King on the line. Calls from the monarch herself were rare legends, and Ms. King called him by his first name confirming his earlier suspicion. She delivered the news that upon reviewing his request for his permanent certification, someone at the state department felt one of his graduate classes was no longer qualified and his certification was denied. Ms King confirmed that there was no hope, he was terminated. Frantically, Vona started to pull together job interviews while simultaneously badgering everyone he could think of about the certification, including his major professors at USF.
The following day, he received a call from the state saying they were going to make a special consideration due to the circumstances (definitely *not* because they messed up or anything). Vona, so relieved to have his degree at last, thanked them aggressively for their generosity and refrained from snarkily adding that they were just certifying him for his hard work. Vona was reinstated by Ms. King shortly after and in the end was only fired for a single day.
