"My TFs have all been kind of cool," says Trygve V. Throntfeldt '01.

Professors come under fire occasionally as well, primarily for showing up late to their exams, often with the tests in hand.

"There's nothing we can do about late professors," O'Connell sighs. "We've been trying for years."

Other difficulties, from construction noise to cramped desks, are also mentioned by students as classic exam distractions, but none with great frequency. Even rarer are incidents of actual cheating.

Although Throntfeldt postulates that "it seems like it would be pretty easy to cheat on an exam," O'Connell, who has been conduct- ing exams for about 12 years, says she's seenvery few cases.

"In 12 years [we've had] perhaps two,"O'Connell says. "And they were not seriousinfractions. The students are very, very honest."

While most students may diligently go abouttheir business as proctors, who are recruited froma pool of former educators and Harvard employees,silently observe, there is one exam proctor inparticular who has made a name for himself.

Thomas F. Gorman, who is in his fifth year as aproctor, is well-known for his'left-field/right-field' baseball analogies duringexams.

"He's a lovely person," says O'Connell. "I knowhe's famous, and we're trying to curb him."

However, O'Connell admits that Gorman's styleserves a purpose.

"He's exceptionally efficient," she says.

Gorman himself has a light-hearted view of hisrole as a proctor.

"My biggest help is to try to use humor, forseveral reasons, the biggest of which is to try torelieve some tension," says Gorman. "I like itwhen I see people smile."

Yet as Throntfeldt points out, even goodproctors can't always make for a great atmosphere.

"It's mostly just people breathing heavily andsweating," he says