This is a short tribute to the retiring chair of the University of Montana Psychology Department, Nabil Haddad. I took the Psychology of Learning from Nabil in 1982. Like most limericks, this one works best if read aloud to a large group of people who have been drinking.

Ode to Haddad

There once was a man named Nabil

He could have invented the wheel

But he came to Montana

With his pet rat Santana

Cause psychology was his big deal

 

You see Nabil had a deep down yearning

And a passion to teach psych of learning

He would trap rats in mazes

Then watch them for days-z

While his cigarettes, well, they were burning

 

Some say that Nabil, he was scary

With a temper that could be flary

But he held it all in

Till he could say, with a grin

I’ve got tenure just like my friend Larry

 

We knew old Nabil had passion

That overshadowed his poor sense of fashion

No more cigarettes smoked

A Jordanian cow-poke

He stopped smoking so as to not cash in

 

Now Nabil is quite keen and patrician

He’s retiring of his volition

There’s a secret he keeps

From all of his peeps

That he wants to become a clinician

 

This story it ends with a flair

With Nabil giving up the Psych chair

So calm and serene

His office now clean

Well wishes to him—if you dare