Things from My Inbox: Call and Response

It must be midterms. And if anything should bring out a special edition of Things from My Inbox, midterms and grades should do it. Having only just - thirty minutes ago - given out midterm grades, naturally e-mails like this one are starting to roll in:

I was just wondering if you would be able to fill me in on why my class grade is a 79 when I feel that I have gotten fairly high grades on all>assignments and received an 85 on the test

Of course, it's not all a downside, since it gives me an opportunity to reply with things like this:

I'd be glad to explain. I take all the scores and add them up as described in the syllabus. When I total the total number of points you've received and divide them by the total number of points currently available in the course, the percentage I get is 79. When you total them up do you come up with something different?

Good times.