Leaving college for the first time is weird.  There’s not a campus-wide End of the Year Assembly or a shared rejoicing in the hallways. You probably won’t run into your classmates in your neighborhood come June, either. Well, maybe you will, considering half of this campus is from “just outside of Boston,” New York City, or Southern California (51st thing I learned freshman year?).

As the rest of your due dates and exams begin to approach, you find it hard to keep track of the days and times when your friends are leaving, when their parents are taking you to brunch, and when you’ll see them next. It’s a weird feeling, especially after spending months hanging out, going out, and studying together. These are things we’ve all just gotten used to. [Read more →]

Freshman year, where did you go? As reading period continues, I’ve procrastinated taken some time to reflect upon the past few months. Here are a few things I’ve learned as I tearfully bid adieu to my first year at Brown. A special shoutout to my predecessors Slev and Neil Armstrong Jason for writing previous years’ incarnations of this post; some of the items on their lists were just too real to avoid in this year’s version (see asterisks). Good to see the freshman experience remains (mostly) unchanged.

1. The right hand door of Jo’s does not open, despite my persistence both before and after midnight.

2. Wednesday nights are a thing. So are Thursday morning classes. (Mornin’, City Politics).

3. I am not part of the FishCo generation.

4. Rock, not Scili.

6. The housing lottery stresses me out more than anything at Brown, but I guess that’s not saying much.

7. Hillel is arguably the nicest building on campus.

8. Wandering around Keeney on a Friday or Saturday after 1 a.m. is great fun. If you sit in a hallway long enough, you are guaranteed to meet new friends.

9.  It’s a week, not a weekend.

10. Talk to your roommate. He/she has much more friend potential than it seems–and even if you don’t become inseparable, they’ll always be there for you.*

11. The RISD Museum is on Waterman and Benefit. You should go.

12. Make “class friends.”

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Spring Weekend lesson brought to you by Furby: bring a cup (drank)

The slip and slide on Wriston has soapy foam on it: Simple, but now that we know we are definitely rinsing off before class/bringing a towel. The foam party was so two years ago…

Marching bands are sick:  I didn’t think there would be much excitement around opening acts, but getting to the concert early on Friday meant dancing like a maniac for a solid half hour or more. Students got down on the cement with the drummers and pretended they were at Mardi Gras. They made eye contact with the trumpeter and almost got decapitated by the chick with the cymbals… and it was worth every minute. What Cheer? Brigade should come back every year. They are that brassy beat that’s missing from our lives.

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Spring Week is mysterious to freshmen. By this point in our second semester, few things still make us feel like freshmen; we have studying regimes, and there are currently young ADOCH pre-frosh wandering around, reminding us that we’re not even close to as confused as they are. We seem to have it all together.

But Spring Week(end) reminds us that we have not actually been here all that long. Because if you don’t know who Binder is, you don’t know anything.

It’s also difficult to find out things about Spring Week(end).

“Why is it Spring Week? What are the week elements?”

“Because it’s a whole week!!! And it’s the best week ever.”

That is really about as much you can get out of anyone about The Greatness of Spring Weekend. I’m thinking this has to do with the magic really being that inexplicable, and also intoxication reasons.

According to Wikipedia, which is always the solution, here is the most important element of the next six days:

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As the all-nighter delirium sets in, your Louis eggs may turn into bear heads.

A few weeks ago, I did the SciLi challenge. No, not that SciLi challenge—think of this as the nighttime, SciLi version of the Ratty challenge. I spent all night in the SciLi, and capped it off with a little Louis. Like the Ratty challenge, my all-nighter consisted of food, some work, more food, and a hallucination or two.

For some, the all-nighter is a routine experience the night before that weekly problem set is due; for others, it’s only done on weekend nights when partying til the a.m. I had never pulled a real all-nighter before, so for the sake of journalism (and the fact that I had to finish two problem sets by the next morning), I did the new SciLi challenge and recorded my experiences gradual descent into delirium.

9:00 p.m. Guys, I think we can finish this problem set before midnight!

Spoiler alert: This did not happen.
Problems completed: 0/6

9:28 p.m. What the fuck is this shit? Physics? Ain’t nobody got time for that.

10:00 p.m. “Sorry y’all, we have this room reserved.” Really? You actually have the nerve to—okay fine, whatever. We move to another SciLi study room.

11:00 p.m. “Hey guys, sorry but we have this room—” Reserved, yeah, we get it, alright? We move to a third study room.

11:44 p.m. I GOT ONE! I GOT A PROBLEM GUYS!

Problems completed: 1/6

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So, you got stuck with a shitty housing lottery number? When you inform your friends of your fate, they probably start using scary words like “Summer Assignment” and “Perkins.” Some people have even told you that they’re thinking of sharing a lounge with random people. While that’s all good and terrifying, we’re here to offer some more creative possibilities for housing accommodations next year if your worst case scenario ends up becoming your reality.

The microscopic gap between City Sports and Kinkos right off Thayer:

Hey, Providence fire department says it’s small, but we think it’s cozy! And you can’t beat the location – you’re basically on Thayer. Does Bajas accept FlexPoints?

Leung Family Gallery: The sub-free, quiet dorm option for summer assignment!

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ResLife recommends you study hundreds of floor plans. Because that is the level of insanity the lottery requires.

This is an incredibly important PSA reminding everyone that lottery applications are due this Friday, March 22 at noon. Do not miss this deadline! If you do, you and your tragic housing group will be automatically entered in the Summer Housing Process. ResLife provides a step-by-step account of that process, but it can be summarized as being officially fucked over for housing. So again, submit your housing lottery application by FRIDAY!

As you’ve probably heard, there have been significant changes to the housing options available for rising sophomores, who are now part of a separate lottery from rising juniors and seniors. As you have also probably heard, no one actually seems to know how exactly this will affect the lottery; some will tell you the Class of 2016 has been saved from the brutality that would have been, while others offer the opinion that they have been royally screwed over (Perkins as a sophomore, anyone?). It doesn’t help that ResLife is intent on sending out very confusing emails and maintaining several different webpages that offer different sets of information. Example: the initial lottery information email told students to check the “front desk in North Wayland” to verify their semester levels. Um, ResLife has been located in Grad Center E since the beginning of this school year. You would think that they would know…

We do our best to provide useful lottery information and links after the jump:

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Full disclosure: the only thing I rekindled this past break was a steamy affair with Netflix Instant. Yet the frequent occurrence of ex-sex (in both real life and in the television I watched with… well, on, my online lover) sparked my interest in rekindling romances with past flames. I embarked on a mission to learn more about this steamy illicit  phenomenon, interviewing 15 anonymous individuals. From their generous (and explicit) contributions, I hope to provide our readers with some examples of this common phenomenon… and perhaps a future ex-sex guide.  [Read more →]

Wait was high school like this? I forget.

Thanksgiving is just around the corner, and for most freshmen this means first-time reunions with old friends are imminent. Seeing old friends is exciting! Remember that time [insert classic high school memory]? Such good times. Reuniting is going to be great.

But you should know that it’s probably not going to be. After returning from Homecoming weekend at my old boarding school, I’ve decided that nostalgia is kind of a dumb and overrated emotion. It’s easy to get confused about what high school was actually like with all that Alicia Silverstone, Heath Ledger, and more recently, Josh Schwartz have told us: that it was awesome, dramatic, and full of beautiful people.

It was not like that. First of all, you probably attended classes if you’re now at Brown, and you also did some homework. Also, pimples.

So you go back, and there’s that uncomfortable party that everyone goes to with a certain set of expectations:

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Much like our elusive Luna Lovebad, I went to SexPowerGod last Saturday. However, the experience was not nearly as sexy for me, considering the only ‘person’ I hooked up with was the toilet.  At 4 a.m., I Skyped my mother so she could lecture me (from across state lines, mind you) about the error of my wild ways. Mommy reminded me that I did not come to Brown for the sole purpose of getting shitfaced every day  weekend.  Are you feeling particularly exhausted during the week? Are you struggling to put the necessary amount of effort into your studies?  My fellow freshmen, here are some tell-tale signs that you are stuck in orientation la-la land and probably would benefit from taking a night—or even a weekend—off:

• If you are in danger of flunking ENGN9.
• If it takes you five shots to get the same level of inebriation that one shot got you to in high school. [Read more →]