Slowly but surely new students always catch on to the Washington University in St. Louis way of speaking. For example, I had never heard the word “sketchy” before I came to Wash U. Three years later, I am perfectly comfortable with calling a situation “quite sketch.” Some words, like “sketchy,” are not specific to Wash. U. Other phrases like “the clock stick” may give freshmen a bit more trouble. In cases of verbal confusion, refer to this handy guide or upper-classmen to help decode the language of Wash. U.

Fro Yo – The shortened form of frozen yogurt. Specifically, it refers to the frozen yogurt available to students at Bear Mart inside the Wohl Student Center. Don’t be alarmed if your roommate disappears at 12:55 a.m. for a “Fro Yo run” right before they close. In fact, you should try it some time.

**Warning: Beware of the abbreviation, or “abbrevs”. The Wash. U. student body rarely says the full name of anything, be it “Poli Sci” rather than Political Science, or “awk” instead of awkward.

Floorcest – Floorcest is, quite simply, hooking up with, dating, or otherwise ruining the platonic nature of a relationship you have with someone on your floor. Most upperclassmen will tell you that this is a bad idea and you should really trust them because chances are they know from experience. Your R.A.’s, or Residential Advisors-yet another abbreviation-will probably bring this up in one of your first meetings. Dormcest, a less serious offense involving inter-dorm relationships, also creates the potential for plenty of awkward situations.

Sexile – This is the awkward and never envied situation when your roommate locks you out of your dorm room in order to commit floorcest, dormcest, or engage in some other romantic rendezvous. These situations are particularly uncomfortable as you sit outside your room at 3 a.m. and twiddle your thumbs. May I suggest finding “the guy with the air mattress?” (See Who’s Who on Your Freshman Floor)

BD vs. B&D – BD is the abbreviation for one of the most important places on campus: Bear’s Den. At Bear’s Den, students can feed their 2 a.m. mozzarella stick craving, listen to jovial workers sing Beyonce, or just hang out when they’re not ready to call it a night. B&D, on the other hand, is the Wash. U. security. They let you into parties (and kick you out), control W.I.L.D. so it doesn’t get too wild, and make sure nobody’s left in BD at 3 a.m. While they may patrol BD, avoid confusing the two, as they are very different. B&D will not serve you mozzarella sticks, although maybe if you’re lucky they’ll sing for you.

EST- The Emergency Support Team, or EST, is Wash. U.’s all-student emergency team. These are the people you call for help in a medical emergency. They share their phone line with WUPD (Wash. U. Police Department), a number that you will learn easily as “fistful of fives,” since dialing 5-5555 from any campus phone will connect you to them. According to the Wash. U. website, EST handles “sudden onset illness or injury on campus, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week throughout the school year.” As such, they are very handy people to have around.

Clock Stick – Formally, this is known as the clock tower. However, it is not much of a tower. Located on the South 40 right outside Ursa’s Fireside, the clock stick nickname was wittily created because the clock is perched atop a mere spindle and therefore, does not quite deserve to be called a tower.

Estro-gym – The South 40 gym located in upstairs Wohl earned the name “The Estro-gym” due to its mainly female clientele. Many males and female athletes prefer to workout at the A.C., or Athletic Center. Despite its nickname, the Estro-gym does have both weight and cardio machines that cater to males. They tend to stand out about as much as a guy in a Women’s Studies course.

The Bunny – Just outside of Mallinckrodt as you head towards the library sits the Bunny, arguably the creepiest statue on campus. Every year students stare in awe as they try to figure out if the inspiration did indeed come from “Donnie Darko.” Because the Bunny is so unique, it often serves as a good meeting place in the middle of main campus.

“What was the best part of your four years at Washington University in St. Louis?”

“The small community and teachers…the ability to take that passion outside the classroom and start a student group or do anything with it. It literally is the Ivy of the Midwest. You have all this power and prestige, and it is so accessible.”

-Michael Morgan
Senior

“Improv-the ability to make a difference on campus by being part of a public group.”

-Atina Rizk
Senior

“My favorite part has been the relationships I made and the friendships I’ve gained. Just thinking about the future and the friendships I will keep in touch with.”

-Marcus Woods
Senior

“My friends, obviously…Just hanging out. I will miss not having responsibilities.”

-Mark Sobin
Senior

Following in the footsteps of Annika Rodriguez, the namesake of the Rodriguez Scholarship, senior Claudia Romeu will become the first Rodriguez scholar to enter the Peace Corps, following graduation this spring.

Claudia Romeu is scheduled to leave this September for a 27-month commitment to the Peace Corps, with whom she plans to work on health extension programs. Although she does not know exactly where she will be headed, Romeu does know she is going to Latin America.

Having spent much of her life there, Romeu explained that she has “always felt an obligation to Latin America.” The native Puerto Rican spent time studying abroad in Argentina, as well as leading a group of American high school students doing service work in Costa Rica last summer.

A self-described proactive person, Romeu feels that service has always been a big part of who she is.

“You learn more from those little interactions,” she said.

Romeu has fostered this love for service through various programs on campus, including Latino Empowerment Team and College Connections, programs sponsored by her scholarship program. This scholarship program, according to Romeu, has helped to define her college experience.

“There’s always one program that takes over your experience at college,” Romeu said. “For me, that was Annika Rodriguez.”

She credits the program with “opening her eyes to the rest of the world” by allowing her to learn from the experiences of her fellow Rodriguez scholars, whom she calls her brothers and sisters, and from the legacy left by her role model, Annika Rodriguez.

“We were very similar in many ways,” Romeu said, smiling. “She served as an inspiration.”

Rodriguez graduated from what was then known as the Olin School of Business in 1996. As a student, she was an active member of the Association of Latin American Students, taking on the role of president of the club her senior year.

After graduation, the Puerto Rican native then joined the Peace Corps and was sent to Honduras. Unfortunately, Honduras experienced a terrible flash flood at the time, and Rodriguez was killed. The Annika Rodriguez Scholars Program was created in her memory.

The program is dedicated to leadership, diversity on campus and, in the spirit of Rodriguez, service. The scholars belong to different “families” in which the older students mentor the younger members of the program, which helps foster close relationships.

Sophomore Aidan Hamke, a friend and fellow scholar, supports Romeu’s decision to enter the Peace Corps.

“She works so hard and is very dedicated to everything she does. Claudia is.truly genuine.[her] enthusiasm for helping others, be it through community service, or telling a joke and giving someone a hug to brighten his or her day, is truly an inspiration,” Hamke said.

Hamke admitted to worrying about Romeu’s safety-after all, Rodriguez died while serving-but Hamke stands behind Romeu if this is what Romeu wants to do since Romeu feels it is how she could make a great impact. Romeu mentioned that her parents were worried as well: but for her, the safety concerns have not yet fully sunk in.

“I’m such an optimist; I try to convince myself nothing will happen. I am religious, and I do pray.there’s that presence or being that will protect me,” Romeu said.

Romeu has two pieces of advice for anyone interested in joining her in the Peace Corps. First, start early. Those interested should apply about one year before they are interested in actually leaving on assignment. The application process is long, and interested volunteers undergo extreme medical and dental exams. The other advice? Just go for it. Sometimes the risky situation is worth it.

“I’m hoping it will be the best experience of my life,” Romeu said.

As such, it is always helpful to be the friend who has all of the food. And, after months of Washington University food, a student becomes even more of a god if what she is willing to share happens to come from some place other than Bear’s Den, especially if it is homemade.

The problem, then, becomes the lack of a kitchen. Those who love to cook often love to share their gifts with the rest of us. However, living in a dorm is not exactly the best cooking situation. Even if you are lucky enough to live in a place like Liggett-Koenig, where a kitchen is located right down the stairs, supplies are not always readily available. But never fear! Good, homemade food is not as hard to come by as you think.

The first rule to dorm cooking is that the student cook must always have a plan. Few things are quite as disappointing as getting psyched up for a home-cooked meal, only to watch it fall through. So plan ahead, even if just by a few hours. Know what you can buy at places like Bear’s Den and Bear Mart and what will require a trip to an actual, honest-to-goodness store. For example, practically all non-vegan recipes require eggs. Eggs are easily purchased from the fryer line in Bear’s Den. You can buy oil at Bear Mart, as well as potatoes and, if you are lucky, onions.

Once you have purchased the food, the next step is to find cooking utensils. For college cooking, this basically means a bowl, a spoon and a measuring cup or two. A good cook changes recipes to taste anyway, so trust your own skills and don’t worry about being so exact. Do you think top chefs always follow recipes exactly? I didn’t think so.

You then find yourself standing in a dorm kitchen, running out every five minutes to take your next shot at pool. You have your eggs from Bear’s Den and you have successfully borrowed a bowl. Now you need a good recipe, something yummy to share with all of your starving friends and roommates.

However, some people are starting to take the concept of napping a bit further. All over campus, posters announce the coming of a new phenomenon: The Collective Nap.

On April 5, a group of Washington University in St. Louis students will be camping out on a 60-foot blanket under the St. Louis Arch for a collective nap extravaganza. Interested students plan on meeting at the Big Bend MetroLink stop at 11:30 a.m. The nap itself is scheduled last three hours, from noon to 3 p.m. Students should keep in mind that the nap is “BYOP”-Bring Your Own Pillow. Also, wacky costumes, while not required, are encouraged.

Why set up a collective nap for what is normally a solitary activity?

Apparently napping on your own is not nearly restful enough. Or maybe, Washington University students have finally reached the point at which they are just too tired and too busy-even to take a nap.

Despite the many reasons students have for participating in a collective nap, the whole revolutionary idea is, according to Ilyse Magy, a senior, pretty straightforward.

“In theory it’s as simple as it sounds. I’ve constructed a 60-foot blanket and people can lie down and take a nap. It’s a sort of protest in the antithesis of a protest,” Magy said.

The collective nap-protest, according to the event’s tagline, protests both everything and nothing.

Magy, who has been throwing this idea around for quite a long time, said the collective nap is a sort of reframing for the ideas of Manifest Destiny and the antithesis for the Museum of Westward Expansion, located underneath the St. Louis Arch. A collective nap, according to Magy, is a chance to dream together underneath one of the American Dream’s greatest symbols.

“If people just lay down together and took a nap together things would be a little bit better. It’s absurd and it’s supposed to be [a] nice, absurd but really kind of necessary idea,” Magy said.

Magy, while admitting the bizarre nature of her event, also took pains to make it legitimate, as she assured those interested in participating that it does indeed have the required permit. There is no denying that Magy’s senior sculpture thesis is an enticing idea. Considering how desperately everyone is in need of both togetherness and a feel-good nap, hopefully 60 feet of blanket will be enough.

As sleep deprived students at Washington University in St. Louis, there is a distinct hierarchy of stress tied into a student’s level of caffeine and what can still have an affect on the caffeine resistant body. It is not unusual to see students fall into a chair, bleary eyed after studying for a chemistry test and pull out a Rockstar during class. Especially during midterms and finals, the line at Ursa’s can be extremely long, detracting from valuable study time. So how caffeine-dependent are Washington University students? How does one know where he fits on the caffeine hierarchy? Here’s a quick list help pinpoint the exact degree of over-caffeination.

Diet Coke – This is the lowest level of caffeine. It’s possible that a student at Washington University might have passed this level during high school as they juggled varsity sports, Advanced Placement classes and club presidencies. At this point, a Diet Coke is probably only good to help keep a Washington University student awake during a class that is slightly less than enthralling, even when he had a good night’s sleep. However, if a Diet Coke is all that is needed for a long night, your friends are all secretly jealous of how much sleep you get every night.

Mountain Dew – When Mountain Dew still affects a Washington University student, that usually means that the student’s life is not that stressful. Perhaps caffeine is necessary only three times a week, and if the student falls asleep on top of his work, it is not all that big of a problem. The difference comes when the cans start piling up, and when each paper starts to require five or six cans in order to stay awake long enough to push through. Then, it is possible that the next level of should be considered.

Chai Tea – This might mean a normal night for some of the higher stress majors or a really bad night for someone who is normally on a lower level. Chai is the transition drink between moderately tired and the truly sleep deprived. A soda just won’t cut it anymore, but there is no need to pull out the ‘big guns’ yet.

Coffee – This is the point where you start to get headaches during the summer, when you actually have the time to sleep, due to caffeine withdrawal. When you have a nightly coffee run and the ladies at Ursa’s know you by name, it means you need to start spending some more quality time with your bed. It misses you. Furthermore, if you are an underclassman, you should probably slow down on the caffeine intake. Something still needs to wake you up when you get to graduate school.

Bawls – When something says “Warning: This product contains high levels of Caffeine” on the label, you have officially reached the dependent state. Congratulations. Caffeine has started to rule your life, and functioning without it becomes a serious problem. Also, the caffeine problem is serious if the name of this drink is slightly funnier than you know it should be.

Rockstar/ Full Throttle/ Monster – This is the absolute top. There is no where left to turn. If you are a pre-med–which you probably are–consider buying stock in an energy drink company. You will be consuming it for years. If you are not a pre-med, beware of the severe withdrawal symptoms that might occur after graduation. And good luck; you have a lot of sleepless nights ahead of you.

Not this. Dance tends to be its own language, and at times its own world. While I may not speak the language, I can certainly inhabit the world long enough to appreciate it.

The biannual show, which lasted about an hour and 15 minutes, was made up of seven dances choreographed by different students in the department. Most of these choreographers are dance minors, or have declared dance as a second major. Each choreographer used a varying number of dancers in their show, ranging from one to eight. Some pieces had no set. One piece, “the Gathering,” used a couch and a table. I enjoyed displays of everything from modern dance to pointe-ballet. The pieces were so different, eclectic and full of diverse emotions that to try and describe the show as a whole is simply impossible.

The only tying themes were the ideas of movement and emotion. The dancers told me they wanted the audience to realize that dance doesn’t have to be restricted. I was urged to open up and just let the dancing elicit an emotion. On the other hand, I was also told that sometimes dance can be movement purely for movement’s sake.

While these ideas may seem jumbled, they worked well together. True, each dance seemed unconnected to those around it, but that sense of unconnected nature kept me interested and made me wonder what was coming next. In short, I was captivated.

The show’s strongest quality wasn’t the costumes (which were nice and added to the interest) or the lights (which helped create mood changes). It wasn’t even the talent of the dancers, though they were amazing.

The Young Choreographer’s Showcase worked because everything came together for a show that was disjointed enough to keep me interested without losing me, and made me eager to see what could come next.

So even if you are not a dancer-not all of us are blessed with grace-this show will keep you watching. It’s short, it has a lot of talent, and it will make an audience member feel more in an hour than they normally feel in a day. The show starts at 8 p.m. March 28 and 29 and at 2 p.m. March 30.

Ever since February 5, something has been missing from the Washington University campus. No longer do students overhear political conversations as they wait in line at Bear’s Den, nor do they get trapped by the political groups tabling as they walk through Mallinckrodt.

This raises the question: Have primary politics disappeared from Washington University?

Several months ago, students were gathering at Democratic Presidential candidate and Illinois Sentator Barack Obama’s headquarters in St. Louis to watch the Democratic debates.

Now, when students were asked randomly, not if they listened to, but if they were aware that Obama made an important speech on March 18, none answered yes.

Missouri is a swing state for national elections, and considering it has a tendency to pick the winner in the general elections, Missouri can be important. Therefore, it was not surprising how much campaigning and politics surrounded the early parts of February, especially considering this campaign cycle’s youth activism.

In a normal election year, both parties’ candidates are chosen on Super Tuesday or soon after.

This year, the primary cycle just keeps going as neither Democratic candidate has yet reached the necessary number of delegates to secure the nomination.

For some students, there is just no point in paying attention anymore.

“I was relatively interested in the race,” said sophomore Natacha Lam. “I did some research on the candidates on my own and watched the actual Super Tuesday on TV.”

After Super Tuesday, however, Lam, like many others, just lost interest.

“There’s nothing I can do about it,” she said. “I did my civic duty by voting and after that I’ll wait until the general [election].”

At this point, the primaries are just not affecting the average University student anymore. For some, this primary cycle has been extremely disappointing.

Student Union Vice President Brittany Perez is from Florida. Due to Florida’s attempt to move up its Democratic primary without consent of the National Democratic Party, the state’s delegates, and therefore votes, were stripped.

“I’m from Florida,” said Perez, “so I paid attention to the fact that my vote was taken away.”

Perez said she was excited about the possibility of Florida redoing its primary but was disappointed when the opportunity did not come about like she hoped.

Students wait for a chance to feel like they make a difference again, whether here or in their home state.

Meanwhile, it seems to students that the primaries are going on without really causing anything to change.

“I have been paying attention but I don’t feel it’s as necessary since I have a Republican view and my candidate is pretty much picked already,” said sophomore Kelly Rocheleau. “All of the name calling between Hillary and Obama I just don’t really pay attention to.”

The stalemate, then, has just as much impact as the length of the campaign.

“If it were shorter it’d be easier to follow, but I don’t really think it’s that big an issue it’s spread out,” said Rocheleau.

For some, it all comes down to the fact that those at Washington University are just students. Junior Neha Tibrewala said that she was working so hard on her extracurricular activities that she did not really have time to watch the news.

“I’ve been paying enough attention to know McCain is the Republican nominee and the Democrats are between Obama and Hillary,” she said. “I have CNN on my homepage so every time I use the Internet I have to look at the headlines.”

The research team, led by Professor Denise Wilfley, director of the Weight Management and Eating Disorders Program at the School of Medicine, Professor Dorothy Van Buren and Professor Rob Wench joined five other institutions in a joint project coordinated by the National Institute of Mental Health.

According to Wench, 0.5 percent of the population, mostly female adolescents, is afflicted with anorexia nervosa, a condition occurring when the patient’s weight is below 85 percent of their expected weight at their height.

The psychiatric disease also increases the risk of anything from osteoporosis to cardiovascular and gastrointestinal problems.

What makes anorexia problematic is its mortality rate, the highest for all psychiatric diseases. In addition, anorexia has only a 25 percent recovery rate.

“It’s very overwhelming to think that if you have it and you’ve had it for over five years, your chance of recovery is very slim,” said Wench. “The reason anorexia is so important is the mortality rate.”

Improving first-time treatment for anorexia nervosa is important due to the chronic nature of the disease. The more chronic the problem becomes, the harder it is to treat and the higher the chance becomes for mortality.

If anorexia develops within the first three years, however, the chances of recovery are much better, according to Wench.

That is where the University and its five partner centers come into play.

The goal of the NIH research is to improve the odds for complete recovery and to raise them from their current status of 25 percent. The focus will be on different types of family therapy and the use of Prozac.

“This is the first time that the National Institute of Mental Health has actually funded a collaborative study like this,” said Wench. “We’re really excited to be part of the six-center study.”

The researchers will be comparing the effects of two different types of family therapy, both of which include 16 one-hour sessions over the course of nine months, on the 240 participants.

Washington University will be treating 40 of the 240 participants and their families.

The patients will either receive Behavioral Family Therapy (BFT) or Systems Family Therapy (SFT). Additionally, half of each group will receive Prozac, while the other half will recieve a placebo.

BFT focuses on breaking the cycle when a family becomes used to the disease. SFT focuses on “holding up a mirror” to the family, according to Wench, to see the effects of anorexia on the family as a whole.

The University is looking for participants between ages 12 and 18 in the St. Louis area. According to Professor Wench, doctors don’t usually see anorexia start after age 18. Both genders are welcome to participate, although males make up only 10 percent of all anorexia patients.

Anyone interested in participating should contact the project coordinator, Nichole Cecil, at 314-286-0076.

“She Stoops to Conquer, or, The Mistakes of a Night” by Oliver Goldsmith, here directed by Jeffery Matthews, centers on the disagreements between parents and their marriageable children. On the one hand, Charles Marlow (played by Justin Joseph) is a man uninterested in marriage and utterly incapable of talking to well-bred females. Even so, his father sends him a-courting. The female in question likes Charles-who can talk just fine as long as he does not realize his “barmaid” is actually his betrothed in disguise-but must convince her father that the suitor is modest enough. This is complicated, as the suitor believes he has stopped at an inn and treats his future father-in-law as an innkeeper.

Meanwhile, Constance (played by Carli Miller), George Hastings (played by Kellen Hoxworth) and Tony Lumpkin are caught up in an odd sort of love triangle. Constance and George Hastings are in love, but Constance’s aunt (played by Alexa C. Shoemaker) insists she marry her cousin, Tony Lumpkin. Tony is not fond of the idea. Basically, an arranged marriage, some generational misunderstandings and tricks lead to a very entertaining play.

A stand-out scene showcases the first interview between suitor and daughter (Noga Landau, who is superb). The meeting is a pastiche of false starts, floor-watching, floundering conversation, stuttering and rapturous flailing. You would think this would get old after about a minute. It doesn’t. The whole theater was laughing hysterically along with me for the entirety of a scene at least three minutes long. We can send most of our thanks for this to the wonderful comic timing of Mr. Joseph. The only question remaining: how the actors made it through without cracking up themselves.

A pleasing surprise greets the audience, upon the first word spoken, in well-attuned British accents; in some cases two different dialects emerged from the mouth of the same character. It set the play, and gave it a good tone. (Although, when a minor character couldn’t grab a hold of her accent during one scene it threw me back into my seat, breaking the spell of the show for a good portion of the next scene.) The bar-room sequence dragged slightly, and was hard to understand at points. However, most of the time the accents were understandable and laudable. Often accents can either make a play work or make it flop, especially if no one can discern what is occurring onstage.

One of the marvelous things about the play itself is its characters, not a one true to life or even vaguely realistic. They are huge, with huge personalities, huge motivations and huge hairpieces, all carried without a hitch in this production. This is all the more impressive, because these characteristic neuroses and quirks (particularly in David Weiss’ Mr. Hardcastle) could not have been easy to pull off; nor could the wigs sported by Alexa Shoemaker’s Mrs. Hardcastle.

The play, performed in the A. E. Hotchner Studio, utilized its small space well, the amount of depth created by receding columns was pleasantly deceiving. As one has come to expect from a Performing Arts Department play, the costumes were very well put together, and the sound suited its purpose. Technically, not much impressed, but nothing distracted either.

Ultimately, a play is only as good as its ability to draw in its audience. This production of “She Stoops to Conquer” boasts larger than life characters that led you in and didn’t let you go until they started dancing. The play is funny enough on its own, but this version was downright hilarious.

The show, performed Friday, February 29, Saturday, March 1 (both at 8 p.m.) and Sunday, March 2 (at 2 p.m.) is worth your time. It may remind you of a sitcom, with wacky characters and a somewhat contrived ending, but like a good sitcom, you can’t help but enjoy it.