Student Life Archives

Jane* is crazy. Not crazy like she sometimes wears mismatched socks or a black belt with brown shoes. Crazy as in she behaves illogically and irrationally.

When Jane wants a boyfriend, she does things to catch a certain boy’s attention. She and her friends put on her their “cutest outfits,” (read: ample cleavage will be showing, even though Jane will routinely slap any poor soul she finds looking at it. It’s not there for men to look at, it’s.nevermind). The girls load on plenty of makeup, because it would certainly be ludicrous for someone to see Jane’s real face. Her philosophy is: the longer you can make him believe you’re actually someone else, the better the relationship will be. Jane straps on her tallest heels whilst complaining about how much they hurt her feet. (Note: her style of walking in the aforementioned heels would only look normal on an ice skating rink, but damn does she look good.)

One night, a male dares to enter the force field Jane and her friends have created. He singles Jane out, asking her to dance. She gasps, slaps him and goes back to grinding with her friends. He refuses to admit defeat, and eventually convinces her to follow him to his room upstairs. What happens after is inappropriate to describe in any venue, except perhaps the lunchroom in a prison.

Jane wakes up the next morning in John’s bed. Despite reiterating consistently over the course of the next couple of weeks that he has no interest in having a girlfriend at this particular moment in time, Jane finally wears him down. She calls repeatedly and presents an airtight case about why they are meant for each other. He gets sick of saying no, so he agrees to be her boyfriend. (What a romantically auspicious beginning.)

What follows represents a typical conversation between Jane and her boyfriend, John:

Jane mutters something between ravenous bites of her gargantuan Big Mac.

John: What was that, my beautiful darling?

Jane (washes down her sandwich with large gulps of the 80 oz. diet soda): I’m just getting so fat.

John: That’s not true – you are absolutely gorgeous.

Jane just looks offended, gets up from the table and storms out of the restaurant. Typically, she will make the entire ride home silent and uncomfortable, only to forgive John for no apparent reason 15.45 minutes later.

Once, during this routine argument, John made the mistake of fighting fire with water (he tried to use logic). He suggested that if Jane was worried about her weight, she could try eating sensibly and visiting the gym occasionally. This never happened again, however, because that was the last time Jane felt the need to bring her hunting rifle out of the closet. Even though she has no idea how to shoot it, John felt a bit apprehensive about sleeping with it pointed between his eyes every night.

One time, John’s car broke down on his way to pick Jane up for a date. Despite the pouring rain and the leaping flames consuming his engine, he dug in his glove box for a quarter and called Jane dutifully to alert her of his predicament. He was met with wailing sobs about his alleged unfaithfulness. It seems that John was wrong; he hadn’t any car trouble. According to Jane, it was clear he was having sex with another woman, but had called mid-gasm to tell her he wouldn’t be coming that evening.

Finally, when John can’t take anymore, he breaks up with Jane, foolishly thinking he can find a woman who isn’t crazy. (Good luck with that, John.) Even though Jane brought this entirely upon herself, and now realizes that she took John for granted and mistreated him, she cries hysterically about how pig-headed he is, and how he doesn’t even know what he’s missing out on. (Oh, he knows, Jane.) What follows is a raucous session of the “blind leading the blind,” where her equally insane friends convince her of what a prize she is. They feed her ice cream, no one goes to the gym, and despite the growing monstrosity of her butt, her friends lie to her about how “she’s never looked better.” (Yeah, because that will help things.) After an appropriate mourning period (about two hours ought to do it), Jane recovers from losing “the love of her life” that she dated for two weeks, and declares herself ready to move on to someone new.

Molly is a senior in Arts & Sciences and the senior Forum editor.

*Name changed

Rachel Tepper

I don’t know what you’re all complaining about: it’s not that cold.

It’s getting to be that time of the year – winter. A time when days get shorter, days and nights get colder, and professors pile on the end-of-the-semester final projects and papers to prevent us from even thinking about finals until classes end. I have to agree, days getting shorter is incredibly depressing (especially after sleeping in until 2 p.m. after a night of heavy drinking and only having about two hours of daylight). And the end-of-the-semester workload is annoying bordering on painful.

But really, people, it’s not that cold.

The problem with going to school in a place like St. Louis is how centrally located it is. St. Louis is pretty much in the dead center of the country – which means that if Wash. U. students come evenly distributed from all over the country, half should come from south of here and half from north of here. Now this isn’t exact, since more people come from places like Missouri and Illinois and New York, but for approximation’s sake we’ll say it’s close to half and half.

This clearly makes for a diverse array of climate experience among Wash. U. students. I can understand if people coming from places like California or Texas or Alabama think it’s cold here. That’s fair. It’s warm where they come from.

But the other 50 percent come from places that are further north and, theoretically, colder than it is here. I understand that on the coasts the climate is more temperate and so it probably doesn’t get as cold as it does here, but come on. You can’t tell me you’ve never experienced 30-degree weather before. It seems like as soon as it drops below 50 degrees, everyone whips out the heavy duty North Face ski jackets and the hats and mittens and starts whining about how cold it is.

In my opinion, everyone here should be glad that St. Louis summers last as long as they do. Officially, the first day of fall is Sept. 21. We had summer-like weather until well into November. Winter is an inevitable season that comes every year, and this year it came later than normal. Rather than whining that now it’s cold (it’s December..that’s what happens in December), enjoy the fact that you got two extra months of summer. I went to my home in Minnesota in October for fall break and it was in the 40-50 range while it was in the 70s here. When I went home for Thanksgiving, it snowed. Last winter break, about 75 percent of the time I was home the temperature before wind chill was below zero. Believe me, it could be worse.

And in a way, the cold weather is a good thing. It’s the last week of classes, and finals are approaching: we shouldn’t be playing outside, anyway. We should be doing work and studying. Granted, it’s not a very pleasant thought. But think about how much worse it would be to be stuck doing work if it was nice outside. I know that I, for one, would be far less productive.

And just think: in two weeks we’ll all be home or someplace far more exotic than here anyway. If you’re walking to the library this weekend and freezing your ass off, just think: at least you don’t have to go to Minnesota.

Anna is a sophomore in Arts & Sciences.

There is a special type of person on the Wash. U. campus. A superior breed. Better than even an “Arrested Development” marathon with a “Curb Your Enthusiasm” nightcap. Yes, I’m talking about the Bear’s Den employees, and they really are amazing people.

After eating at Bear’s Den approximately 1,428 times, it never ceases to amaze me what a delight the Bear’s Den employees are. Always smiling, they make Bear’s Den a feasible dining option (and you thought I was going to say bearable), even after 1,427 quesadillas and a buffalo chicken caesar.

These keepers of the Den deserve to be appreciated more. The job seems almost as bad as being a 13-year-old boy serving frozen bananas in Southern California on a warm summer day. I can’t even begin to imagine having to stand over a hot grill for hours, serving burgers to mostly ungrateful and, after a certain hour, drunk college students (for anyone who has had to do something similar before: I’m so sorry). But they find a way to do it, and sometimes even seem to have fun, joking around with us lowly students about how crazy it is to get breakfast burritos for non-breakfast meals (namely lunch and dinner).

This is why it is such a travesty that there are a few students who are being belligerent in Bear’s Den and forcing them to consider shortening their hours. While there is such a bastion of greatness on one side of Bear’s Den, there have been a couple of people who deserve to be thrown into an ocean near a seal with a taste for blood nearby. People who have decided to be assholes, and detract from the workers’ aura. These people might not always be so Buster-ish, and are very likely under the influence of some substance, but when confronted with the eminence that is a Bear’s Den employee, everybody needs to bestow the proper respect.

As this op-ed marks the conclusion of my first full year as a Forum editor, I feel that it is my responsibility to attack someone in a position of power as well, not just students who had too much to drink and would (hopefully) act differently in a more conscious state. So Wash. U. administration (or Bon App‚tit, or whoever is in charge of this): pay these men and women more. Whatever they’re paid now is not enough. They are kings among men (and queens among women, I guess) – give them their ransom.

And watch “Arrested Development.” For everyone who’s read this far, good luck with finals, have a good break and read more next semester!

Daniel is a sophomore in Arts & Sciences and a Forum editor.

Give course evals after courses end, not beforehand

Dear Editor:

I think the idea of course evals is fantastic. I also think that we students can fill them out more accurately and with more care if we could finish the courses we’re evaluating first! Geez, ArtSci people – lay off! Stop pestering me to fill out evaluations of classes I’m still taking. You wouldn’t ask Ebert for a thumbs up or thumbs down before the movie ended, would you? Which brings me to my next gripe: the course evals in their current form stink. The 1-7 rating system just isn’t that telling. Sure, there is the section for additional comments, but we students don’t get to see those when we’re trying to pick classes for next semester. That’s why I use ratemyprofessors.com. There you get basic number ratings on professors as well, but more important, you get a brief couple of sentences from students who have taken classes with that professor in the past. In the past, I’ve come across such helpful comments as “Avoid [this professor] like the plague!” and “One of the best teachers at Wash. U. Take anything you can with this professor!” So Wash. U. students, fill out your evaluations of three-quarters of each class you’re in, but also visit ratemyprofessors.com and let your fellow classmates know what you really think.

Eli Bilek
Class of 2007

ArtSci Webmail has problems

Dear Editor:

Hey, you guys should definitely do a story on the disgraceful state of the ArtSci computing server. ArtSci students (who make up a large proportion of the school) are very frequently inconvenienced by not being able to check their e-mail because the server is slow. This happens to me like two or three times a week, and each time lasts something between three to five hours. When you have to get an e-mail out urgently, it’s hugely irritating. We need to campaign for them to change the server. So much for being one of the richest universities in the richest country in the world.

Elgin Toh
Class of 2009

Go intramurals!

Dear Matt Shapiro:

I truly enjoyed reading your forum piece today on IM football. I’m not quite sure that what you learned on the football field is more important than what you learned in the classroom, but I believe it is just as important.

Thanks for the unsolicited plug for the IM program.

Lynn Imergoot
Associate Intramural Director

For all those who thought that the Bunny was the most ridiculous sculpture the Wash. U. administration would ever choose, some drastic opinion revision may be necessary. Earlier this week, the University presented its new artistic masterpiece, consisting of a large orb and pyramid (hereafter known as the OP) on the campus side of the underpass by the South 40.

A few months ago, it seemed like the administration was finally doing something about the ugly shack-like thing that was previously camped out on this spot. As construction proceeded, much discussion ensued about what might take the shack’s place, from additional space for advertising student programming to an a capella stage or “speaker’s circle.” Little did we know that the school was just making room for its next masterpiece, the ugly, useless concrete shapes currently greeting all students heading to class from the 40 each morning.

Staff editorials shouldn’t sound like a broken record, but if there has been one recurring theme this year, it is the administration’s problematic spending of our tuition money. If you’re honestly going to charge us $40,000 a year just for the privilege of attending school here, could you please not waste it on what looks like a couple of oversized cement building blocks? Surely there are student groups or departments that could use an extra few thousand dollars, and they would probably do more with this cash than take up space just outside the 40.

The administrators behind this monstrosity were unavailable for comment before we went to print, so we couldn’t find out exactly how much the OP cost. It could be that this “installation” was in fact donated, thus costing students nothing in monetary terms. (Though who knows how much this will ultimately cost in terms of mental anguish?) Yet even if the piece was donated, couldn’t the administration at very least have made an announcement about these concrete lumps so that the general campus community would have known to expect (and protest) this bizarre installation?

Next time the University considers another major project of this sort, perhaps they should find some way of getting input from the larger student body about what they’d like to see, especially when it’s going to be in a high-visibility area like right outside Mallinkrodt or directly next to the underpass. Or perhaps the University could even sponsor a student contest to come up with the next piece of sculpture they install; it might not be great, but it will certainly be better than Eliot, the Bunny or the OP.

For all the University’s talk about curbing student alcohol use, perhaps those in charge of deciding what artwork to install on campus should take a close look at their own personal consumption habits. How else can we explain the recent major decisions our administration has made when it comes to deciding what sculptures to place in prominent places on campus? It’s not clear why the University continually chooses sculptures like our beloved anorexic bunny and the OP – but it is fairly clear that if taste in campus installations was at all factored into the U.S. News & World Report rankings we all value so highly, Wash. U. would be nowhere near the top 10.