I thoroughly enjoyed my time at Washington University. I received an exemplary education and met some students who have truly impressed me. But everyone writes about that kind of stuff at the end of the year, and I have some things I’d like to get off my chest-in sequential list form.
10. Engineering students who try to avoid taking Ecomp
No, I did not learn anything essential in Ecomp besides the fact that most freshmen have worse tense agreement than the Wu-Tang Clan. But just because you’re an engineer does not mean you should not be able to compose sentences. I know you’re busy masturbating into your quantum physics textbook, receiving a hand job from that robot you built and researching to see if Missouri’s bylaws condone autofellatio (and they totally do!), but you know you won’t be able to speak in emoticons all your life.
9. Students who don’t realize St. Louis is a lame city
Unless you come from a shantytown where your mayoral race was between a banjo virtuoso and a recently deceased but beloved steer, you should not be enthused by life in St. Louis. The city revels in its problematic drinking, and that makes people forget about the widespread heart disease. Well, they forget until that triple bypass surgery rolls around. For the fourth time. There are numerous parts of the city I avoid driving through due to exorbitant crime rates, and numerous parts I avoid driving through due to their distinct putrid odors. When friends of mine from St. Louis die one day, I sure hope their funerals are broadcast on the internet.
8. Students who try to work their race/ethnicity/orientation/religion into every conversation
It seems almost daily I have a conversation that proceeds along these lines:
“Hey fellow student, how are you doing today?”
“Well, I’m (names group affiliation), and therefore I’m nervous/a poor driver/dangerous/smelly/hydroelectric/Jewy, etc.”
Do not blame your shortcomings on attributes over which you have no control. Each time you do this you’re setting your respective group back years in your respective group’s confusing, non-Gregorian calendar. You’re probably the kind of person with no friends outside of your affiliated group. The colorful brochures say Wash. U. is a multicultural university, so go out there and try to meet people from three, or maybe even all four cultures it has to offer. Collect them all!
7. Students who feign righteous indignation
You’re not that pissed off about Alberto Gonzales coming to speak, or Chris Matthews being the commencement speaker or the fate of the Peruvian bush shrew. But you do hate your parents always telling you what to do. So you pretend to be deeply concerned about causes you read about on a flyer outside your dorm. I have no problem with students “making a difference,” but pick your battles. You look ridiculous picketing for the rights of the poor in your $300 jeans. And that reminds me .
6. Girls who wear North Face jackets and Uggs
Congratulations, your parents have cushy jobs and will buy you hideous, overpriced merchandise. Simply because these items are expensive does not mean you have a semblance of personal style-you simply wear what all of the other rich kids are wearing. Your upper-middle-class parents should have bought you some rhinoplasty because that would have made you more friends.
And while I’m on the topic, I hate people who wear:
Running shoes to parties – That’s just lazy, and you’re obviously not lazy because you own running shoes.
Beanies with brims – It needs to decide if it’s a hat or a ski cap, I don’t like straddlers.
A helmet indoors – That’s cool that you rode your Schwinn here, but when you’re inside don’t wear protective headgear unless it was prescribed by a physician.
“I Heart WU” shirts – Judging by recent tuition bumps, I doubt the sentiment is reciprocated.
Camo, and aren’t in the armed forces – Either enlist or buy the plain cargo shorts. Just because you shop at Old Navy doesn’t mean you’re a veteran. Plus, I can’t see you, damn it!
5. Girls who overvalue their looks because Wash. U. is a school of hideous swamp people
I’m more annoyed with you than I hate you. You’re maximizing your worth, and that’s intelligent. But you’re really not pretty, you just own a lot of cosmetics. And you must have figured that out yourself, you realize how frumpy your parents are.
You have one exceptionally good-looking feature that you emphasize and accessorize so that nobody notices you’re otherwise nothing to call home about. Sure, you look marginally presentable after I’ve had a couple of drinks (i.e. bottles of cough syrup) and in a very specific lighting scheme (i.e. utter darkness), but still something’s off. Maybe it’s because you’re turning skinny jeans into a misnomer. (I’ve heard that males often act in a similar fashion, but will leave that injustice to another author who cares.)
4. Freshmen
In hindsight, I hated my freshman self. I was a snarky, arrogant braggart. And now I’m less of a braggart, so I’m glad I’ve changed for the better. But there are plenty of other traits in freshman that I personally didn’t have that still disgust me.
Certain girls would try to befriend everyone on the floor. If you’re the kind of person who would do that, I’ll tell you in advance we shouldn’t be friends. I’ll stay in my room and you can stay in the hall, your shrill voice echoing as your beaming smile attempts to hide your deep-rooted loneliness.
Certain guys would sit in pitch-black rooms glued to the television, engrossed by whatever gory novel of Tom Clancy’s that X-Box has decided to adapt into video game form. You wonder why you have body issues by the end of October? Maybe stop playing Madden and pick up an actual football sometime. Hopefully, you can ignore all those blisters on your palms.
But at least most freshmen males figure out by the end of the year that playing beer pong every day is kind of childish. Well, not everyone has this realization .
3. Super Frat Guys
This does not apply to all men in fraternities. I have amiable relationships with many frat boys. So here’s how you know if you’re a super frat guy, and therefore worthy of my vitriol.
– You haven’t really drunk until you’ve binge drunk.
– You like to do the Borat impressions all the time, nice?
– All of the collared shirts you own have vertical stripes. (Note: No number of elongating stripes will hide all that Natty Light you’ve siphoned out of the keg this year.)
– You blast Hilary Duff’s music at parties because it’s ironic.
– The toast at your wedding will be with a Solo cup.
I have fewer issues with mega sorority girls. Although I would like to ask sororities to stop asking girls to join by means of obscenely-sized posters that spell the young lady’s name in candy. Why must you tempt the student body? It’s so hungry! And you know it can’t resist nougat.
2. Liberals
Okay, this totally overlaps with #7, but it needed its own category. Now I am probably a “liberal” myself; I voted for Nader in the last election. But my time at this University has left me embarrassed to label myself with that term. The resounding majority of you all have little idea how your candidate stands on the issues. Ask yourself right now: what’s Barack Obama’s stance on education reform? You don’t know and your MacBook has so many campaign stickers on it that you can’t open it up to find out.
Any question I have about your candidate’s faults you retort with a statistic about the discretions of the Republican candidate. But that’s not an answer to my question! And any mention of George W. Bush during a class and you break out in hysterics. No, he has not been an ideal leader of the free world. But his name should command a little more respect than Snuffleupagus.
Liberals are the students who are offended by vigorous profanity. $#@! that. If you’re offended by more than two things on this Earth, that qualifies you as easily offended and qualifies you as a Wash. U. liberal. Stop being so politically correct and go watch some $#@!ing CNN. (And if Student Life wasn’t run by liberals, I could get my expletives published.)
1. Girls who frequent the frozen yogurt machines
It’s early Sunday morning and below freezing outside, do you know where your girlfriend is? My guess is she’s quenching her before sunrise fro-yo fix. Wash. U. females flock to that satanic machine at all hours to refill their trough and complain why Bear Mart runs so low on rainbow sprinkles or why they can’t put their mouth directly on the spigot. You girls don’t need to have it every day, it’s not insulin. Dessert is not a meal; it’s a treat to reward yourself for acing that exam or going another week without eating any of your extremities.
You always reason that fro-yo belongs in your diet because it is so much “healthier” than ice cream. That’s like saying cocaine’s not that bad because it’s so much “healthier” than heroin.
The overuse of the frozen yogurt machines on campus has irked me throughout my college career. Friends always thought this quibble was unfounded. But actually, you fro-yo gluttons are ruining Washington University.
Here’s my logic:
I knew a couple of extremely bright kids in high school who decided to go to lesser colleges because they heard Wash. U. females were not so easy on the eyes. You, the fro-yo maven, may reply, “Who needs those shallow jerks at our prestigious . hey, are you going to eat that pie?” That seems like a valid point, but have you seen the wives of successful, intelligent men? They’re all super hot! So Washington University thins its pool of potential world-saving braniacs if the women eat vats of fro-yo, and consequently become homelier. I promise the administration, get rid of the fro-yo machines and the average GPA at this University will somehow triple. And if that doesn’t pan out, at least we’ll have healthier female undergrads and happier males.
Many thanks to everyone at Student Life, especially Brian and Cecilia, for publishing my nonsensical rants this school year. I will thoroughly miss having my spiteful views read by the as many as 12 people every day who find old copies lying on the bathroom floor. Thanks for braving potential diseases.
MCT
MCT