What are the two most widely present characteristics of any bar? Darkness and beer, right? So it only makes sense to have parties when the power is out on (and off) campus.

Nothing much happens in Ohio so when something interesting does happen we tend to blow it way out of proportion. For example a really bad windstorm came through and we called it a hurricane.

Once the power was out it was only logical for my roommate and I to join our beers with our neighbor’s beer and celebrate this force of nature.

We had only met him once before. We had run out of sugar while baking cookies (this was in no way a common occurrence by the way) and what are neighbors for if not to let you leech off their baking materials? He opened the door sans shirt. Both his nipples were pierced.

But there we all sat, brought together by boredom and the realization that our own beer would not last us the night. Plus, he had tons of candles.

The candles, side note, could either mean

1. Creeper
2. He doesn’t bat for our team

The later it gets the more people cram into his apartment. Someone tries to make Jell-O shots before realizing that no power means no freezer. My roommate and I learned a lot that night. We learned that the nerdier the major, the more they can drink along with several other things that we wish we hadn’t learned. At the end of the night we inherited a book, The Guide to Getting it On.

We went back to our apartment and read the book by candlelight just like our forefathers. Ok, mainly we giggled at the pictures. By candlelight.

The next day there was no class since the campus had no power. The dean announced that there would be class, power or not, the following day. That night there was the most yuppie “riot” in all the history of riots. Miami is not known for its tough troublemaker students. Students at Miami wear pastel polo’s and designer sunglasses. The riot was more or less a ton of students standing on the lawn of the dean’s house complaining that they had class in the morning. The saddest part of this is that the city called in all of the neighboring cities police officers to “subdue” this “riot.”

The lessons learned in this are that you shouldn’t judge your neighbor by his piercing, if you’re going to riot go big or go home, and that nature likes it when you party.

My roommate Al may have possibly discovered the single most helpful homework catalyst we’ll ever know. It is not a work ethic, nor is it a secret study locale, but a song. Specifically, “The Final Countdown.”
Now we don’t know why this is the magic work song, but ever since it was discovered Al’s used it every time as a fail safe to finish a paper with an hour to due date. But how did she stumble across this jewel of knowledge you may ask? Much like many discoveries that change the world, it was an accident. She is a big fan of playing music while doing homework and realized she’s more productive while this song has reached the almost blasphemous stage of a homework Messiah. She has played it on loop for a solid half an hour as a fight song of finishing homework. As of now, she has played it a total of 59 times (the length is 5 minutes and 9 seconds). That’s ~304 hours of sweet sweet countdown.

Now it may seem trivial or maybe not even that funny. But now treating “The Final Countdown” as the sound track to accompany the last stand against homework I dare you not to feel productive. Or that by attempting conversation you would risk having your head ripped off by a jittery overcaffeinated perfectionist. Though in reality, who isn’t amidst that techno beat?

Dearest roommates,

Listen. I’m really worried about you guys. By the amount of repulsive, dirty dishes that is eternally stacked in our kitchen sink, I can tell something is wrong. The fact that I’m the only one out of the four girls that live here who has the time to scrub clean the grimey forks and greasy, Ramen-stained pans makes me think that you are seriously overwhelmed. You’re too preoccupied with homework to clean one single dish, and that is excruciatingly concerning.

By the look of the leaning tower of post pizza-eating plates, you guys are well over-booked. You know you have too much on your plate (metaphorically; I’m talking about schoolwork, not the aforementioned serving of Giordano’s) when you aboslutely cannot take 5 seconds out of your day to clean your cereal bowl. Really, 5 seconds. I timed it. It takes a person 5 seconds to clean a bowl.

Now, I totally understand. The dishes make it clear that you are swamped with feverishly writing, proofeading, and editing carefully constructed papers, e-mailing your questions and concerns to your professors, contacting fellow classmates and teacher’s assistants to discuss course materials, utilizing professors’ office hours and every other available class resource AND calling your parents nightly to discuss your daily struggles in coursework as well as to seek advice on how to resist peer pressure at social gatherings. You’re not alone. But even with all that, I can still find those couple seconds in my day to sponge the remnants of my Lean Cuisine off of my eating utensils.

John, Anthony, Nick, Frank, Michael, and Robbie’s frequent late night visits make it obvious that you are up well into the night frantically collaborating on group projects. Also, seeing that you guys don’t emerge from your rooms until the mid-afternoon definitely relays the message that you spend all of your waking morning hours affixed to your laptops typing up lab reports and critical analyses of literature. And for those reasons, I respect you, but your dedication is downright scary.

As long as I consistently see the signs that you are overwhelmed and over-working, I am more than willing to do the dishes. I will help you out in any ways that I can. Garbage? Sure. I’ll continue taking that out too; that’s fine. Anything. I just want you guys to try to take a break; you’re going to burn yourselves out. Try to put the pencils down for just a minute; you’re frightening me. Please.

Love, Joanie

p.s. If you guys ever need to talk, I’m here for you.