The New School

The novelty wore off a few months ago so now I don't check Brightness Falls's site statistics anymore. As far as I know, the 0 - 2 people who leave comments lately are the actual number of people who visit this site on a daily basis. And of you 0 - 2 people, I'm guessing the majority of you are no longer college students, and you've forgotten what it feels like to spend a lot of time on a college campus. Here's what you're missing:

(But first a parenthetical aside: when last I checked, I was getting regular visits from students -- I'm guessing they were students and not faculty or staff -- from colleges like NYU, Wellesley, Georgia Tech and Wittenberg, whatever that is. Once in a while I'd notice a visitor from Harvard or Yale or Brown, but I think those were accidental visitors searching the Web for gay lacrosse porn. I'd make fun of whoever those people are from Penn who were periodically logging on to this site if I didn't already know that assholes from Harvard or Yale or Brown probably make fun of Penn students for not getting into Harvard or Yale or Brown. I've no idea what anyone from Wellesley could possibly get out of Brightness Falls, but that's my own fault for clinging to the idea that all Wellesley students look like Hillary Rodham in sweaters and corduroy jeans.

College campuses are nothing if not insular, so what I'm about to tell you will probably be helpful if you're like me and you're thinking of going to grad school after having worked for several years. If you're still in high school, on the other hand, shouldn't you be doing your algebra homework?)

1. Flip-flops everywhere, though the swarthier the student, the fancier the flip-flop. Leather flip-flops? Why not a cashmere tank top? And, sure, I've joined the ranks of the flip-flopped, but fucking why wouldn't you?

2. I'd forgotten this formula, which evidently applies to any university campus across the country: sunny weather + grassy area = frisbees. Actually, it doesn't necessarily have to be frisbees. I've seen laughing collegians toss around softballs, footballs, hammers, kittens. On Monday I saw some ROTC guys play soccer with the decapitated head of a Vietcong.

3. Weirdo activities aplenty: guys sparring with staffs, guys with big swords making like David Lee Roth from the "Panama" video, guys on unicycles, guys playing lutes. I wonder if any of these guys get ass, and if so, is it unconventional ass.

4. In stark contrast to the frisbee flippers, I'm always seeing people asleep in the union in the middle of the day. It's not even finals. If you're studying so hard that you need to nap in between classes, I don't care what your major is -- you should be considering junior college.

5. I know some of you think science geeks are cute. Trust me, you're infatuated with the idea of a science geek from a John Hughes movie. I interviewed members of the physics club in the science building a couple of weeks ago, and I wanted to punch every single one of them in the face. Seriously, that afternoon every one of those giggling dorks suddenly became my archenemy, and I really did have to suppress the urge to punch them and take their snackpacks. (Geology majors, on the other hand, are strangely really cool.)

6. Why are the foreign students in my seminar classes so obnoxiously vocal? The absence of an appropriate timidity -- they're foreigners, after all -- suggests they're incredibly arrogant, which is why I've made the pledge to make at least one of the offending foreign students cry before the semester is over.

It's only my second semester of grad school, and already I sound smarter.

Posted by john at March 25, 2004 04:28 AM