The great thing about living on campus in university is the prevalence of personal lives falling into stereotypes, deserved or not. If you don't know someone on your floor, personally, you're bound to talk about them. Then again, I might just be a horrible person. Case in point, if you were one of two girls who only spent time with each, and avoided meeting other people, you might have just been shy, but living in campus residences, you're known as the floor lesbians. Sorry, that's just how it works.

Or if you're the RA, and during an april fools day you are forever known as douche. Said April Fools Day, Justin and I were trying to think of a prank to pull on someone, anyone. After googling "good pranks to pull" and coming up with nothing (our only surefire way to think of pranks) and coming up with nothing, we sat down and decided to brainstorm things to do. After hours of creative genius, we came up with a frank hitherto unequaled with creative genius and engineering prowess. We decided to tie a sheet to opposing doors, rendering the doors locked in place.

So, armed with Justins extra sheet (thanks Justins mom!) and youthful exuberance, we set off to celebrate April Fools Day in traditional fashion. Obviously, we had to prank an RA, when you can only stick it to the man one day a year in good fashion, the RA was an obvious target. Our good friend, Phipps, shared bathrooms with the victim of our prank, and so it was his door we had to tie the sheet to as well.

While we walked down the hallway, the sounds of the Offspring's "can't get my head around you" wafted out to greet us. The Offspring, of course, are the number one greatest selling independent label band in the world. A fact reiterated to us numerous times by Phipps, all in numerous stages of sobriety as well...

And so, with both doors tied, we pounded both doors, just waiting for the first angry soul to poke his head out the door. No response from Phipps. With the exception of the Offspring blaring out from his doors, there was little signs of life. Now, from the RA he was attached to, he opened the door about an inch. Struggled with it. And yelled "who did this!". After shutting the door, returning with scissors, and ruining Justins sheet.

And there you have it, the story of the Jerk. And of the greatness of our pranks in university, a sheet. PS. sorry Justins mom for being irresponsible with the sheet...

"Riding the Bus"

One thing that I forgot to mention was that in university, there were a lot a bus riding's going on. People would ride the bus night and day making all the stops. Of course sometimes the bus broke down or failed to halt at the bus stop you were on which really sucked sometime. There were always some occasions where people would enjoy riding the same bus over and over again or times where the gaskets would blow and you'd have to walk to find a new bus . There were other occasions where the bus was one of those luxury coach lines and there was no way they were gonna pick up a bum like you. Anyways, the moral to the story is to make sure you are well protected when stepping on a bus because some buses are dirty and you can catch something. In conclusion, don't drink and drive!

The BS detector

It was the first day of classes and man was I nervous! Everyone who I had talked to said that university would be wayyy harder then high school and that I'd be having homework like no tomorrow. Of course the thought always ran in my mind as to whether those comments were like the one's made by elementary teachers who said "you gotta practice your handwriting skills cause once you get to high school you'll have to do handwriting for everything". Those comments were BS!! I wish I would of purchased a BS detector cause that thing would be beeping off the charts!

7:00am

I force myself to wake up at this ungodly hour and do the usual brush teeth take a shower routine that I do everyday. Boy, was that shower ever small...I had to twist and turn my way just to grab a bottle of shampoo/conditioner combo that my parents had purchased. I particularly liked this combo because it was quick and effective...you put a glob of stuff in your hair once, rinse it off and your done.

7:20am

I rushed to my wardrobe and put on the best stylish combo I could find. I believe that I went with the beige shorts and white Puma shirt combo which was stylish at the time and provided maximum bicep show-off-ability...

7:30am

I rushed to the classroom of which I had been shown through the Create first year gathering thingy and was surprised to see that the class was almost full....the class started at 8am....I ended up finding a seat near the front of the class in the so called "keener seats".

8:00am

The professor arrived to the classroom and told everyone about himself. He gave us a sheet of paper and asked us in groups of two to write down whether we thought this story he came up with was ethical or not and why.

8:15am

My partner and I submitted our answer and then the teacher told us that the class was over for the day.

8:16am

I searched the internet for a BS detector so that I would not be told any more stories about having to hand write or that university would be hard...

The cafeteria

When I first arrived at the UBCO cafeteria I was actually fairly excited! The first few days I ate burger after burger and sandwich after sandwich until I got absolutely sick of it! The constant "carvery" and the so called "specials" suddenly grew old but one thing that didn't grow old was my constant excitement to see the cafeteria workers. There was the "old guy" who was stubborn as hell and always cursing at how much he hated his work. The "greasy haired guy" who had the thick round glasses and did constant tricks with the tongs. One thing I remember about him was when I asked for a certain "special" and he replied with "you do know that's vegetarian?"....I quickly changed my order to an all beef patty burger. Over on the pasta side was what my buddy Phipps nicknamed "oddball", he also had glasses like the "greasy haired guy" but he was bald with a crazy scruffy beard. We'd walk through the door and "oddball" would be flipping one thing with one hand and shaking one thing with the other. Working the carts was the "serial killer" with a stare so devastating that it made people feel nervous.

Now,once moving on to the checkout line we would have three options. Option number one was that we could go to the "Robot" who would calculate how much your meal would cost before you even it got it..."that will be 8.99 please"..."that will be 2.99 please"..."that will be...."...you get the point...it was annoying as hell. Now, if you think that option #1 sucked, then option #2 isn't any better....at the checkout stand was what my friends and I called the "Tranny"...he/she would calculate your meal in a non annoying way but then when giving your card back would hold it between both hands and stare into your soul!!! the stare was creepy I must say.....I had countless discussions on whether this worker was a boy or a girl. My friend Landon deduced that it was a man because of its large adam apple and strong jawline....it was also hinted that it was a man from the name tag which read "Amanda" or how we read it " a-man-duh??". However, the long hair and the soft speaking sound of its voice made people think that it was a girl...who knows??...The last and final option was a tall middle aged fellow with a dark beard, long pony tailed hair and suit who we nicknamed "the terrorist". My friends and I always heard him talking about military guns and it was later confirmed when we creeped him on Facebook that he had written political propaganda on his notes.....it seems that today I would take the "Tranny" so i could try and find a clue as what gender it was........and this was just a regular cafeteria day...

The first weeks...

I remember the first night I spent in my vinyl wrapped twin bed, thinking to myself "wow, this is so comfortable", an opinion that was sure to change over the coming months. How young and stupid I really was, having left my queen size memory foam, triple bedspring space age technology mattress at home. Now, for the first two weeks, I didn't really hang out with anyone on my floor. I met a girl, katie, in the line up to get student cards, and we spent most of our time watching laguna beach and eating pasta. The first two weeks had past, and I still had no idea who I was sharing the bathroom with.

On the first day of school, both of the doors to the bathroom were open. Each room had a door on opposite ends of the bathroom connecting our rooms to the bathroom, and on that first day, I caught a glimpse of my mysterious roommates back. But for the ensuing two weeks, that's all I saw of him. I guess I could have walked the 5 feet of common space we shared, and knocked on his door. But this was university, who does that?

So I spent my time going for runs on the trails, hanging out with katie, and blasting mos def and biggie smalls throughout my little dorm room. And then, on some random night, probably going down to the cafeteria (the caff) for some food, I was in the elevator when this guy, turned to me and said "so, do you think we should clean the bathroom soon".

"what? you're my roommate?"

The First Encounter

It had been a couple weeks since I arrived and I still felt like I knew nothing about anyone. The one person that I shoulda known was the "mysterious bathroom-mate". A sly bandit and with the few times I had seen him, possibly azn...or even worse...an azn imposter otherwise known as a fazn. I had recognized him with his parents on the first day and proceeded to follow the "bathroom-mate" through-out the orientation day for Valhalla. Unfortunately, he was always going to the wrong events!!! Was this a diabolical plan to mess with me? I wasn't sure.

The next week ensued and all I heard from across the bathroom was a constant cough and the occasional piss(The only little tid-bit I wanna add is that after talking to one of my buddies Praneil (with a pre-fix P)I was able to determine that this mysterious man know as Thomas...was basically like me).Anyways,the loud words of Notorious B.I.G. filled the room on most days and it was at this point that I knew the "bathroom-mate" known as Thomas...would be starting the day with his morning shower...

4 weeks later:

It was around 7 O'clock heading back from the gym when there we were standing face to face in the elevator. The elevator reached the fourth floor and we both got out. "Hey, when do u wanna clean the bathroom?" I said
"We're roommates" Thomas uttered
"I think so" I said as we both reached for our keys and opened our doors side by side in room 401A and 401B.

The BIG MOVE

There it was, my whole life collected in the back of a medium sized mazda mpv . An assortment of boxes, pillows and life assets pressed as tight as could be against the light grey walls of the vehicle.This was it, this was the BIG move.

We departed for the ferry on the 820 that day, leaving the small town life of Gibsons...where everybody knew everybody. The drive was 4hrs long and it went by as quick as I can remember which isn’t saying much cause it takes me a while to remember things.
I’m not gonna lie to you but I was choked that I had to come to ubc “O” instead of the regular ubc in van. In my mind, it shouldn’t have been an “O”, it shoulda been a “U” for underachieving highschoolers who couldn’t make the jump to the big leagues. Anyways, enough about my rant....we went up early that week and when it was eventually the time for my parents to give up their child for 8 months of the year, it was preddy sad. It reminded me of an animal being set free after years in captivity, you didn’t know what would happen but u sure knew that animal was gonna get wasted drunk....LOL, wait.. wut?
- Jbrown