College students move more than army wives. Do you realize that you will move at least twice a year for at least the next four years of your life, and possibly many more if you have a hard time finding a job? Realize it, homey.
Now, you might be like, "Whatever, I live in a dorm room, there isn't that much stuff in here."
Yes, yes there is.
As soon as you move into a dorm room, your stuff stops being a solid and becomes liquid. However much room you have, that is how much stuff you have - and if you have extra room, then your stuff will expand to fill that space. If you want proof, open the top drawer of your desk. Is it so full of stuff that it resembles a tetris board? Yep, I win.
This means that even though you live in a space smaller than most doghouses, you still own more stuff than a magpie. Actually, no, that is exactly what you are: a very studious, hipster magpie. Anyway, when it comes to moving, you have to figure out how to transport all of your krap from college to home and then back to college again. Here's how to do so.
*Note: I will now assume that you go to an out-of-state school*
Divid your stuff into two teams: Team Staying Here, and Team Going Home. Team Staying Here consists of all the krap that you don't need/want at home. Your microwave, fridge, winter wardrobe, dorm furniture, posters, school supplies, books, and garden gnomes are all examples of things that belong to Team Staying Here. If it helps you, you can think of these Teams as straight and gay, or as Jacob and Edward. That doesn't help me, but hey, to each his own.
Now take Team Staying Here and find three or four other people who have their own Team Staying Heres. Pile all of your Teams into one pick-up (it helps if one of the other people has a pick-up) and drive the pick-up to a storage center. You are all going to split the cost of a pod/storage room/similar storage thing. Make sure that ALL of your stuff is labeled with your name (maybe you want to mark the floor with painter's tape so it is very clear whose Team is whose). Pay for the pod up front so that you all pay the same and someone doesn't disappear and never pay their part when school starts in a few months.
Team Going Home should now be packed in rubber maids or sturdy cardboard boxes and, again, labeled with your name. Make sure that the stuff you are bringing home fits in your car/that you can afford to ship it. Pack the things that you will need up until the last minute in a suitcase so that you have easy access to them. Make one final trip to the storage center when you realize that your garden gnomes should really be in Team Going Home because you can't live without them.
Now you are a moving pro. Look at you, you studious, organized, hipster magpie. Rock it.
Saturday, April 20, 2013
Sunday, April 14, 2013
When You Need $$
Mooching money from your parents is a dangerous thing. Especially if they are already helping you pay tuition or something like that, you may (should) feel like a major freeloader if you ask them for money all the time. So here are some tricks to getting your parents to help you out without making them feel like they have raised you badly.
- Go shopping when they visit. We've already been over this but I'll say it again: when your parents are in town, they will be predisposed to spend money on you. Don't force them to buy you things you don't need, like another pair of jeans or that enormous poster of Thor. Stick with groceries and shampoo.
- Don't ask for money. What? Backwards? Yes. It's called reverse psychology. Call your parents on the phone and spend a good 10 minutes talking about other stuff. Then, casually mention that you are really stressed out because you have to put in a deposit for your travel abroad next semester and it's going to wipe out your bank account (it helps if it actually will wipe you out). Then your parents can say "oh, we'll help you with that!" or even better "Oh, we'll pay for that!" SCORE!
- Don't make them pay for little things. If you call your Daddy every time you decide you need $20, grow up. Get a job on campus or something, you smelly turnip. Save your requests for when you actually need money.
- Watch out for sneaky technology. Most of you have bank accounts that your parents have access to. Guess what, they can go online and SEE everywhere you spend money, how much you spend, and how often it is. Your parents are not going to want to buy your books when they see that you spent $246.59 at Hipsters R Us last week.
- Love your parents back. They know you don't have a lot of money, but you still need to send them cards on holidays/birthdays that you miss. Call them on those days too. If you don't want to pay for shipping to send an actual present, but you want to send a present, just order it online and have it delivered to their house. Tell the parent that it isn't for that it's coming and get him/her to wrap it for you. Bam! Lawyered!
- I am really proud of my web browser because it actually recognizes the word "Lawyered" as a thing. Good job, Chrome!
Now, because you are in college and you don't read the complete text of anything, here is the cliffs notes version of what I said above: (I may or may not have randomly selected words from the above paragraphs and arranged them here in a vaguely logical way. Results may vary)
- Parents in town? Buy predisposed groceries, Thor.
- Reverse psychology is like SCORE and wipes you out.
- Grow up, you deadbeat tangelo.
- Technology just bit you in the ass-type-regions
- Send some cards about wrap
- Lawyered is a proud thing!
Look at that, I just saved you time AND money! That'll be $37.95.
- Go shopping when they visit. We've already been over this but I'll say it again: when your parents are in town, they will be predisposed to spend money on you. Don't force them to buy you things you don't need, like another pair of jeans or that enormous poster of Thor. Stick with groceries and shampoo.
- Don't ask for money. What? Backwards? Yes. It's called reverse psychology. Call your parents on the phone and spend a good 10 minutes talking about other stuff. Then, casually mention that you are really stressed out because you have to put in a deposit for your travel abroad next semester and it's going to wipe out your bank account (it helps if it actually will wipe you out). Then your parents can say "oh, we'll help you with that!" or even better "Oh, we'll pay for that!" SCORE!
- Don't make them pay for little things. If you call your Daddy every time you decide you need $20, grow up. Get a job on campus or something, you smelly turnip. Save your requests for when you actually need money.
- Watch out for sneaky technology. Most of you have bank accounts that your parents have access to. Guess what, they can go online and SEE everywhere you spend money, how much you spend, and how often it is. Your parents are not going to want to buy your books when they see that you spent $246.59 at Hipsters R Us last week.
- Love your parents back. They know you don't have a lot of money, but you still need to send them cards on holidays/birthdays that you miss. Call them on those days too. If you don't want to pay for shipping to send an actual present, but you want to send a present, just order it online and have it delivered to their house. Tell the parent that it isn't for that it's coming and get him/her to wrap it for you. Bam! Lawyered!
- I am really proud of my web browser because it actually recognizes the word "Lawyered" as a thing. Good job, Chrome!
Now, because you are in college and you don't read the complete text of anything, here is the cliffs notes version of what I said above: (I may or may not have randomly selected words from the above paragraphs and arranged them here in a vaguely logical way. Results may vary)
- Parents in town? Buy predisposed groceries, Thor.
- Reverse psychology is like SCORE and wipes you out.
- Grow up, you deadbeat tangelo.
- Technology just bit you in the ass-type-regions
- Send some cards about wrap
- Lawyered is a proud thing!
Look at that, I just saved you time AND money! That'll be $37.95.
Friday, April 12, 2013
How to NOT Break the Bank at the Grocery Store
Ok, so we all stash snacks in our rooms because sometimes cafeteria food just isn't enough (or is so gross that it actually makes you hungrier than before you ate). The problem is that you are already spending approximately 1.79 buttloads on your dining plan, so you can't really load up on all the good snacks that you want. Fortunately, I can get you in and out of the store for less than $15 if you are willing to follow my (crazed) lead.
Step 1: Go to Costco with your parents whenever they come to visit you and/or you go to visit them. If you aren't flying back, come back with a car full of groceries. If you are flying back, see if you can talk them into giving you grocery money (more on that later). While you are at Costco, get:
- Cup of Noodles. These cost like 30 cents each in bulk and you can have them as a late night snack, a quick lunch, or a portable dinner when you have night classes.
- Protein Bars. Get something like this that you can throw in your backpack to tide you over until lunch at 1:30 (you wouldn't be in this situation if you had just followed my instructions when I told you how to register for classes).
- Emergency Chocolate. Find some kind of bark or candy or chocolate-covered something so that you can nurse your 17 page theology essay with some fatty goodness.
- Fizzy Juices or Energy Drinks of some kind. These are expensive and you can use them as barter later on. "I'll give you an Izze if you edit my paper" is a very common phrase among us.
- Shampoo, Conditioner, Toothpaste, etc. Stock up on this krap.
Step 2: Make a Freaking List. Do not go to the store with only vague dreams about what you will get. You will end up buying an entire pineapple and then realize that you have no way of slicing or storing it (at which point you will dissect it with a jack knife and force your roommate to eat most of it). Keep in mind:
- Coffee supplies. Creamer doesn't expire for like three months, so if you can fit the big jugs in your fridge get those - they're a better deal. I suggest that you start liking Folger's coffee now because it is only $4 a bag.
- Breakfast Stuph. If you eat breakfast in the dining hall, good for you. I never do but sometimes I still want something breakfasty before class. Generic cereal is good if you have milk. Microwave oatmeal is good if you have a microwave. Don't ever get frozen egg sandwiches or anything like that because mini fridge freezers can't keep that frozen.
- Chips. Those big pre-school sized cartons of goldfish are your friends. As are giant bags of generic tortilla chips.
Step 3: Stay out of the Clothes Section. Unless you specifically need a certain kind of clothing, don't even go over there. Just don't. Stay in the food section and don't fall for the clearance bins that they put in the no-man's-land between the clothes and the food. It's a trap! They are just trying to lure you in and drown you in debt.
Step 4: Get the Cheapest Kind. Oh, I'm sorry, do you like Sargento cheese better than Silly Moo? SUCKIT! Don't even look at the expensive slices! Just grab your clearance string cheese and try not to wonder why cheese would ever be on clearance.
Step 5: Don't Let the Checkout Line Stuff Call Out to You. All of that gum and candy and gossip that they keep up by the check-out, yeah, don't even look at it. Pretend it's an eclipse and that it will burn your eyes. Just look at your shoes and try to count the number of tiny flecks in the tile under you. Never mind the weird looks that the cashier gives you when you blindly wave your cash in front of his face - you can't even see those looks so they don't exist.
With any luck, you will come home with a stash of goodies that will last you for a few weeks. Yes, a FEW weeks. Don't go to the store every week. Buy the bigger version of whatever you need because it is usually cheaper than getting two regular sized things. That way, you can budget about $30 a month for groceries and not feel like you are suffering in any way. Sort of.
Step 1: Go to Costco with your parents whenever they come to visit you and/or you go to visit them. If you aren't flying back, come back with a car full of groceries. If you are flying back, see if you can talk them into giving you grocery money (more on that later). While you are at Costco, get:
- Cup of Noodles. These cost like 30 cents each in bulk and you can have them as a late night snack, a quick lunch, or a portable dinner when you have night classes.
- Protein Bars. Get something like this that you can throw in your backpack to tide you over until lunch at 1:30 (you wouldn't be in this situation if you had just followed my instructions when I told you how to register for classes).
- Emergency Chocolate. Find some kind of bark or candy or chocolate-covered something so that you can nurse your 17 page theology essay with some fatty goodness.
- Fizzy Juices or Energy Drinks of some kind. These are expensive and you can use them as barter later on. "I'll give you an Izze if you edit my paper" is a very common phrase among us.
- Shampoo, Conditioner, Toothpaste, etc. Stock up on this krap.
Step 2: Make a Freaking List. Do not go to the store with only vague dreams about what you will get. You will end up buying an entire pineapple and then realize that you have no way of slicing or storing it (at which point you will dissect it with a jack knife and force your roommate to eat most of it). Keep in mind:
- Coffee supplies. Creamer doesn't expire for like three months, so if you can fit the big jugs in your fridge get those - they're a better deal. I suggest that you start liking Folger's coffee now because it is only $4 a bag.
- Breakfast Stuph. If you eat breakfast in the dining hall, good for you. I never do but sometimes I still want something breakfasty before class. Generic cereal is good if you have milk. Microwave oatmeal is good if you have a microwave. Don't ever get frozen egg sandwiches or anything like that because mini fridge freezers can't keep that frozen.
- Chips. Those big pre-school sized cartons of goldfish are your friends. As are giant bags of generic tortilla chips.
Step 3: Stay out of the Clothes Section. Unless you specifically need a certain kind of clothing, don't even go over there. Just don't. Stay in the food section and don't fall for the clearance bins that they put in the no-man's-land between the clothes and the food. It's a trap! They are just trying to lure you in and drown you in debt.
Step 4: Get the Cheapest Kind. Oh, I'm sorry, do you like Sargento cheese better than Silly Moo? SUCKIT! Don't even look at the expensive slices! Just grab your clearance string cheese and try not to wonder why cheese would ever be on clearance.
Step 5: Don't Let the Checkout Line Stuff Call Out to You. All of that gum and candy and gossip that they keep up by the check-out, yeah, don't even look at it. Pretend it's an eclipse and that it will burn your eyes. Just look at your shoes and try to count the number of tiny flecks in the tile under you. Never mind the weird looks that the cashier gives you when you blindly wave your cash in front of his face - you can't even see those looks so they don't exist.
With any luck, you will come home with a stash of goodies that will last you for a few weeks. Yes, a FEW weeks. Don't go to the store every week. Buy the bigger version of whatever you need because it is usually cheaper than getting two regular sized things. That way, you can budget about $30 a month for groceries and not feel like you are suffering in any way. Sort of.
Wednesday, February 6, 2013
And Then Your Perspective Changes
Apparently, people in college think that having more than three classes in one day is really hard.
What?
You people went to high school, right? Don't you remember when you had seven classes every day and the homework for those classes was due the next day? What is wrong with you?
I guess after mere months of having your classes spread out, the idea of attending more than two classes in a row is daunting. It is not unlike kindergarten where you take a nap in the middle of the day so you don't suffer a nervous breakdown. So good news! College is just one big kindergarten. I am sure that at some point, I will sympathize with people when they complain that they have four classes all on the same day, but right now all I can think about is when I sat in class for seven hours, went to work for five, and then did homework for three EVERY DAY.
Gosh, people, stop being kindergarteners. Weirdies.
What?
You people went to high school, right? Don't you remember when you had seven classes every day and the homework for those classes was due the next day? What is wrong with you?
I guess after mere months of having your classes spread out, the idea of attending more than two classes in a row is daunting. It is not unlike kindergarten where you take a nap in the middle of the day so you don't suffer a nervous breakdown. So good news! College is just one big kindergarten. I am sure that at some point, I will sympathize with people when they complain that they have four classes all on the same day, but right now all I can think about is when I sat in class for seven hours, went to work for five, and then did homework for three EVERY DAY.
Gosh, people, stop being kindergarteners. Weirdies.
Tuesday, February 5, 2013
Those Darn AP Books
You are a Peaker. Therefore, you bought and *maybe* used a bunch of AP books for all of your super hard classes. Well guess what, you should keep those babies around. If you feel a great need to sell them, you can, but you will probably wish you hadn't because they are very useful study tools for actual college classes.
These books can provide sample problems to practice with, vocabulary lists, summarized readings, and other such goodies. Admittedly, some classes will very closely follow the content of the assigned textbook, but still, AP books can save you a lot of work.
Also, consider the fact that some college textbooks may not explain the little details of all of the concepts they cover because they are too hoity toity and advanced to bother with such trivialities. When this happens, you can use your AP books (or even the actual textbooks from that high school class) to fill in the gaps. My Spanish textbook this year is useless when it comes to explaining grammatical concepts. Yes, I know that I have already been taught these things once, and I know that in an ideal world I wouldn't need reminding, but I also know that it is shockingly easy to mix up the pluperfect subjunctive and the past perfect indicative. Imagine that.
Don't feel like you have to cart all of your high school textbooks and prep books to college with you, but if you know that you will be taking a Calc II class and it has been two years since you took AP Calc, then it might be helpful to have something from that class around to help you out. You can always use your extra books as brown-nosing fodder by showing up in your Proff's office with an old textbook and asking if the sample problems listed here on this page would be helpful for the upcoming test or if it would be better to look at these over here. I smell sympathy points!
These books can provide sample problems to practice with, vocabulary lists, summarized readings, and other such goodies. Admittedly, some classes will very closely follow the content of the assigned textbook, but still, AP books can save you a lot of work.
Also, consider the fact that some college textbooks may not explain the little details of all of the concepts they cover because they are too hoity toity and advanced to bother with such trivialities. When this happens, you can use your AP books (or even the actual textbooks from that high school class) to fill in the gaps. My Spanish textbook this year is useless when it comes to explaining grammatical concepts. Yes, I know that I have already been taught these things once, and I know that in an ideal world I wouldn't need reminding, but I also know that it is shockingly easy to mix up the pluperfect subjunctive and the past perfect indicative. Imagine that.
Don't feel like you have to cart all of your high school textbooks and prep books to college with you, but if you know that you will be taking a Calc II class and it has been two years since you took AP Calc, then it might be helpful to have something from that class around to help you out. You can always use your extra books as brown-nosing fodder by showing up in your Proff's office with an old textbook and asking if the sample problems listed here on this page would be helpful for the upcoming test or if it would be better to look at these over here. I smell sympathy points!
Monday, February 4, 2013
Four Years
By now we are all used to the whole "spend a succession of years in a category" thing. Three years in middle school, four in high school, 12 years as a child, eight as a teenager, six years in an insane asylum, etc. So four years in college seems like the next natural step - except it's not four years.
You need to start thinking about college as eight semesters. This is a key distinction because each semester is independent of the others. This isn't like high school where you sign up for classes four times and your classes are a year long and it's all divided up into four neat little segments. Granted, you will apply for housing four times, and the freshman through senior system works for four years, but pretty much everything else should be considered in terms of semesters.
There are a significant number of greater implications with the whole eight semesters thing, but I am currently eating a banana and it is hard to hold it and type and chew all at the same time so you are just going to have to wait a few posts to find out what they are. You might possible be waiting forever because this post was boring anyway so chances of me revisiting it are slim. Bananas ho!
You need to start thinking about college as eight semesters. This is a key distinction because each semester is independent of the others. This isn't like high school where you sign up for classes four times and your classes are a year long and it's all divided up into four neat little segments. Granted, you will apply for housing four times, and the freshman through senior system works for four years, but pretty much everything else should be considered in terms of semesters.
There are a significant number of greater implications with the whole eight semesters thing, but I am currently eating a banana and it is hard to hold it and type and chew all at the same time so you are just going to have to wait a few posts to find out what they are. You might possible be waiting forever because this post was boring anyway so chances of me revisiting it are slim. Bananas ho!
Saturday, February 2, 2013
Visiting Campus: Scholarship Competitions
A lot of schools have competitive events where they host a hundred or so students for a weekend and at the end they award one student a scholarship. These events are like the hunger games, except they don't tell you when you die so you have to just keep on fighting and sucking up and killing people even if you're pretty sure you were brutally murdered in the first six minutes. This also means that you could very well be killed by someone who is already dead. Sucks to be you, you just got zombied.
If you attend one of these weekends, keep in mind that they never stop watching you. From the minute you sign in, they will be taking notes and analyzing your behavior. Make sure you are always having a friendly, meaningful, and mildly intelligent conversation with someone. You need to seem like the kind of person who will automatically make the whole campus more happy just by being on it.
Make sure you ask intelligent questions - ones that CAN'T be answered by your event packet or by a basic troll of the website. Have a list of twenty or so questions that make you seem insightful, curious, open-minded, and/or unique. For example, at a Christian school, you can ask "In what ways do you include faith in class on a regular basis?" Ooh, now you have told them that you love Jesus, care about your faith, advocate for yourself, and have the ability to brown-nose. Everyone needs to learn how to brown-nose at some point.
Wear something distinctive but not weird or edgy - a slouchy beanie, or a brightly colored shirt, or something. That way, people will remember you more easily.
Do your best to show your leadership skillz but never seem like a dictator. Yeah, good luck. You can't ever be sure what these people are looking for, but they don't want a Peeta who just paints himself into a rock for three days.
So, to sum up: try to avoid being zombied, ask good questions, never stop talking to people, wear a hat, be a brown-noser (but subtly enough that they can pretend they don't notice), don't paint yourself into a rock.
If you attend one of these weekends, keep in mind that they never stop watching you. From the minute you sign in, they will be taking notes and analyzing your behavior. Make sure you are always having a friendly, meaningful, and mildly intelligent conversation with someone. You need to seem like the kind of person who will automatically make the whole campus more happy just by being on it.
Make sure you ask intelligent questions - ones that CAN'T be answered by your event packet or by a basic troll of the website. Have a list of twenty or so questions that make you seem insightful, curious, open-minded, and/or unique. For example, at a Christian school, you can ask "In what ways do you include faith in class on a regular basis?" Ooh, now you have told them that you love Jesus, care about your faith, advocate for yourself, and have the ability to brown-nose. Everyone needs to learn how to brown-nose at some point.
Wear something distinctive but not weird or edgy - a slouchy beanie, or a brightly colored shirt, or something. That way, people will remember you more easily.
Do your best to show your leadership skillz but never seem like a dictator. Yeah, good luck. You can't ever be sure what these people are looking for, but they don't want a Peeta who just paints himself into a rock for three days.
So, to sum up: try to avoid being zombied, ask good questions, never stop talking to people, wear a hat, be a brown-noser (but subtly enough that they can pretend they don't notice), don't paint yourself into a rock.
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