Books Are My Master

Quite miraculously, I think I managed to come up with a senior thesis topic. Even more miraculous? I think the topic might actually be good.

As the story goes, I was probably one of ten people who spent Saturday night in the library. Don't let the aspect of Saturday night in the library scare you-you know I definitely left at ten o' clock for a late night Stop & Shop run which eventually resulted in baking pumpkin pie-but sometimes it's kind of nice to chill out and go on book hunts instead of going completely haywire at some sort of Vassar concert. The best part is that you always feel like you did something productive after you leave, whether you actually did work or not. Don't believe me? Try it:

Cool Friend #1: Hey, where were you Saturday night?
Cool Friend #2: Yeah, seriously. There was a killer concert in Main featuring the Jimi Hendrix Experience and The Clash!
Me: Oh, I was in the library sleeping, I mean, SLAVING over books.
Cool Friend #1: Wow! You have so much motivation!
Cool Friend #2: I wish I could be you!

See? That's pretty much exactly how a conversation between my friends and me would go. By the way, The Clash actually did play at Vassar back in the day. No joke.

But Saturday was dedicated to finding a thesis topic. I had an idea of something I wanted to do along the lines of new media (such as the Internet, YouTube, Facebook, etc.) but I wasn't sure exactly what. Then, after leaving the library, I was talking to my friend about what a sociologist might write a thesis about when the words literally came out of my mouth, "Something like, I don't know, activism on the Internet...Wait a second... WHOA."

After researching the topic briefly, I realized that the topic had been researched just enough-not too much or too little for me to write about it. Now all I need is a 1-2 page summary of the topic, a projected outline and annotated bibliography for Monday.

T minus four days until my proposal is due-I'm in the clear.

Vassar in the Summer, Part 3

As a long time resident of Cushing House, I was crushed when I learned I would have to move to Main Building for the summer. Not that Main is that bad, but I’m lazy and had no desire to switch rooms. While this was my main concern at the time, my concern changed when for some reason my room door locked automatically (which I wasn’t used to as a Cushing resident) and I got locked out of my room wearing nothing but a towel. Quite embarrassed of the situation, I decided my best idea was to walk over to a group of cleaners and explain what had happened. Immediately upon hearing what happened, they started laughing. Feeling sorry for me, one of the cleaners called the ROC (see Vassar in the Summer, Part 1) for the spare key to my room and allowed me to use their lounge for a bit of privacy while I was waiting. While sitting in the cleaner's lounge, it was at that point when I realized just exactly how hot my room was in comparison to the rest of the building. The cleaner's lounge on the fourth floor was comfortable. My room on the fifth floor? Not so much.

As you may have guessed, I don't have many friends. Actually, that was a lie, but seeing as it is summer time, a lot of them have gone home and most of the time I'm on my own, which makes me feel like I don't have many friends. I'm watching a rat over the summer for a friend, and, needless to say, I became pretty good friends with him a while ago. We generally sit around and complain about the temperature of my room together. While the temperature for the day is generally somewhere between 75 and 90, my room temperature seems to hover around 100. You know there's a problem when you start sweating immediately upon entering your room, which happens to me all the time. The other day I even had a dream about buying two more fans to cool my blistering hot room, and I have come to believe the dream was actually a prophecy. How else am I going to survive? I witnessed my current best friend, the rat, try to commit suicide the other day because of the heat. But luckily the short size of his cage decreased the height of what could have been a nasty fall, sparing the life of my friend.

I've been trying to make some more friends (especially friends who have air conditioning), but no luck as of yet. The other day I went on a pilgrimage to find air conditioning, choosing the slightly off-campus cafe known as "Babycakes" as my refuge. Only a short walk from campus, Babycakes serves the most amazing brunch as well as fancy pastries. (I totally recommend it.) But when I arrived at my destination, I found that the usual group of college kids inside had been exchanged for a much... how do I say this... "older" crowd. Upon walking inside, I knew I'd be leaving quickly. Everyone there felt it necessary to stare at me as I approached the "to go" counter and ordered a small cup of coffee. I was probably the first Vassar student they'd seen in days, which apparently put me on the same plane as a space creature. Shunning the idea I'd had of quietly sipping my coffee while reading the Harry Potter book nestled within my bag, I decided it was time for Plan B so that I could avoid their gaze. Feeling eyes upon me while I left, I ditched this older crowd and decided to check out the nearby Poughkeepsie Public Library instead.

Luckily, while I don't really have many friends and possess only a memory of my beautiful, cool room in Cushing (Cushing room 100, to be exact), summer at Vassar isn't actually that bad. In fact, for a nerd like myself, it's actually kind of fun. I'd much rather be here, sitting in the beautiful campus library surrounded by thousands of opportunities for fun reading than going home and suffering through a fast food service job.

As a lot of you may know, the seventh, and last, book of the Harry Potter series is coming out in July. 44 days from today, to be exact. Naturally, I decided that it would only be appropriate to start reading the books for the first time during the Spring, so that by July I'd be all caught up. But while the Vassar library possesses everything from the Bible to Where The Wild Things Are, I was quite surprised to find that all of the Harry Potter books once owned by the library had been stolen! To think that fellow Vassar students were criminals was slightly nerve-wrecking and the idea, "maybe I shouldn't leave my computer unattended in the library..." came to mind (gee, perhaps I should have thought of that sooner?). But fortunately, for those times when a book you'd expect to be in the library isn't there, a wonderful tool know as "NY Connect" searches the libraries of several schools partnered with Vassar and delivers the book you request for free. It's saved my life several times-especially when I was left to wonder what happens to Harry in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban.

And of course, don't let me forget about my free summer access to Vassar's state of the art gym. While not as large as a gym at your average University, it has all the bells and whistles. In fact, I have been known to spend as much as three hours in Vassar's gym before. Instead of partying with all of my friends last Saturday (which is actually my secret phrase for "not having anything better to do"), I spent a majority of my time weight lifting and swimming. According to Time magazine, which I read while peddling the stationary bike, excercise does make you smarter. Lord knows I could use the extra brain power considering the courseload I'm taking next semester. Don't worry, you'll be ready for it by the time you're a senior (but I'm not sure if I am....).

If the rest of the summer is anything like the past week, I know at least a few things will be true by the end of the summer: I'll be a lot smarter, and in much better shape. Or at least that's what I keep telling myself.