Big ups to everyone else who’s traded daylight for fluorescent library light this weekend. Somewhere among those throngs is your UTB editor! As we we sit here pitying ourselves, it occurred to us that we have transgressed some sort of finals line of demarcation and found ourselves behaving in ways that, in our day-to-day lives, we would consider heinous. Here’s a little cheat sheet for recalibrating your personal code of ethics:
You have no idea how thankful we are for this
Saving a seat by leaving all your crap there unattended for hours at a time
Normal level of offensiveness: High
Finals level of offensiveness: Low. Completely permissible.
Not turning off your cell phone in the library
Normal level of offensiveness: Low
Finals level of offensiveness: Medium (But completely acceptable when we’re the ones with the ringing phone)
Wanting to hug the person who brought in a surge protector
Normal level of offensiveness: High. Never hug a rando.
Finals level of offensiveness: Nonexistent. You would be nothing without a place to plug in your laptop!
I went to boarding school (in response to your immediate thought, no, it was not a punishment) in a pretty isolated part of Connecticut. Though I consider myself a relatively proficient Internet shopper, my desolate location was a big hindrance on my ability to purchase the perfect Christmas (and/or Hanukkah, Kwanzaa) gift for each and every person that I love. Adding to this problem were the domains concerning who I actually should have been purchasing gifts for: hall faculty, neighbors, friends who may awkwardly be giving me something even though I only pretended to like them because their moms sent the best care packages? The lists are endless.
This holiday season, those lines are growing continually more difficult, especially considering the current economic state of turmoil. I’m here, after a brief sabbatical, to impart some wisdom in terms of who actually deserves presents this year, and what they should be getting.
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We all party. I will not bore you, or myself, by listing the many, many events of the past couple weeks that have spurred on reckless behavior (and besides, if you don’t know what I’m talking about, just read the rest of this blog. Gosh.), but suffice to say: there has been a lot of revelty around here.
As your Emily Post liaison for the millenial generation, there are many things about wild partying that I should probably be critiquing. Vomit, for one, is a subject no one should ever stop criticizing. Along the same lines, dirty hook-ups, one-night stands, keg stands, drunk eating…all of these and more fascinating topics that, in my opinion, have a specific protocol and deserve their own individual discussions. For this week, however, I am going to concentrate on a personal favorite: passing out.
I get it, Boy-Who-Fell-Asleep-on-My-Couch, you were tired! Sure, Girl-in-Philly-Diner, your friends will probably wake you up before you leave. And who doesn’t enjoy a sighting of Couple-Spooning-on-the-Bed in a room in which everyone has decided to continue the after-party? But, and I’ve got to be honest here readers, there is a time and a place for passing out, particularly drunkenly. That place is your bed, the bed of a willing companion or even something bed-like (read: couch). That place is not in front of Rodin.
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So considering that Halloween is this week, you’d think I would dedicate today’s post to inappropriate costumes. Wrong again, reader! That was my intention, but today I eavesdropped on a conversation so heinous that I decided to bypass the whole “Halloween” theme altogether, in the name of a much-needed review of common decency.
So, to paint a mental picture, I was sitting in Houston eating and studying for my Criminology midterm, when my mind began to wander (not all of us are as efficient studiers as we would like to be). Anyway, my mind wandered on over to the table next to me, where two upperclassmen guys were having a conversation about their weekends.
Sounds harmless, no? It could have been, but instead what ensued was one of the more offensive conversations I’ve overheard in a long time. Parenthetically, for those of you who are upset at my blatant admittance to eavesdropping, I would chastise myself for a breach of etiquette had this guy not insisted on screaming so that half of Houston heard, voluntarily or no.
In a period of about five minutes, he managed to drop such conversational gems as, “I dunno, I hooked up with some random bitches,” “no, I didn’t ask her name it’s not like she was there to cuddle,” and “it’s like, why do ugly bitches even talk to me? I’m not gonna go there.”
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We’ve all seen it happen; it’s tragic, really. You or a friend has scoured the scene and finally found Mr. or Ms. Right. The pair’s burgeoning relationship falls flat on its face as a result of–you guessed it–overzealous or just plain wrong texting.
To try and remedy the love lives of its textually-challenged customers, AT&T brought in a “love expert” to create “Textiquette,” a set of rules to govern those virtual sweet nothings. Watch AT&T’s instructional video, “How to Lose a Guy in 10 Texts” here, and check out UTB’s additional texting rules after the jump.
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Welcome back to Over It, the occasional feature that consists of a UTB contributor ranting about something they are so totally over.
Over the past year or so, we’ve noticed an insidious element creeping into e-mails from our peers: first it was just a line or two at the end of a message, something like “Joe Studentstein, Penn ‘09.” But over time, it grew to include phone numbers and other contact information, eventually reaching its current state of bloatedness: a block of text that includes as much information as a resume, sometimes finished off with the ever-loathsome “Sent from my iPhone.” We’d like to just point out the obvious and say that interminable signatures are pretentious.
We know you’re going to use long, toolish signatures when applying for jobs and stuff, but in your day-to-day casual e-mailing, please spare us the listing of your “mobile” phone number and the fact that you’re a member of Penn’s save the whales advocacy group (Penn4FreeWilly | Secretary, in fact). A simple class year and unlabeled phone number (we can all guess what 10 digits in a row signifies) will usually do the trick. And you should avoid including a quote in your signature. But if something compels you to do so, you should never, ever, quote one of your professors in an e-mail to that professor and the rest of your class, as we once saw a classmate so egregiously do.
Signed,
UTB
Ranter and Angry Person | UnderTheButton.com
University of Pennsylvania | Class of 2009
E-mail: underthebutton@gmail.com
Mobile: (215) you wish
“A small leak can sink a great ship.” -Benjamin Franklin
If only he read UTB first...
With parents’ weekend fast approaching, I know a lot of people are nervous about meeting their significant other’s folks. I have major sympathy for those of you who are stuck in the awkward position of wanting to avoid this happenstance at all costs, but consider your partner’s position too! Even I have been on the other side of the spectrum–I had a boyfriend once who refused to be introduced to my parents for the entire sixth months we were dating. Ouch. I should mention that, when I did finally force them to get together, nobody came out happy or satisfied. The whole horribly awkward encounter could have been avoided had I only respected my ex’s–and my parent’s–wishes. Please feel free learn from my mistake.
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So here we are, in the midst of midterms. Apologies for not writing last week; even I am capable of bad behavior, particularly procrastination. But now that I’m back from my self-imposed hibernation, I’m here to provide you with some helpful hints for appropriate midterm behavior.
First, we feel for you, O Person Who Has Spent the Last Four Days in the Library. Good news! I’m hereby declaring that spending an entire week studying in the same pair of sweatpants is completely acceptable, even if by the end, they are covered in coffee stains, errant highlighter marks and melted chocolate or grease marks (depending on your stress food of choice). Just be sure to wash them after your hell week.
Furthermore, let’s discuss stress eating. Ordering $40 worth of Chinese food and then eating it alone in your room without offering any to your roommates? Perhaps not the most gracious behavior, Emily Post may even be upset with you, but I proclaim: It’s fine, midterms leave you with a little leeway in terms of what exactly is “polite.” However, stealing your roommate’s last chocolate bar, eating it secretly and then telling her she must have lost it? One step too far; even I draw the line at theft.
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Our intrepid etiquette columnist intones: there’s a time and place for P.D.A. But when! And where? Read on for a moral compass beyond W.W.J.D.
This weekend, at an unnamed fraternity party, I saw yet another drunken hook-up. This time, however, I noticed two minor deviations from the norm: One, instead of being freshmen, these people appeared to be older (see attached picture). Upperclassmen recklessly engaging in minor sexual deviance at a frat party? Weird. Shouldn’t these two have been at Smoke’s or, even better, in private?
Don't let this be you!
And, two: Instead of standing in a dark corner or on the side of the room, this couple decided to engage openly in their acts of barely restrained passion between the exit of said frat and the bar. This was a relatively well-lit area, and they were surrounded by the 21+ (or the card-carrying majority) who were trying to get their beer.
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Our etiquette guru Abby Johnston is back with more advice for you ill-mannered hoodlums. This time, she lays down the unspoken rules of the Facebook friend request.
Your number of friends on Facebook is an easily located statistic that shows anyone who cares enough to look essentially how popular you are. Thus, proving your popularity through acquiring as many friends as possible is important to at least some (if not the vast majority) of you. This issue brings us to this week’s topic of discussion: When is it appropriate to “friend” someone? Does the time span vary depending on the situation in which you meet someone? Is it ever appropriate to request someone you’ve never actually met?
How many of these people do you know?
Let’s start with the last question first, as it is the most pressing. Unless it is someone who, at the very least, knows a lot about you through amusing anecdotes or with whom you will be sharing some sort of experience (trip, class, birthday party, etc.) in the near future: no. The one exception to this rule is the summer before freshman year, when everyone reassures himself that he will survive college, maybe even thrive there, by friending a lot of other random freshmen. Creeping on a friend’s pictures, seeing one of his acquaintances that you find attractive (even though that person is from Bosnia or elsewhere that makes actually meeting her an unlikely event) and then friending her? Questionable at best.
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No one will suspect a thing if you're wearing Victorian clothing.
Consider UTB contributor Abby Johnston the Emily Post of collegiate indiscretions. Below, she guides us through the finer points of walk of shame etiquette.
A few mornings ago, I saw one of the most glorious walks of shame that I have ever experienced. It was a girl, perhaps a junior? Anyway, she definitely was old enough to know better. She was wearing an obviously too-large athletic shirt paired with a short, black skirt. Dear morning after girl, wherever you are: Next time, please wear panties. The real kicker though, was that she was not wearing shoes. Based off the assumption that she had been at some sort of bar/club the night before, her shoes were presumably inappropriate-for-the-daytime heels. I can understand why she would not want to wear them; what I cannot understand is why she did not steal some slippers or something along with the shirt.
For those of you who will someday, perhaps soon, be caught in this awkward position, let’s have a frank discussion on what constitutes appropriate morning-after attire. First, always remember this: we, the general public, can tell when you’ve had a one-night stand. Own it; you will not fool even the most naïve passer-by into thinking you are out on some early-morning stroll.
I sympathize if you wore heels out, but either steal slippers or walk briskly. Don’t walk the streets of Philadelphia without some form of protection. Finally, I understand that your skirt covered enough of your body last night that you maybe even felt comfortable dancing on the bar, but in the bright light of day, a pair of your slumber buddy’s boxers will do just fine. Should an awkward encounter occur, you can always claim they belong to a beloved brother, and this way we can all avoid an unwanted peepshow.
Have a social quandary you’d like Abby to tackle? E-mail us.
