The Good, The Bad, and The Hordes of Drunk High Schoolers: A Review of Lolla 2013

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.”

While this iconic line is best known for opening Charles Dickens’ famous novel, A Tale of Two Cities, few people realize that he originally used the phrase to describe his three-day drinking and drugs binge at the 19th-century Britain version of Lollapalooza, which I assume was headlined by Fleetwood Mac.

So here I sit miserably at my 9-to-5 job, wrecked after spending the last three days taking in everything my first music festival had to offer (except Steve Aoki, because fuck Steve Aoki).  I got up at 6:30 this morning to get to work, and I have a residual hangover that could slay a large family of oxen.  Looking back, would I do anything differently?

Yes.  I made horrible, horrible decisions this weekend.

Lolla was a blast, of course.  But wow, that place could not be more heinous.  So I guess it’s only fitting to reflect on this weekend by looking at both the positives and negatives of spending this weekend with my favorite 60,000

Your Latest Dwombos (Daily Word Combinations)

New lexical creations to describe current events and occurrences at Northwestern? Why, of course!

Hot Cookie Bar beats writing that thesis on the Roberts Court any day of the week.

Procrastin-eating
If you’ve ever sat down to finish a problem set, and instead played Sporcle until Allison opened at 4:45, you’re procrastin-eating. If you’ve ever found yourself entirely focused on your bag of vending-machine Salsitas that you weren’t hungry for until you saw the vast white expanse of Microsoft Word that you must magically transform into The A+ Paper That Will Save Your Grade, you’re procrastin-eating. When you don’t know the answer, don’t want to figure it out, and it’s snacktime, you’re procrastin-eating. My name is Eleanor Kinkervoss and I am a procrastin-eater.

The 5 Historical Figures You’d Least Like To See at a Frat Party

Hmmm... why don't you make that THREE kegs of Busch Light

5. Henry Kissinger
I love getting into heated political discussions whilst heavily inebriated as much as the next guy, but there comes a point when you have to draw the line. Yes, Henry Kissinger was one of the greatest political thinkers of the 20th century, but that by no means gives him a place at a frat party. First of all, the guy is older than balls. We must consider the rule of three: If someone has lived to see three presidents die in office, they are too old to set foot in a frat house. Additionally, we must consider the other rule of three: If someone has spent three or more years of their life working under the Nixon administration, they are too heinous to set foot in a frat house.

4. William Howard Taft
Oh, for fuck’s sake! These things are already crowded enough. If we throw a 400-pound man into the mix, we’re completely forfeiting our ability to move. If he was excessively overweight but also cool, like Buddha, then it would be worth sacrificing our mobility, but in reality, he’s just a complete twat. And worse yet, knowing that the presidency didn’t satisfy Taft, and he became a member of the Supreme Court after his presidency, it’s probable that he would not be satisfied by frat parties, and would find it necessary to go The Keg afterwards – another establishment that is already too crowded and doesn’t need yet another morbidly obese man further clogging up the place.

I need a drink, and I need it NOW!

3. Susan B. Anthony
There are some things that feminists simply should not see. The 21st century is one of them. If Susan B. Anthony were to tragically find herself on the 3rd floor of SAE, there are a few possible outcomes. The most likely result is that she would spend about five minutes observing the social phenomenon before her, and then spend the remainder of the party obnoxiously screaming about the oppression of women. However, there’s always the off-chance that she would follow the mold, get unnecessarily trashed, and wake up the next morning on the roof of Swift next to some rando from Pike. Regardless, rather than experimenting with the frat scene, she would be better off where she is now: on the front of gold dollars that stopped being minted in 2001.

2. Charles Dickens
If Dickens couldn’t stand the living conditions of post-industrial England, there’s no way he could stand the living conditions of the DU basement. People go to frat parties to be social, not to watch some elderly British assbag sitting in a corner writing in a romanticized manner about the hardships of being dateraped. However, if Dickens were to experience a frat party, it would very likely have had a tremendous effect on his novels. Oliver Twist would have been ejected from his workhouse not for requesting more food, but for pregaming an 18-hour work shift. Other novels, such as Nicholas Nicklebro and A Tale of Two Titties, would even further deviate from Dickens’ traditional literary style.

Columbus wearing the traditional "party foul" tricorn hat

1. Christopher Columbus
For those of us who have been to frat parties at Northwestern, we know that there are already enough people on power-trips – doormen, bartenders, Sir Twattingworth III, and the like. The last thing we need is some dickbasket walking in, claiming the dilapidated ZBT house in the name of King Ferdinand of Spain, and transmitting diseases to sorority girls (syphilis, PiPhilis, GammaPhilis, etc.). Furthermore, his methods of colonization would hardly work at a frat party; the amount of germs being exchanged is already maximized, and it’s far too hot for anyone to accept a blanket. That being said, there’s something very charming about the notion of three wooden ships landing on North Beach.