REPORT: You are a Complete and Utter Failure

NEW HAVEN, Conn.—A report from Yale’s School of Medicine published in the New England Journal of Medicine suggests that you, the reader, are a total failure and, quite frankly, an insult to the human race.

In a recent interview, head researcher Edward Feynberg made clear that the report is indeed referring to you, not to the person next to you or behind you. “Stop turning your head left and right, looking around like a damn buffoon,” he noted. “You look like an idiot.  We’re talking to you.”

“How does it make you feel, fuckface?” asked Feynberg. “I hope it makes you feel awful, because you’re a waste. You’re nothing. Remember how all you did in college was sit on your bed, picking your nose and flicking your boogers over to your roommate’s side of the room? Disgusting. God, you’re awful.”

“Why can’t you be more like your brother?” asked Vanessa Donovan, another researcher

Total Fucking Idiots Try to Have Intelligent Conversation about Breaking Bad

(WARNING: CONTAINS BREAKING BAD SPOILERS, OBVIOUSLY)

EVANSTON – Early Friday night, three Northwestern University students, all of whom are complete morons, reportedly attempted to have a meaningful discussion about the characters, symbols, and possible outcome of the hit television series Breaking Bad, whose series finale airs this Sunday at 8:00 Central Time.

Bentford also mentioned that the above image, of which he has a poster-sized version in his room, is “pretty mesmerizing.”

Sources say that the conversation, conducted by Wesley Bentford (WCAS, ’15), Zach Silverberg (Comm., ’15) and Ryan Mancuso (WCAS, ’15), lasted well over thirty minutes, despite the fact that all three of the participants are incredibly stupid, and touched on topics such as the show’s use of color, the show’s cinematographic techniques, and the development of some of its most major characters.

99 Things You Could Do Instead of Laundry

Okay but this is a great picture.

1. Eat cheese.

2. Pluck your eyebrows.

3. Get a pet rock.

4. Boil some spaghetti and use it as pet rock hair.

5. Put your spaghetti-wigged pet rock on someone’s porch. Ring the bell and run away.

6. Wait until it’s dark out. Turn on the lights, roll up your shades, and perform for the passersby outside your window.

7. Go to a restaurant by yourself.

8. GET OFF MY LAWN.

9. Clean all of the dirt out from the spaces between the keys on your laptop.

10. Eat cheese.

Sherman Ave Freshman Guide: A Step-By-Step Guide to Your Laundry

Try not to think of everybody and their pledge mom hooking up on these.

Listen up. If you’re over 18 and your mommy still does your laundry, you’ve probably realized by now that you’re going to be SOL in the big scary world.  Hey, it’s okay – at some point in your life, Momma stopped brushing your teeth, washing your hair, wiping your ass, and all the other things that kept you fresh-smelling and somewhat socially acceptable.[1] You’re gonna learn to do laundry on your own, too, because the ability to remove Svedka and BO from your clothes is a basic function of self-sufficiency and personal hygiene.

So you’ve taken the first step and decided you don’t want to grow up to be Buster Bluth. But if you ask your friends how to do laundry, they WILL remember for the next four years[2] and they will tell the hotties at da club and the hotties at da club will think you’re a pampered dumbfuck (you might be) and YOU WILL NEVER GET LAID. So here’s your (mostly) shame-free guide to being the independent fucking human you are expected to be in higher education.

Before you start, plan accordingly.

Things I’ve Learned From Living Alone For A Week

It’s comforting knowing that this obnoxious girl has nobody to live with.

I’ve been living alone for about five and a half days now. Technically I have a roommate, but he doesn’t start work until September (lucky bastard), so he’s on an extended vacation on the other side of the country. When I first heard this news I thought, “oh this will be great! I’ll have plenty of time alone with my thoughts, and I’ll be able to catch up on all the reading I’ve been wanting to do forever!” But apparently I don’t have that many thoughts, and I don’t want to catch up on that much reading after all.

I guess part of me thought I would remember how to entertain myself from a childhood full of older brothers that insisted on exclusively playing single-player video games; turns out I remember less of that than what I learned in high school history.*

Anyway, all this alone time has left me bored out of my fucking mind. So much so that I’ve decided to write this article outlining a few of the things I’ve discovered out of aforementioned boredom (probably more for my entertainment than yours).

7 Unexpected Changes After Two Weeks In Off-Campus Housing

If only my kitchen had this much counter space.

1. I feel guilty for feeding myself.

For the most part, I am happy to be done with meal plans. Never again will I need to resort to a bucket of cloudy ice cream water to clean my ice cream scooper, and for that I am eternally grateful. But the good thing about meal plans is that you’re charged a flat rate. The pain of parting with your hard-earned money is concentrated into large, but infrequent, payments. The real world is not so merciful, administering small doses of guilt whenever you buy groceries or pay for a meal. Even if you end up spending less money overall than on a meal plan, there is no escaping the constant reminders of your shrinking bank account.

How to Avoid the In-Class Creeper

Want to come back to my place and finish our discussion on Freudian Theory?

Recently, I was at a party with my gals dancing the night away, celebrating being done with yet another quarter of my godforsaken Spanish class, when a sweaty guy from my class came up to me and started a conversation. It went as so:

Boy: Ammonia$ta?! [puts an arm around my shoulder and drunkenly leans on me] Totally didn’t recognize you! You’re like, actually attractive!

A$: Uh…thanks?

Boy: Yeah like…how come you don’t come to class looking like this? Totally would have hit on you.

A$: Oh uh… [trying to get out from under his arm without making him fall over] I’m just lazy I guess.”

Boy: [Laughs because he thinks I was joking and walks away]

Little Victories: Small Things That Help Improve Your Mood

We all have bad days. Maybe you just wake up on the wrong side of the bed. Maybe your orgo midterm grade came back. Maybe you found out that the Theta girl you had over last night watched a little too much Twilight in high school and wake up to find that your neck matches Northwestern’s new uniform color. Or maybe that guy you told to call you maybe didn’t call you…MAYBE. Regardless of the reasons, we will all have bad days, but there are several tiny things that can help make those bad days better – or maybe even turn those days around completely.

1. Putting on Warm Underwear

The South will rise again!

Let’s be honest here: there are few things better than the sudden warming of your nether-regions that comes after slipping on underwear just out of the dryer. Though the feeling is short-lived, I imagine it’s the same feeling female gymnast have after winning their medals – excited, jubilant, and a little depressed knowing things only go downhill from there.  I’d even go as far as saying that putting on warm underwear is one of the best things that can happen to anyone’s junk (man junk and lady junk) without another person involved (placing it around the 2057^th best thing that can happen to someone’s junk overall). When you put on warm underwear, you feel like you can take on the world – and you would too if only you could get yourself to put on the rest of your clothes and stop moaning in the middle of the Laundromat.

2. Discovering New Meme Websites

This is a personal bright spot for me. In my personal opinion, discovering a new source for your favorite type of meme – whether they be Olympic-themed, celebrity-themed, or little-face Mitt Romney-themed (look them up, seriously…seriously…srysly), discovering a new meme site can brighten up any boring day. Let me save you a little time. Did you know there’s a website dedicated to Animals Talking in All Caps? Really. It’s a thing. Here it is: http://animalstalkinginallcaps.tumblr.com/.

However, if for some odd reason animals talking in all caps is not your thing, there’s bound to be a meme site for you out there for you to waste hours upon hours of your day staring at, forgetting that you just bombed your last test because you spent the entire day prior to the test staring at a new meme site.

3. When workers at Starbucks spell your name right

I had no idea “Omar” had so different spellings.

It’s the bane of any non-Anglo-Saxon person’s existence. No, I’m not talking about racism, intolerance, or even Paul Ryan, no – I’m talking about the barista’s at Starbucks. Yes, those illiterate bastards are probably the worst thing to happen to anyone of foreign descent since colonization (As a person of German, British, France, Austrian, and Russian descent, I am still deeply, deeply sorry about that one. We really fucked up. No, you still can’t have complete control of your economies yet – but I’m still sorry). It’s amazing to see how anyone who managed to successfully fill out a job application can misspell a four letter name so badly.

However, these horrible failures do have one up-side: the feeling of delight you have when someone finally spells your name right. The day that you received your Frappuccino with your name spelled without three extra Y’s, a J, and a dollar sign is likely one of the best days you’ve had in recent memory and this occurring again could probably turn any bad day into a pretty good one.

4. Fat Kids

Just look at this funny bastard. Manua circa 2007

I know we may disagree on the meme thing, but I think we can all agree on one thing: fat kids are hilarious. Like, is there anything funnier than a fat kid doing things wrong? As a former fat kid, I know – we’re just a hilarious bunch. So whenever you’re having a hard time, just look up videos of fat kids struggling and you’ll replace your normal sadness with happiness and guilt.

5. Finding out that people you dislike got ugly

Does this really need explanation? Think of someone you hate. Now, imagine one day you saw this person and you noticed that he or she had put on 30 pounds and lost their front tooth. You’re welcome. If you’re ever fortunate enough to have this happen in real life, take a picture and frame it. It will basically be like taking an anti-depressant except without the risk of Nausea, Insomnia, Anxiety, Restlessness, Decreased sex drive, Dizziness, Weight gain, Tremors, Sweating, Sleepiness or fatigue, Dry mouth, Diarrhea, Constipation, Headaches, Worsened Depression, or Desire to Commit Suicide (real list of side effects. It’s probably best to find people you dislike that got ugly or look up pictures of fat kids).

6. Coming Back to School

DEAR GOD THERE WOULD NOT BE ANYTHING BETTER THAN SCHOOL STARTING! WHY ARE WE ON THE QUARTER SYSTEM? WHY IS EVERYONE GONE? WHAT AM I SUPPOSED TO DO WITH MYSELF? DID YOU KNOW THAT THERE ARE 24 HOURS IN EVERY DAY? 24 LONELY, SAD HOURS? LET SCHOOL START AGAIN! I DON’T WANT TO PICK UP A NEW HOBBY AND I’VE WATCHED EVERY EPISODE OF EVEN STEVENS TWICE!!! MAKE IT END!!!!

For more small things to help you improve your mood that don’t rhyme with “shmucksaw,” LIKE OUR FACEBOOK PAGE!

Sherman Ave Freshman Guide: Packing

Don't forget your D&D board

It’s late August, all of your friends are already at college, and – as much as you love watching 7 episodes of Jeopardy every day – you’re starting to get pretty antsy to leave home. Unfortunately, one gargantuan task stands in between you and your soon-to-be heinousness: packing. Well, tits. The dilemma of what-to-pack vs. what-not-to-pack is a difficult one for all incoming freshmen, but hopefully the following guidelines can help you pack for college with more efficiency and success.

Rule #1: Pack Light
Now I don’t want to sound like your grandpa, but when I marched across Europe in Patton’s Third Army, I was allowed to carry nothing but a canteen and a rifle. The ability to pack light is not only an excellent life skill (just ask anyone except Chris McCandless), but is also indispensable when moving to college. For one thing, you won’t make a stellar first impression on your roommate if you show up on the first day with 200 books and 35 hoodies. Additionally, it’s important to note that your dorm rooms are not especially large. And when I say “not especially large,” what I mean is “atrociously small.” Unless you live in Rogers House, in which case you have numerous other concerns.

Sherman Ave Freshman Guide: Dorm Life

The legendary Tupac Shakur once famously stated, “I didn’t choose the thug dorm life, the thug dorm life chose me.” For several reasons, surviving dorm life can certainly be one of the most difficult challenges you’ll face your freshman year. While some things (ex: People vomiting outside of your room and covering it up with printer paper) are out of your control, the proper knowledge and expectation of what lies ahead can help equip you for a successful year.