Tag Archives: Stephen Colbert

7 Observations From Being Home For Break From Northwestern

4 Jan
Bonus observation: The lakefill looks like a man pooping on the library.

Bonus observation: The lakefill looks like a man pooping on the library.

Nothing brings clarity to a Northwestern student quite like being home for the holidays with a refrigerator full of your parents finest beer. Here are the observations of one Wildcat on life on the outside.

1. Nobody will compliment you on how good you look ever again*

Maybe you’re like me and were in peak physical condition sophomore year of high school. Maybe you’re also like me and your body stopped changing for the better by the time Wildcat Welcome Week rolled around. Or maybe you’re like me and just not that good looking to begin with. Either way, you can kiss those “oh my god you look so great!”s and “wow, bro, you lift?”s and “hey, so the thing is, I never would have broken up with you outside of Six Flags Great America’s Raging Bull if you looked like that”s goodbye. Your physique has started what promises to be a decades-long decline, and all that you have to look forward to is people poking your love handles and observing how fat you’re getting. But hey, making donuts with your belly is pretty fun, right?

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8 Potential Slogans for Northwestern

3 Sep

Northwestern has its signifiers and catchphrases (“Go ‘Cats” “Purple Pride” “Chicago’s Big Ten School” or “The Ivy of the Midwest”) but it’s about time Northwestern had its own solid all-encompassing and honest slogan. I’ve provided a few suggestions.

(When you read this list, say “Northwestern” before you read the slogan. It adds to the experience. Just do it.) Continue reading

Sherman Ave Freshman Guide: Res College Power Rankings

27 Jul

Well camouflaged into the surrounding sorority habitat.

Residential Colleges at Northwestern are designed to enrich the intellectual, cultural, and social lives of their students by extending the learning environment from the classroom to extracurricular life. Essentially, a res college is a dorm filled with like-minded nerds and future friends you’ll spend the next couple of years drinking, arguing, and (for the truly venturous souls) hooking upwith.

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50 Shades of Purple, Chapter Two: The Battle for the Keg

10 Jul

“At first I was like, ‘You know, it might not be such a great idea to go skinny dipping in the Amazon with a bottle of Patron and the entire San Diego Chargers Charger Girls squad,’ but then I was just like, ‘YOLO.'”
-Morton O. Schapiro

Don’t worry, the sex scene’s coming soon.

It’s a Monday evening, and my roommates are pregaming the pregame for the Keg. I’ve had a pretty stressful day in Journalism 301, filled with lots of hard-hitting pestering of innocent yuppies reporting for my enterprise story, and it’s time for me to kick back and relax. I pop a bottle of Peach Andre and my night has begun.

“How was your interview with Ross Packingham?” asks Beverly Brooke, my roommate and consummate frenemy.

“Intriguing. There’s something secretive about him that I can’t figure out. Is it true he once had a threesome with a Theta and Willie the Wildcat in the library stacks?”

“I heard it was with Stephen Colbert and two theater majors on South Beach while Andrew Bird played in the background,” Beave answers, “But that’s just what I read once on College ACB.”

We finish off our bottles of Andre while watching Say Yes to the Dress and head over to Alpha Delta for the true pregame. The second we step into the basement, our senses are assaulted by skunked beer, bros in tank-tops, and Katy Perry. Lots of Katy Perry.

“WOOOOOOOOOO” shouts Beave as “Teenage Dream” comes on, and immediately begs a frat brother who looks suspiciously similar to an Asian Nic Cage (and almost as belligerent) to let her take a beer pong celeb shot.

I leave to get myself a drink. I pour myself some Mohawk vodka into a solo cup of Busch Light, which I affectionately dub ‘The Bobb,’ because the drink’s always a party and smells like piss.

The Alpha Delta brothers are getting rowdy. Some jackass tries to hit on me by asking which Vice President I’m most sexually attracted to, only to leave the next moment muttering to himself about the similarities between House Republicans and gonorrhea.

“KEG! KEG! KEG!” The Alpha Delta brothers shout. I down my drink and steel myself for the heinous that is to come.

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HE’S HERE! OMIGOD HE’S HERE!!!

It takes me a little while to recognize the man before my eyes, but after I adjust to the hedonism around me and get over the brief torrent of terror that shot through me as the Keg bouncer took an additional five seconds to ensure that I truly am the 25-year-old Beyonce Lovato from Anchorage, Alaska that my ID said I was, I realize that I really am beholding the elusive Ross Packingham, HERE, in the flesh, at the Keg!

Gorgeous as all hell and with a gleam in his eye, Packingham is freaking the night away with some co-ed like he’s Channing Tatum on ecstasy.

“Carla!” He shouts, “Carla Rossi! Over here!” He’s beckoning me over to join him and his slam-piece on the dance floor, and I head his way.

And then, with a tremendous blast, the door of the Keg comes crashing down. A dark, shrouded figure looms large in the doorway. For a moment everything stops, douchebags freeze mid-thrust where they were dancing, and even that one townie playing pool turns to look. The only sound is that of Ludacris’ verse on “Baby” as Mayor Tisdahl, clad in combat boots, night-vision goggles, and a James Taylor t-shirt, fully armed with a crowbar and flanked by a cadre of Evanston cops, steps into the neon light of the Coors Light sign.

“My sources tell me that there’s been underage drinking in this establishment,” Mayor Tisdahl growls, tossing the disemboweled corpse of an engineer into the stunned crowd. “You can thank this snitch here. Now I’m going to shut this motherfucker down once and for all.”

All hell breaks loose as Elizabeth Tisdahl and her police posse attack.

Intoxicated and sweaty bodies frantically jostle with one another (not unlike the Keg on a normal Monday night) as Tisdahl brutally swings her crowbar with reckless abandon at poor defenseless English majors and ETHS seniors while the cops gleefully cite students for underage drinking by the score.

“That’s for yacking on the Evanston Post Office!” screams Tisdahl as she brains a Comm Studies student with her crowbar as he tries to scuttle up a stripper pole.

“And this will teach you to holler about blowjobs on MY streets!” she adds, sucker-punching a Tri Delt like she’s Michael Barrett squaring off against A.J.

“Say blowjob one more time. I FUCKING DARE YOU!”

I can’t bear the sight of her pile-driving two foreign students through a window, and quickly duck under a booth and pray that God will save me, or at least turn off the Bieber that’s still playing if I am to be summarily executed by Mayor Tisdahl in this den of debauchery.

The Keg has all but cleared out as I cower in fear, watching Tisdahl and her cops methodically pour big cups of Bud Light and handles of Svedka and Wild Turkey all over the Keg’s walls and floors.

Tisdahl shoulders her crowbar and lights a cigarette. Turning with a menacing gait, she addresses the few remaining students.

“Based on what I see here, I think that the Keg has some grave public safety concerns. I’m revoking the Keg’s license,” she flips her cigarette onto the booze-soaked floor, “Permanently.”

The flames erupt immediately, burning away years of sin and memories. Students scream, and Tisdahl laughs, but just as she turns to leave a gallant figure, wearing nothing but an enormous purple cape, bursts through the Keg’s window riding on the back of a dashing wildcat.

“MORTY SCHAPIRO!” everybody cheers as the lionhearted president rushes to their defense.

His body is lithe and stately, glistening in the fiery inferno as his beard bristles with the white-hot intensity of a hundred thousand Pat Fitzgeralds.

“Oh no you don’t, Tisdahl!” cries Morty, slapping the Mayor back with his massive appendage. More cheers from the students. Morty rips off a stripper pole to serve as his quarterstaff (he already has a full staff down below).

“I’m going to give you the Chet Haze treatment tonight, baby,” shouts Morty. “You’ll be white and purple when I’m done with you.”

Then Morty sets to work, fighting off cops left and right with the help of his trusty wildcat. Those police officers who are too foolish not to run away suffer the awful fate of his beard, and Morty and his steed finish them off faster than the NCAA finishing off Northwestern’s March Madness dreams.

Yet somehow in all the confusion, Mayor Tisdahl managed to escape, cursing Morty and swearing that her revenge is nigh. Few seemed to care, however, as Morty ripped open a fire hydrant with his bare hands, soused the Keg’s raging flames, and turned the club into an all-night slip-and-slide.

“Come here,” a voice says gruffly. I turn with shock and look at the man gripping my hand. It’s Packingham. “This way.”

He leads me to the Popcorn machine, raps it three times with his knuckles, opens up the top, and helps me inside. “Follow me,” Ross says, pushing a button and revealing a secret passageway that travels out of the popcorn machine and leads to a mysterious tunnel. I follow, obediently, trusting Ross completely.

“I hereby declare the Keg re-instated!” bellows the victorious, and still mostly-nude, Morty. “I wish the Keg luck with their newly instated Lifetime License to Rage!”

I can barely hear the cheers as I go deeper and deeper down the tunnel, guided only by the mysterious Ross Packingham.

To be continued

Chapter one of 50 Shades of Purple can be found HERE.

Love a Random State: Ohio

24 Jan

I may be a tad bit biased, but Ohio is a pretty badass state. We fuck up pretty much every Presidential Election. We can’t make decisions on anything from street cars to abortion. We are some waffling motherfuckers, and I’m not talking about McGriddles. Besides being a political asshole, here are some other reasons you should bow down and worship my state of conception/birth/childhood.

The beautiful metropolis of Cleveland

1. Ohio is the 7th largest state by population.
Cincinnati is the 61st largest city in the nation by population.* Being mediocrely medium-sized takes all the pressure off being big. We may not have the hustle and bustle of New York or the flotsam and jetsam of Chicago, but we sure do have a lot of wide open spaces and corn. This makes for some great middle school field trips, like visiting an Amish farm and learning how to properly milk a cow or taking a spin on a tea-cup-death-trap-vomit-inducing ride while eating a stick of deep-fried butter at the local carnival.

2. Subpar athletics.
I may not be an expert when it comes to sports. I didn’t vehemently protest the NBA lockout, I do not worship Tebow born from the Virgin Mother, nor do I have any vague inkling as to what Royal Shrovetide Football is really all about. However, I do know one thing: If the Cincinnati Bengals were running in the Republican primaries, they would rank somewhere above Michelle Bachmann and somewhat below Stephen Colbert. They may suck at football and politics, but the Bengals have quite a record off the field. Since 2000, the team has a combined criminal record of 30 arrests, 8 DUIs, and 1 charge of “boating under the influence.”** I’m not really sure how this makes Ohio awesomely badass, but it does.

3. Larger than life Presidents.
We produced President William Howard Taft, the man who couldn’t fit in a normal bathtub. In fact, a bathtub fit for four men was installed in the White House just for him. I bet VP James Sherman had a pretty good time in there, seeing as he was a normal sized man. (That leaves room for three more people, for those of you who are still in Math 110).

O-hi-OH!!!!

4. Ohio is beautiful.
OK, maybe just Halle Berry is. Halle Berry was Miss Ohio 1986. At 19, Halle managed to lock down a state title and first runner-up for the Miss USA pageant. Pretty badass, Ms. Berry.

5. Badass motherfuckers in office.
Jerry Springer, host of The Jerry Springer Show, served on Cincinnati’s city council for three years, before resigning when Jerry’s favorite hang-out was revealed: a Kentucky “massage parlor.”*** But it only gets better: he paid his “masseuse” with a city check. It doesn’t get much classier than that. He was then elected the mayor of Cincinnati from 1977-1978. We obviously know how to choose effective leaders.

6. In Ohio, it is illegal to get a fish drunk.****
Need I say more?

7. Where art thou, Ohio?
There actually aren’t many NU students from Ohio. There should certainly be more Amish, chili-loving, politically frustrated, Midwesterners up in Northwestern’s business. However, this makes for some great feedback. Apparently, Californians have no fucking clue where Ohio is. My roommate thought it was near Iowa and her friend could swear she thought it was south of Illinois. I guess they don’t teach Geography in the Bay Area. As a loyal Ohioan and a college student with half my brain still intact despite raging alcoholism and mind numbing, drug-induced Sporcle competitions, I know exactly where Ohio is: right between New Mexico and Arizona. Right?

8. Home of Skyline Chili.
Although none of you Northside Prep trust-fund babies or LTHS fanboys have heard of Skyline, enlighten yourselves. Cincinnati’s definition of chili: chocolate (yes, chocolate) ground beef soup poured over spaghetti noodles and topped with neon yellow, synthesized, shredded cheddar cheese. Mouth-o-meter: fucking delicious.

9. Hipsterz.
Searching for the inner-sanctum of hipsterism? Look no further. Clifton, a small neighborhood on the outskirts of downtown Cincinnati, is a hub of culture and excitement. 98% of Clifton residents are Democrat, making us some badass, Obama loving hippies. 98% of us also love Indian food. Why? There are 7 locally owned Indian restaurants in Clifton. Step outside my house and take a good whiff of Saag Paneer and Chicken Curry. Yum. You can always find a homeless town troubadour belting out his love life with the aid of his trusty accordion. Besides musicians, we are also home to many other badass personalities, such as the mysterious bag man who, although he appears to be homeless, goes to the grocery store every day and picks up 3 lemons, a loaf of bread, and a bag of kitty litter. Meth lab, anyone? There is also the penguin man who yells at cars going over 25, the local business owners who all seem to be tangled in a Romeo and Juliet-esque love affair, and my personal favorite, the middle school drug dealers who hang out at the shelter in Burnet Woods after school. (Whoops, did I just blow your cover?)

Take a trip back in time

10. We have one of the largest Amish populations in the country.
Amish people are badass. Love the Amish, and eat their chicken; it’s free-range!

Needless to say, Ohio is a badass state. If this article has convinced you to pack up your Illinois life (or wherever the fuck you’re from) and move to Ohio, call my step dad. He’s a realtor.

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*Sporcle. Yeah, I did it. I used Sporcle as a source. Try to censor that, PIPA.
**NKY Sports World
***Massage parlor = brothel
****Twitter