The college dormitory: A poem.

Sounds of sex

From every door

Pizza boxes

On the floor

Penises

Are drawn on boards

Sometimes one

Sometimes more

No one’s black

So it’s weird

That rap music

Is all I hear

My door is closed

My light is off

I’m catching winks

But still they knock

My one escape

Is being used

Up and down

It is abused

The police come

And they talk fast

Someone’s caught

Not wearing pants

I do homework

I give my all

But it’s so loud

Sex in the hall!

I’m dirty now

I need some soap

But the shower-place

Is really gross

Hair on floor

Hair in sink

Hair by drains

The showers stink

Someone broke

The TV set

I don’t care

But they’re upset

Girls in the lobby

Are flaunting their stuff

It’s kind of sick

What they do for love

I retreat

Back in my room

And lock the door

Safe in the gloom

The dormitory message board often has messages of all kind posted on it; parties, tutors, notices etc.  The other day a notice was posted on the message board informing us that on the 19th, from 8a.m. to 5p.m., the electricity supply would be stopped.  I thought it was a bit overboard to have to stop the electricity supply for a whole day, but they gave us ample notice, and I didn’t actually believe they would stop the electricity supply for the whole day, only parts of it.  The 19th came and went, with no disruption to the electricity supply, though I spoke with a friend the following day and she told me that the electricity supply had been stopped in her dormitory.

Today I was working on a Powerpoint presentation for my class on Monday.  It was around lunchtime, and suddenly my computer switched off.  The electricity supply had been stopped, this time with no notice.  To say I was annoyed was an understatement.  I was quite worried about how much of my presentation could be lost, since I hadn’t saved it for quite some time.  Twenty minutes passed, and thankfully we had electricity again, so I booted up my computer and immediately launched Powerpoint.  I think I need to thank whoever though up auto-saving and file recovery, and for Microsoft for implementing it in Office, otherwise the few sentences I had to re-write could have been a few slides.  If only they could be pro-active enough to inform us every time something important was going to happen, instead of the times it doesn’t.

Well, Ever since I came to Southern Connecticut State University in New Haven, CT. Their’s been a new phase in my life. Yes, I am proud to say that I am no longer single and I am not longer throwing caution to the wind. I now can say I have a Girlfriend and she’s very wonderful and very sexy for me. She completes me and she’ eve more smarter than me, though she’s younger than me at the age of 21 and I’m 33. I think she likes that in an older guy. Oh and by the way, her name is Alexis, She’s mine and she’s someone that’s near and dear to my heart.

I can say that yes I lost myself twice. Once when I was in my early 20’s when I was experimenting with guys and now I lost myself to a girl with Alexis as well.  At the time when I was in my early 20’s I didn’t know what I wanted in my life and I was still playing the field to find myself and define myself. Now that I reached the age in my 30’s I finally found myself and defined myself as to who I am and Alexis really showed that in me.

As far as doing the kiss and tell about what me an Alexis do in the dorm room. Sorry guys, I’m not going to tell and I’m going to let you all think about it and even sit on it. I’m not going to tell what Me and Alexis do when the blind are shut and the door is closed because that’s very personal and very intimate that only me and Alexis can share. Through the only thing I will say is that she’s sexually young for a 21 yr old and Alexis has a lot to learn from me sexually and I have a lot to learn from her as well.

So all in all, I’m no longer a single person and I’m so deep into my relationship with Alexis and sexually active with Alexis. So that means I am off the market and off the fence now.

Give someone you love a big bag of coal this Christmas. Seriously! Charcoal is what many people in refugee camps use to cook their daily meals and without it, none of the children we support get fed.

If you don’t know what to get the person who has everything, why not get them a Munch or Snuggle Basket?  If for no other reason than they are fun to say, Munch and Snuggle baskets are quick and easy to give. When you donate funds on someone’s behalf for Christmas, you will be giving food, blankets and school supplies to a child on the Thai-Burma border. Your friend will get a certificate telling them all about their gift and both of you can feel warm and fuzzy inside. Most importantly, so, too, can a child living in a boarding house in a refugee camp here in Thailand, wrapped up in a nice big blanket with a clean pair of underwear on and a belly full of rice.

The Munch Basket costs $20CDN and contains:

• 4 kg of rice
• One chicken
• One month’s food (vegetables and protein once a week)
• One school pack with school supplies
• Christmas treats

The Snuggle Basket costs $30 CDN and contains:

• 1 pair of slippers (flip-flaps, sandals, or whatever you call them)
• 2 pairs of socks
• 3 pairs of underwear
• 1 large blanket (comforter, cotton duvet or whatever you call it)
• A whole lotta lumps of coal (otherwise known as cooking fuel or charcoal)
• School supplies
• Christmas treats

The easiest way to purchase is by using Paypal either through our website or through the Paypal website. Please remember to send us an email with the information on those receiving your gift(s),  so we can send their certificates. If you have any questions or want to get in touch, please send us an email: info@roomtogrowfoundation.org

Happy Holidays!

I have a friend. Let’s call her Veronica.

I’ve known Veronica since my first day of college. We’ve been classmates all the years of my college life until now. We weren’t so close before because we belonged to different groups of friends, or maybe because we were seated too far apart in our classroom. Blame the alphabetical seating arrangement.

During my 3rd year in college, I decided to move to another dormitory, the same as Veronica’s. My mom wanted us to be roommates because we came from the same province. She thought that maybe we could get along well. Fatefully, the land lady placed me in a different room than Veronica’s. Nevertheless, Veronica and I ate lunch together, went from school to dorm together, jogged together, and eventually grew closer to each other.

After our graduation, I encouraged her to study for another year with me, and she did. Actually, while I’m typing this blog entry, she’s sitting on the bed beside mine, surfing the net on her own laptop. Yes, we’re still roommates, but we’re not that close anymore, I think. I don’t know.

Being her roommate for quite some time, I’ve known many things about Veronica, like her brand of clothes, soap and shampoo, her style of dress, her type of movies and music, her diet regimen, her weakness for artistic guys (especially those who dance and those who are good in words), her everything.

Veronica is, by nature, a silent person. She’s gentle with words and careful not to hurt anybody’s feelings to the point that it’s difficult for her to say no. She’s also got several traits that I don’t like. I won’t mention them here anymore. She’s not perfect—that I know. But I think I know her quite enough to think and say what I’m going to say…

I think Veronica is infatuated.

Why do I think so? It’s because when he’s around, Veronica is not her usual self. She seems to be “so” happy, and “loud.” She cracks jokes a lot and laughs a lot. She’s in motion. She is hyper.

Well, I don’t want to be judgmental. I just thought it would be nice to write about something once in a while, and when I was thinking of topics, this observation of mine crossed my mind.

Nine paragraphs. Now, that’s cool.

I felt real bad and guilty the whole day. But thank God, Mommy phoned me again tonight and we’re finally okay, just like nothing happened. That’s one of the best things about Mommy—she doesn’t hold grudges. Oh, how I miss her now. I love her very much.

Here’s another story. I feel guilty right now, like I’m an uber selfish person. There’s a “semi-epidemic” of colds and sore throat here in our dormitory tonight and there were only 2 tablespoons left in the Bactidol bottle. There were three of us who wanted to gargle. One of my dormmates gargled before me, so when it was already my turn to gargle, there was only 1 tablespoon left. So I was faced with this “dilemma.” Should I consume it all? Should I consume some and then leave some? Or should I just not gargle for the sake of my other dormmate who is also sick? Well, I chose the former. Now, I feel guilty.

Sick of seeing photos of my dorm room yet? Well, tough! I’m so crazy proud of how much I’m making this place a cool Dorothy Guest hang-out that I pretty much just have to show it off.

Click on the thumbnail to see a looonnng photo which grossly exaggerates the size of my truly tiny living space:

I’ve stuck plastic hooks on the wall so that I can display my necklaces:

And check it out – chilling in some mukluks you may perhaps remember from past adventures:

Someone out there either has too much spare time or is deadly at Scrabble.
(Wait till you see the last one)!

PRINCESS DIANA
When you rearrange the letters:
END IS A CAR SPIN

MONICA LEWINSKY
When you rearrange the letters:
NICE SILKY WOMAN

DORMITORY:
When you rearrange the letters:
DIRTY ROOM

ASTRONOMER:
When you rearrange the letters:
MOON STARER

THE EYES :
When you rearrange the letters:
THEY SEE

GEORGE BUSH :
When you rearrange the letters:
HE BUGS GORE

SLOT MACHINES:
When you rearrange the letters:
CASH LOST IN ME

ANIMOSITY:
When you rearrange the letters:
IS NO AMITY

ELECTION RESULTS:
When you rearrange the letters:
LIES – LET’S RECOUNT

SNOOZE ALARMS:
When you rearrange the letters:
ALAS! NO MORE Z ‘S

A DECIMAL POINT:
When you rearrange the letters:
I’M A DOT IN PLACE

THE EARTHQUAKES:
When you rearrange the letters:
THAT QUEER SHAKE

ELEVEN PLUS TWO:
When you rearrange the letters:
TWELVE PLUS ONE

GAUTENG- when you re-arrange the letters you get:
GET A GUN

AND FOR THE GRAND FINALE:

CASTER SEMENYA
-YES A SECRET MAN

I just made my first cake.

I used the 4-3-2-1 recipe on p. 212 of Alice Waters’ The Art of Simple Food. I’m a real fan of her cookbooks and her cooking style. I’ve even used a number of recipes with my Cooking for Boys group.

This cake? Simple, it was not. Separate four eggs. Cream butter. Whip egg whites. Sift flour. Mix. Measure. Mix again. Wow.

The resulting cake, though, is quite lovely. I took a picture of it with the camera in my cellphone.

It is such a lovely cake, that my cellphone no longer works. Oi. (Update: Now it’s working again, and we’ve had the birthday party.  Here are the remains of the day’s efforts.)

My first cake!

I also made chocolate frosting. Have you ever creamed butter in with sugar, and then mixed in semi-sweet melted chocolate that you hand-melted in your grandfather’s double boiler?

I may have to make chocolate frosting more often.

The occasion, you ask? Oh, one of the kids on my dormitory has a birthday today. He’s fourteen. His mom shows up tomorrow, but she wanted something nice to happen for him today. I think I managed to make something nice.

It’s also October 15, and we are having our first snowfall of the school year. Welcome, winter. I wasn’t really used to the idea of autumn, though.

Okay, so we’re six weeks into the semester and midterms and due dates are in full swing. It’s my senior year so the whole rat race of exams, projects and presentations becomes fairly routine. I figure senioritis will kick in eventually anyway in the next few weeks. But what about the freshman?

I remember moving into H-Quad two days before the semester began and strategically mapping out all of my classes so I didn’t get lost. I even carried a map of the campus – yes, I know it’s embarrassing. But I didn’t want to have to run around looking for people that looked trustworthy enough to not give me directions to the 6th floor of the library or through the underground tunnels. During that first week, I took in so much information. So many things were going through my head. What’s a syllabus? A What? Recessitation?…recitation?…whatever, what is it? And HOW MANY pages do I have to write? It was because of this frenzy of anxiety that I decided to poll freshman about their thoughts of their first few weeks as a college student.

The Question: So far, has freshman year been what you expected it to be?

The Results: Yes – 17, No – 33

The only thing that surprises me about these results is that to 17 people, Stony Brook is exactly what they expected. Maybe they have older siblings that went to college and showed them the ropes. I, and apparently most of the 2009 Freshmen, was clueless as to what to expect in the weeks ahead when I first arrived.

One freshman said, “I expected it to be as easy as high school. But now I think I’m going to have to work harder for the same grades.” True, you have more standards to uphold as a college student, but as a freshman, most professors understand that you’re still adjusting, especially if you’re in an introductory class.

In terms of social life, I wasn’t fully prepared either. But I, just like I’m sure the freshman will, got very comfortable very quickly with the umm…nighttime extracurricular activities.

My advice to any freshman would be to go out and get as much out of your college experience as possible. And if you’re feeling overwhelmed, don’t worry, it’ll all become routine one day – a paper here, a presentation there. And if you’re still having trouble adjusting, there are tons of places you can go on campus for some advice. The counseling center, center for prevention and outreach and even the academic and pre-professional advising center are all well-equipped with tools to help you adjust to your new life.

For more inspiration on partying, check out my blog about a particular Thursday night party.

• DORMITORY:

When you rearrange the letters:

DIRTY ROOM

• PRESBYTERIAN:

When you rearrange the letters:

BEST IN PRAYER

• ASTRONOMER:

When you rearrange the letters:

MOON STARER

• DESPERATION:

When you rearrange the letters:

A ROPE ENDS IT

• THE EYES:

When you rearrange the letters:

THEY SEE

• GEORGE BUSH:

When you rearrange the letters:

HE BUGS GORE

• THE MORSE CODE:

When you rearrange the letters:

HERE COME DOTS

• SLOT MACHINES:

When you rearrange the letters:

CASH LOST IN ME

• ANIMOSITY:

When you rearrange the letters:

IS NO AMITY

• ELECTION RESULTS:

When you rearrange the letters:

LIES – LET’S RECOUNT

• SNOOZE ALARMS:

When you rearrange the letters:

ALAS! NO MORE Z ‘S

• A DECIMAL POINT:

When you rearrange the letters:

I’M A DOT IN PLACE

• THE EARTHQUAKES:

When you rearrange the letters:

THAT QUEER SHAKE


ELEVEN PLUS TWO:

When you rearrange the letters:

TWELVE PLUS ONE

AND FOR THE GRAND FINALE:

• MOTHER-IN-LAW:

When you rearrange the letters:

WOMAN HITLER!

Now, I love to travel. Once I’ve got the means (once I’ve got any cash at all, that is) I’ll be travelling a lot. I’m no homebody. I am, however, that person you know who brings scented candles to hotel rooms. I’m capable of roughing it, but I like to claim whatever space I’m in.

This is why I’m making a really big push to decorate and really inhabit my dorm room. Here are my efforts so far. First, my bookshelf:

Then my desk where I write and prepare tea (rarely at the same time):

Then my desk where I keep my rose lamp and photograph of my mama as a child feeding chickens in Ireland:

Because my room mate transferred schools, I’m currently alone in my dorm room, so I’ve got a spare bed. I’m using it as a place to put my Chelsea boots and French advertisements:

Here’s a fullish view of my room, as seen from my bed:

It’s still got a long way to go – but pop some Marianne Faithfull on that Hello Kitty cd player and, I don’t know, I feel a little bit at home.

Driving down Reserve Street, you will notice piles upon piles of debris that looks like the UW-Stevens Point campus got attacked.  Don’t worry, it is just an old dormitory, Hyer Hall.  The plan is to rebuild new apartments on campus.  Students who live in houses or apartments often have quite a walk to get to campus, but that will not be a problem for some any more.  According to an article in the Pointer by Justin Glodowski, this new apartment complex will provide housing for up to 330 residents.  The complex will resemble the dorms with places to study and lounge, but the focus is for juniors and seniors to live there.  Reconstruction began in the summer of 2009 and the goal is to have people calling these apartments home by the fall of 2011.  The total cost of this project according to Glodowski is looking at about $35.5 million.

Hyer Hall was my first home at UW-Stevens Point.  It was a cozy, little dorm where you knew everyone.  The building was one of the farthest from the scholastic buildings comapared to the other dormitories.  I completely understand why the school decided to reconstruct Hyer Hall into a new apartment complex for upperclassmen.  Currently I live quite a ways away from campus and it is going to be rough in the winter time so this project is definitely necessary.  The only concern I have is that they mentioned the new complex will resemble that of a dorm.  It will include a study area, a lounge, a place to do laundry, etc.  The reason this concerns me is because I feel like students who had previously lived in the dorms their freshman and/or sophomore year(s) cannot wait to live off-campus.  I have a feeling students will look at this new building and think “dorm”, so they won’t live there.  Sure it’s close to campus, but it is also close to authority.  What’s next? Are they going to include a meal plan on the lease?  New apartments on-campus is a great idea, but to make them look like a place that students can’t wait to get out of is not.

Today I have heard a new song. ‘Papillon’ by Editors. It is kind of a weird song. Why? All the previuos songs of Editors were totally different – rock. This one is electronic… Bands change, people change, that`s good. Change is usually good.

Some things in me cannot change…

It was a few years ago, me in my very early twenties. Night as any other nights during a week at my university. Maybe not as any other, there was no alcohol that night, no party, no jumping out of windows from our dormitory. Anyway I was sitting alone in my room hearing from time to time some people in corridor. Anyway I was still wasted by hangover after the previous night (night like many others during studies). I studied 2 directions, IT and business. I liked both and I managed to pass everything, while still attendting all the parties. Uh, I loved my University… Getting back to that night. As some may know, when you are an IT guy you get lot`s of questions from friends like ‘Hey, my Windows showed me a blue screen… Would you like to come for a coffee?’. Yeah, I hated that. That night I got an IM from one chick living 2 floors down. Hot, but never trying to really show that. Usually really calm, got just drunk few times. She said something is wrong with her laptop and she needs to finish some paper and… ‘Pleaaaase help!’. OK, I can spend all night looking for music over internet or at least spend some time with a nice chick. After a while I was in her room. Oh how surprised I was when I opened the door and she was standing there next to her desk just in her tiny bathrobe. The same moment I shut the door her bathrobe fell on the floor. I never complained for lack of nice chicks around me but it was the first time I got so nicely tricked by a girl. So we did not talk too much about her… whatever I primarly came there for, we decided to act accordingly to the situation. It took me milliseconds to jump off my Led Zeppelin t-shirt and jeans and we were there, on her bed… making love for hours. It was so amazing, first experience like that. You have no time to think, just get to work! That was the first time I saw her tattoo. First time, as it was well hidden from any eyes that should not see it. It was a really nice butterfly. I still remember it, I still remember the night. We met in secret for few weeks after that. Not that we were afraid of anyone. The ’secret’ was giving us some thrill. After these few weeks we stopped to see each other. I got bored, I found a new thrill…

Butterflies evolve from cocoons, change from something ugly into something beautiful. Not everything in this world can change so easily. I can change, I love the way I am

When Bertie Wooster is feeling cheerful, he demands that Jeeves bring him his “yellowest shoes”. So today, in order to be as happy as I possibly can, I am wearing my yellowest dress. See here:

And here are some drawings, as well. They’re badly-scanned because I’m just figuring out my new scanner, and also because I am so damn tired that everything I do is a little bit off. Drawing One is called “Dorm People”:

Drawing Two is called “Some things I drew last night”. Just click on the link, because WordPress is taking AGES to make a thumbnail.

Tomorrow classes start. For that, I think I will wear my fish dress. (It is a dress printed with fishes, if you’re wondering – “fish dress” is kind of vague, and to those who haven’t seen the garment before, might suggest “dress shaped like a fish” or “dress which fish wear”.)