DUDES!
DID YOU SEE
THE LIBRARY
THEY'VE GOT
HERE?
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Man, when I came out to campus for the prospective students' weekend last spring, I knew it was going to be fucking off the hook. I mean, it's just a completely different level from high school. I have my own room with my best bud Kyle, and high-speed Internet and cable, a cafeteria open till 11 p.m. with, like, all the Honey Nut Cheerios I could ever eat and an omelet bar on weekends, and even a whole floor full of totally hot sophomore chicks just an elevator ride away.
But the library, man, the library is the bomb.
I mean, you know how we spent all of high school telling each other we were totally going to start staying after football practice to spend some quality time with the books? And we never did? Dude—now the library is, like, just across the quad from my dorm room. I can totally go study every morning, on the way to Psych 101. Or just before lunch. Or, like, right at the end of the day. Or maybe late at night, if they're open that late.
Yeah, Kyle, I think I heard, like, till 11, maybe 11:30 p.m. Man, my brain is going to be totally pumped by spring break.
Oh, I took the tour back during the prospective weekend. It got me totally psyched. Dude, they've got the latest computerized catalog system—just roll right up to a terminal, type in your search terms, and it gives you a list of titles and call numbers, plus a little map to show you where they all are. Fucking Dewey decimal, man. It's tight. Or maybe I'll just wander through the stacks—they've got those awesome shelves on wheels, so they're all space-efficient—and just pick something at random. It'll be totally intense. Six floors of books and periodicals, all ordered as neatly as soldiers on parade.
Like that use of simile, huh, Chris? Yeah, I've done a little studying over the summer, trying to get a base for hitting the big time this semester. My dad's got a couple of shelves of classics in the basement. Nothing real hard—a little Dickens, a little Frost. Some Emily Dickinson. Chick was fucking messed up, dudes. But she could scan like shit. "Because I could not stop for Death, / He kindly stopped for me." Yeah, I think I'm going to try and really hit the ground running. Start with some Shakespeare sonnets, maybe work my way up to memorizing "Howl" by fall break. I think I could totally do it, if I really just put in the time, went to the library every day and hit the books.
I'll come back from biology and change into my nylon-mesh shorts and this awesome Under Armour shirt I got over the summer. It's sleeveless, so you can totally see my new tattoo, with the Mark Twain quote. "The man who doesn't read good books has no advantage over the man who can't read them." Words to live by, man. Because, yeah, it's about showing off a bit, too. I'll sit down at a table across from the big glass windows in the second-floor lounge, so I can get a bit of reflection, check myself out. Maybe catch some chicks checking me out, too. I'll be all cool and stuff—I'll have my headphones on, with Nickelback going, and I'll just keep turning pages. But I'll know they're watching. Getting totally hot for my mind.
I tell you what, though, dudes—you only get a chance like this while you're in college. After we graduate, we'll have to figure out how to fit studying into our work schedules, make time to get to the city library branch and its crappy little collection. Yeah, while I'm here on campus, my life is totally going to revolve around that library.
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OTHER McSWEENEY'S FEATURES:
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Dudes! Did You See the Library They've Got Here? By J. Byard Yoder
Jigsaw Speaks His Piece By Fortunato Salazar
Welcoming Remarks Made at a Literary Reading, 9/25/01 By John Hodgman
Time for a Vacation
Ulysses Sells Out By Rebekah Frumkin
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