CHICAGO STYLE

Print your essay and then spend the next two hours preparing a rich and zesty marinara sauce. Place your essay in a deep pie dish, cover it with a layer of sausage and cheese, top it off with your homemade red sauce, and throw it in a 425° oven for 35 minutes. Your essay is now finished! You have also guaranteed that nobody will ever like it (except for readers from the Chicago metropolitan area). If somebody says they like New York-Style essays better, include a footnote where you call them a “jag-off.” If somebody tries to put ketchup on your essay, Chicago Style permits you to bury them alive under Wrigley Field.

APA STYLE

Before you begin writing, head to your local microbrewery and purchase a twelve-pack of American Pale Ale (6% abv or higher). Return home and follow these 12 easy steps:

Step 1) Open a new Word document, and open an APA. Ignore the Word document and drink the beer, followed by two more beers.

Step 2) Try to figure out how to include page numbers in your essay. Is it something in “Tools”? In “Format”? How did Bill Gates make $100 billion from this? Drink three more beers.

Step 3) Open a second Word doc for some reason. In lieu of writing, insert a picture of Mr. Belvedere you found on the internet. Another beer? You bet.

Step 4) Go for a walk to clear your head. Make sure you take a beer with you. Hold on to the empty bottle in case you need to pee in the alley behind Taco Bell (NOTE: you will definitely need to pee in the alley behind Taco Bell).

Step 5) Take the last four beers to your futon while you watch just one episode of Queer Eye. Just one.

Steps 6 through 9) NAP TIME.

Step 10) Wake up 12 hours later with your face stuck to your MacBook’s keyboard. Send an email to your professor asking for an extension before puking in the paper bag you brought home from Taco Bell.

Step 11) Open a new Word document.

Step 12) Enter a 12-step program.

HARVARD REFERENCING

Just keep referencing the fact that you went to Harvard anytime anybody asks you about something you wrote, no matter how factually inaccurate it is. Eventually they’ll just stop asking.

ASA STYLE

Ignore whatever topic you were assigned and write an essay about nineteenth-century baseball player Asa Brainard instead. Here are some possible “hooks” you might use to draw your reader in:

  • Who became the starting ace for the Brooklyn Excelsiors after superstar pitcher Jim Creighton fatally injured himself while hitting a home run in 1862?
  • Who made a whopping $1,100 pitching for the Cincinnati Red Stockings in 1869?
  • Who is Major League Baseball’s all-time home run leader? (NOTE: sometimes you should use a trick question to keep your readers on their toes)
  • Who died of consumption in Denver, Colorado in 1888 at the ripe old age of 47?

After reading these fun facts about Asa Brainard your professor will forget all about the topic they originally assigned and give you a 78, which is, of course, the same number of walks Asa Brainard allowed between 1871 and 1874.

MLA STYLE

Throw your essay in a suitcase and catch the next flight to Malta International Airport (MLA). At MLA you meet your Airbnb host, Baldassar, who drives you to his country estate. Before long, you become lovers. You spend the late summer days wandering around Baldassar’s organic vineyards, stopping occasionally to chat with local farmers. The farmers are friendly, but you notice that they fall quiet when you ask them how you should properly cite a YouTube video of Slavoj Žižek in your essay on the socio-ideological implications of Cupcake Wars. You begin to wonder why you ever wanted to write such an essay in the first place, especially when you could spend each day watching the sun set into the azure sea while sipping from a jug of rustic wine instead. Eventually, you release your essay, one page at a time, into the Mediterranean waters, while Baldassar rests his strong hand on your shoulder. Your “Works Cited” page is the last to float away.

VANCOUVER STYLE

Nobody has ever heard of this style, including people from Vancouver. Just do whatever the hell you want as long as it’s double-spaced.