Fire and Slice

When you’re standing in the freezing cold staring dully at your apartment building going into tantrum mode, you’ve got some time to kill. No one around seems ready to play “Catch the Icicle in your Teeth” or “Dodge This,” so you are less inclined to play in the snow and allow memories to pass the time. One such recollection popped into my head last night, so I figured because of its relevance to this morning’s post, it’s worth the second blog of the day. Damn, I’m productive.

Fire drills are far more welcome in college. There are a few reasons for this. First, you’re asleep a lot less frequently. That’s fewer hours of the day in which a fire alarm, real or fake, can drag you from your bed. Secondly, you live in a building of your friends and peers in such a number that in order to kill time outside, a spontaneous game of ultimate can break out. Third, fire fighters are WAY more aggressive in dormitories. They’ll run up and down the hallways banging on doors completely crazed, you’d think that Blockbuster ran out of copies of Backdraft. High comedy all around.

In college, fire alarms are also largely unscheduled. You have to rely on stupid college kids to do stupid things, like run their sleeping bag through the dryer or microwave their leftovers shrouded in aluminum foil. Stupidity, in general, is an unscheduled phenomenon. This is why you never know when you are going to be asked to vacate the premises.

Mid-terms can do funny things to your daily routine. It was the middle of October and I had just finished a paper for my US History course, when I decided that I did not feel like going to the dining hall for dinner. I had rarely ordered pizza before, much less for a party of one. But these were pre-Wawa days at W&M, and the only snack food outlet was the crappy Sentry Mart across the street. (Where you never knew if the powder on the donuts were sugar or, um, the ‘other’ merchandise) I did what my stomach ordered: I called Chanello’s for a medium cheese pizza.

The pizza came; I ate, and tried to read a chapter or two in Microeconomics. This was the only sure-fire way to induce a long nap. It’s okay, I just had pizza, finished a paper, and it’s still warm out. Good night…

Screeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee-

Waking up to the fire alarm, I saw that Dave was nowhere to be found. The sun’s still out, so I couldn’t’ have been asleep that long. Which means I was only in a light sleep, and that the alarm had *just* gone off. No big deal, I thought – Jasen’s luminescent turtle probably blew a breaker. I conformed, grabbed another slice of pizza and a disc and headed outside.

And as I stepped out the front entrance of Monroe Hall, I saw that the other 153 residents were already outside on the other side of the street. Turns out I vacated a good ten minutes after everyone else. But who can be mad at the guy who brought a Frisbee?

Everyone – if the guy who brought the Frisbee didn’t bring enough pizza for everybody.