Typical Awkward

Awkward Photo Saturday at its finest:

Left to our own devices.

Ain't no party like a cookie baking party!

...because a cookie baking party has mountains of cookie dough! 

 My small group is the best. A once or twice each semester we have traditional cookie baking marathon. This time, we baked ONE MILLION(x10^-4) cookies! Dark chocolate chip, oatmeal butterscotch, and chocolate with vanilla chips. Are you drooling yet?

Hard at work, or something like that.

Making a mess and getting judged for it.

Friendz 4evur.

This junk is ridiculous. Thank you Pinterest and thank you Whitni.

Maybe this photoset isn't actually funny. But I can't stop laughing at it.

The night included many SNL references to we finally sat down and watched some old sketches together while the cookies cooled.

The whole gang— not quite ready for the picture, but looking good anyway.

You are correct; these do look outrageously delicious.

We looked at the hundred-or-so cookies we baked and realized we could not and should not eat them all. So we brought them as an encouraging treat to the night shift nurses at a nearby hospital, where our Bible study leader is an interning chaplain. The nurses were confused and excited to see us delivering cookies at midnight!

Happy, happy Ana with the cookies all packaged up and ready for delivery.

We've all got another year and a half of dorm life before we live with real kitchens. And once we do, it may not be such an exciting endeavor to bake cookies. So until then, I'll keep marveling at the opportunity to mix things in a bowl, stick it in an oven, and come out with a delectable treat.

The Great Hall

Letitia Pate Evans Hall, circa 1950

Much of Agnes Scott College's culture revolves around our dining hall. Agnes Scott's small, quirky student body is required to buy a meal plan, so Evans Hall is an intrinsically comical place for people-watching.

Tonight in the dining hall I saw my favorite professor eating dinner by himself. I said hello and we chatted for a few minutes. He was sitting at a small square table with one tray full of salad, ham, and potatoes and another tray full of dessert and a soft pretzel. It was adorable.

There's always a group of girls huddled around the scanning station, standing and eating.  The group changes depending who is currently scanning people into the dining area. If it's a group of Juniors or Seniors, they say "hey," smile, and scan. Polite and efficient. If it's a group of Sophomores, they grin, tell you what's for dinner, scan your card, and say "You're so very welcome!" Enthusiastic and exhausting. If it's a group of Freshmen, they avoid eye contact, scan, and look startled when you say "thank you."

No one pities the loner. People sit by themselves all the time. I sit by myself all the time. It's refreshingly normal. Introverts welcome.

Everyone gets excited when we see catering staff setting up for a fancy event somewhere on campus. The next day we will have fancy leftover pasta salad, fruit salad, salad made of leaves, and exotic cheeses. Sometimes I only go to breakfast on Saturday mornings in hopes of finding fruit leftover from a rehearsal dinner. 

The popular professor table. Every Thursday they meet at 11:40am and eat at a particular large round table at the back of the seating area. They may seem like just a friendly bunch of professors, but everyone knows they're popular and exclusive. And everyone dreams of one day being invited to sit with them. Ways professors can get invited to the table:

• Have a baby, and it better be cute. You will only be invited when your child is with you.
• Be the adviser for the winning Black Cat Trivia team. That'll earn you about two weeks.
• Look like handsome young Frankenstein and marry an Episcopalian princess.
• Don't blink, ever, and be super witty when talking about your pets. 
• Throw swanky dinner parties where guests make fun of people who think they understand Robert Frost's poetry.
• Go on sabbatical to write a literary textbook.

Holidays make people go bonkers. I now try to avoid the dining hall on holiday dinners because chicks will trample you if you are between them and chocolate covered strawberries.  Halloween? Apparently we've never seen candy before. And even though the dining hall serves cake almost every day, on Birthday-Day we act like savages attacking the enormous sheet cake. Freshman year at the Christmas party, Paige and I had to sit outside because the dining hall was too wild and packed. 

Evans is beautiful, sure. But I fail to understand why so many people book their wedding receptions here.  Do they know what goes on inside these walls? Drag shows, date raffles, capping weeks... this is no place for a formal reception.

Letitia Pate Evans Hall, circa 2009

Black Cat

Agnes Scott College has countless bizarre traditions. This week: Black Cat. 

What is Black Cat? The short answer: some sort of equivalent to homecoming week. The long answer: this blog post.

Black Cat week begins at the stroke of midnight Sunday night. The entire school has from midnight until 2am to "decorate" campus. 

Gathering outside the student center with our decorations.

Pestle Board has the option of wearing black, pink, or nothing. Their job is to wreak havoc and scare first-years.

The tower bell rings at midnight and we rush. Each class tries to get their class color to dominate the quad.

We also have a floor of the student center to decorate. Ours didn't turn out too great.

This is the "office" for the class of 2013. This is also where I lost my lens cap.

Against all odds, I found it! Sad that the best part of my night was finding my lens cap.

At 2am, the festivities were called to a halt.

Did I mention that all this while, I had two prospective students spending the night? Woof.

Tuesday: Trivia Night. One of my favorite parts of Black Cat. We had an incredible team and a brilliant adviser.

Final score for 2011. This is the definition of domination.

Thursday is bonfire night.

First, we all gather behind the library, wear yellow, and yell things, like "We love our sisters!"

As a giant herd, we make our way from the science quad to the main quad.

First years (green) are supposed to be fully clothed. Sophomores (red) are supposed to wear underwear. Juniors (yellow) are supposed to be topless. Seniors (blue) are supposed to be totally naked. Fortunately, very few people adhere to this scandalous rule of thumb.

We are the math tutors- hear us roar. Don't you have faith in our problem solving skills?

The actual "bonfire."

The majority of people are terrifyingly drunk. Each class takes turns singing their original song, and the Dean of Students reveals "The Black Kitty." We are graded on our costumes and spirit. When Black Cat was first made a tradition, the bonfire was enormous, held in the amphitheater (which no longer exists) and "The Black Kitty" was an actual cat to be won (not just a silly stuffed animal).

Paige and I hassled Dean Lee for a picture. I think she was pleased to find some students who were far from intoxicated.

After bonfire, we have one hour to clean up the mess we made on the quad. Paige, Megan and I made a quick run to Java Monkey in order to inject ourselves with caffeine. We then participated in the infamous tradition of a midnight rehearsal for Junior Production.  We finished by 2am, which was better than any of us were expecting.

Friday is "the big day."

Field Day. Three-legged races, egg races, tug-of-war, etc.

Community picnic. Hot dogs and hamburgers and veggie burgers, oh my.

Song Comeptition. Each class writes a song for themselves and a song for their sisters.

Dance competition. You know, just endorsing the objectification of women.

Then comes Junior Production. About 25 Juniors perform in a 100% original play, which is a parody of Agnes Scott life. It counts for 21% of the Juniors' overall score. We had been rehearsing every night from 9:30-midnight, we met on weekends to make props and costumes. Needless to say, JP had thoroughly taken over my life.

I played the clueless first-year student. We were four knights in a quest to save Agnes Scott's dragon. We searched for the magical healing Great Scottie and had to overcome great obstacles. In the end, we figured out that when we all work together, we are the Great Scotties who can heal the dragon. Cheesy for sure. But awesome. JP was graded and we only lost one point, for tact. In the words of the yellow knight, "What the hell is tact?!"

I only allow myself to go to Waffle House if there's a good story to go along with it. Post-show waffles at midnight?- Great Wa-Ho story.

 Saturday is the formal Black Cat dance. This year, it was held at the Westin Hotel in Buckhead. I didn't stay long because it was pretty crazy... but I took a few pictures, just to prove to the world that I have friends.

We like giggling.

We like pumpkins.

We like math.

 And so concludes Black Cat 2011. I need to hibernate.

Wait- I go to school?

I distinctly remember four years ago the thought crawling though my high school head, "I'm a junior now? Wowie zowie, I'm old!" 

Now classes have started up and I'm thinking the exact thought once again, but I'm hardly the same "old" person. The summer was a dream- doing what I love most, surrounded by the people I love most. Then two weeks of living at Agnes without classes was an adventure. I was so consumed with preparing for the class of 2015 to arrive that today hit me like a ton of bricks. Classes? Me? Homework? Moi? Nevertheless, I survived the day, rejoiced, and was glad in it.

Here's to hoping that the rest of the semester will be much like today– I didn't wear a special outfit or wake up extra early or eat a fancy breakfast because I already know all my professors and classmates. No one left to impress. I spent a good deal of time in the library, a great bit of time in the Math Learning Center, and a fun snippet of time with my Bible Study pals. All good, all learning, no stress. A beautiful time to grow. 

 


Story from today:
A typical Abstract Algebra textbook is expensive. So my kind and generous professor wrote his own text book for us. 151 pages to print, 351 homework problems assigned. So I went to the library to use the double-sided printers and asked the librarian which print station would be best to use and I explained my 151-page predicament. She didn't quite understand that my professor wrote the book himself and asked us to print it out because she started explaining to me copyright laws and that I can't print out a book. I smiled and thanked her, printed at the busiest print station, monopolized the three-hole-punch, and walked out carrying my freshly printed algebra book. She was startled.

The finished product: not your typical text book.

Sing, Shout, Sing

My entire life revolves around two places: Agnes Scott College and Camp Glisson. Both have long-running traditions of goofy singing paired with crazed dancing. I should investigate what this says about me- that I gravitate towards communities that enjoy being absolutely ridiculously out of control. Maybe it's nothing to over-analyze.

At Agnes, it's the Hub Sing which happens twice a year. 

Tonight's Hub Sing

We are a women's college. We have no shame. The majority of the upperclassmen are intoxicated. All of the alumnae are wasted. Yes, even the 75-year-old playing the piano. We sing plenty of politically incorrect songs that span the topics of death, prostitution, Noah's ark, and Black Cat. (Black Cat is another tradition I'll be writing about in a few weeks.)  I love that we've been able to reclaim so many depressing songs and turn them into a beloved tradition.

My favorite Hub Song is Running Bear, which ends with Running Bear and Little White Dove's inevitable deaths.

At Glisson, we have Singing on the Porch every evening after dinner, Amphitheatre every Sunday, and Celebration every Friday. We sing and dance often and with much gusto.

I stole this photo from the Glisson website.

The songs we sing at Glisson are equally goofy, but topics are rated G, including: Jesus, Moses, grace, forgiveness, jet planes, country roads, and the Boogaloo. No one is drunk, and children are hootin' and hollerin' along with us.

I don't want to pick favorites, but of course camp is more fun. I'd much prefer a button that instead says, "Ballin' on the Lord's side."

Home Sweet Rebekah

I've ventured back to the land of Agnes Scott-

where the squirrels are not afraid of people,

the 106-year-old porches are straight out of a movie,

and the air is feverish.

Very few people are back on campus, but I needed to move in early so I can go on an upcoming leadership retreat. Empty sidewalks, quiet student center, toothpaste-free sinks- it's all slightly eerie. I will not be venturing into any basements any time soon.

My roommate Paige and I are pleasantly shocked by the size of our room is. We're living in the same building as last year, Rebekah, but our room feels even nicer. They're not called "Dorms Like Palaces" for nothing.

As is plain to see, we have an enormous dance floor in the middle of our room. What better way to enter our third year of undergrad than dancing?