sh*t i hear in my junior year

Sh*t
Junior
I Hear In My
Year
Brooke Burnette

Sh*t
I Hear In My
Junior
Year

© 2021 All rights reserved. No part of this
publication may be reproduced without
permission.
The opinions expressed in this book are
those of the author only and not those of
York College of Pennsylvania.
This book is an experimental class project
for purely educational design purposes.
Design and lettering by Brooke Burnette
Printed by www.lulu.com

Sh*t
I Hear In My
Junior
Year
Brooke Burnette

This book is dedicated to everyone featured in this book as
y’all are the reason I didn’t completely lose my mind.
Love y’all.

Introduction
A documentation book, they said. It’ll be fun, they said.
When this project was introduced, we had to come up with three
concepts. Of course, the concept that I chose relied on other people.
I’ve never really been a team player. I played golf, for god’s sake. That’s the
most individual sport there is. I don’t particularly like the idea of having
to rely on other people. If something goes wrong, I want it to be my
own fault. I don’t want to lose when I’m playing my best because of someone
else’s mistakes. But I digress. I’m actually not even sure why I came
up with this idea and actually presented it. It was my least favorite actually.
However, I think it’s the one that would cause the most growth in my
personality. It was just the fact that to get this project done, I had to get
people to say things that were interesting which is a spontaneous and
unreliable concept. Not to my surprise, it ended up being just as difficult
as I expected.
Originally, this book was only supposed to be about my roommates.
However, due to some unfortunate circumstances in which I was forced
to learn remotely from home, I had to expand my horizons to include
other people in my life. Instead of just my roommates, this book now
includes my parents and classmates in addition to my friends. I think
this turn of events is actually fitting for this book and what it’s supposed
to do for me.
This book is a special project in which I documented the shocking,
interesting, thought provoking, and just plain weird sentences that I’ve
heard this semester. Since I was excited to be living back on campus after
being gone for six months, I really wanted to make the most of the time
I had with my best friends and roommates. I’m actually extremely glad I
chose this idea especially after what happened toward the end of the semester.
The past two years, I have gotten increasingly reclusive and self-isolating
to the point that after my roommates and I went our separate ways after
sophomore year, I hardly talk to them now. This year, I wanted to change
that. Although I still have my days where I just want to stay in bed and
be alone, I believe this project has forced me to interact with my roommates
more. Due to this, even though I’m now at home, five hours away
from all of them, we all still talk and stay in touch, which is something
my roommates from last year didn’t do. I firmly believe that because of
this project, I have gotten closer with my friends since I constantly had
to be with them.
On another level, not only did I have to hang out with them all the
time, but I also had to listen to them very closely. It’s crazy how much
i

you realize you don’t really listen to people until you constantly make
the effort to. Since I listen more closely now, I know so much more
about them. I feel like I really know them now. For the first time in
my life, I can say I have best friends. I know them better than I know
anyone else and it’s not just because we lived together. Learning how
to have a genuine conversation with someone that isn’t just saying
something and then replying has changed my life. I not only have best
friends, I have my bridesmaids and my people. These girls will be in my
life forever and I will cherish all of the memories in this book. Someday,
when we’re old we’ll look back at this and laugh just like we did in the
moment. That aspect is worth so much more than the grade I’ll get for this.
Carrying over from the three months I had to train myself to interact
differently with people, once I got sent home for the rest of the semester,
I noticed that the habit was set and now I’m listening so much closer
to every single person I talk to. Of course, we all have moments when
we’re tired or just not in the mood to talk, but even then I find myself
tuning in closer than I would have before. Because of this, I have also
gotten closer with my classmates even though I’m so far away from them.
Since I’m at home, I have the most alone time and now, I don’t want it.
Instead of laying in bed and eating junk food, I play video games with them.
This gives me more opportunities to get to know them and they show
up a few times in this book too. In a weird way, I’m glad I’m forced to
stay home since without it, I wouldn’t have had the chance to get to
know them like I do now.
Additionally, it also gave me a chance to talk to my parents more. A lot
of times, it’s hard to talk to them since they both work. My parents
divorced when I was young so they’ve both been working parents ever
since I could remember. Because of this, I feel like I’m not as close with
them as I could be. Especially being so far away from them while I’m at
school, I don’t talk to them very much during the semester. Now that
I’m forced to be home, I have to talk to them more since I have to see
them all the time. My mom and I were always decently close so it’s a
lot easier for me to get quotable things out of her than my dad. My dad
just likes to drink his gin and tonics and watch tv when he gets home
from work and I’m usually in my room doing something as well so it’s
a little harder to talk to him. Even when we do talk, it’s usually more
serious conversations. However, even though I don’t have many quotes
from him, I did make an effort to talk to him more. I think he appreciates
that I don’t just talk to him about money anymore.
ii

Characters
Maggie: Junior, Business Major. A very prominent character in this life
story. She’s extremely playful and funny, a little needy but only because
she loves us. Maggie loves to have fun and hates being alone. She often
has her not-boyfriend, Matt, over.
Kalynn: Junior, Nursing major. It’s not that Kalynn is a more serious
person, but she’s the type that likes to laugh along with others rather
than deliver the punchline. She’s busy a lot since she’s a nursing major,
which probably takes up a lot of her brain space as well. She’s often
studying or writing papers.
Ashley: Senior, Bio major. Ashley is a difficult one to describe. She’s really
funny, but in a way that’s more gestural rather than verbal. She doesn’t
deliver many one-liners. A lot of the funny things about her are situational.
However, talk to her late at night and she’s on-par with Maggie. She also
uses her phone a lot more.
Mom: A passionate redhead. My mom could talk forever. She has her
funny moments too, but most of the time it’s with things that aren’t really
supposed to be funny. She loves to talk about politics.
Dad: A golf lover. My dad really isn’t home very much (which is why
I stay at his house when I’m home) since he has a corporate job and is
starting up his own business as well. Most of our conversations center
around golf or my dog.
Jake: Graphic Design major. Jake is the most quotable classmate I have.
He just says things that are so quirky and clever that it takes a moment
to be like “oh, that’s funny.”
iii

aggie and Matt were arguing a lot during the beginning of the year.
I think being able to see each other all the time after six months
of not being able to was an adjustment for them. Although they
really like each other, their personalities are very different and too much
time with anyone is a recipe for disaster. They had regular couple’s arguments
here and there, but this time Matt had done a bad thing. I think
this event stemmed from some things he did during the summer, but
I’m honestly not really sure exactly what happened. It must have been
pretty bad though since it was enough for Maggie to close the door to
her room and have a long, heated discussion with him about what he
had done. Since we were sitting in the living room, we couldn’t hear every
word that was said especially since they were speaking quietly most of
the time. However, we could hear things every now and then even if
it was just words here and there. After a little bit of us eavesdropping
unintentionally from the kitchen table, this iconic quote could be heard
reverberating from Maggie’s room. The rest of us in the kitchen covered
our mouths and tried really hard not to burst out laughing. The couple
emerged from the room a little while later and after assessing the situation
to make sure they were okay, we told them what we heard. That’s
when we all got to laugh at the situation. Maggie couldn’t remember exactly
why she said it but she stood her ground on the statement. She looked
at Matt and said, “it’s true though.”

was especially antisocial on this day and pretty much stayed in my
room doing homework or watching TV all day. Everyone was gone
except Maggie and it was a rare day that Matt couldn’t come over.
I didn’t even think about what she was doing all day now that she was
alone since I was stuck in my own world. When I ventured out from my
cave that evening to get food, Maggie was sitting at the table eating.
We chatted normally while I made some food and when it was done,
I turned to go back into my comfy space. As I was doing so, Maggie puffed
her cheeks out and crossed her arms, full toddler style, and begged me to
eat with her. She complained about me being in my room all day to which
I told her it was more comfortable, but she wasn’t buying it. She said that
I had to hang out with her since we’ve been alone all day, which was
a valid point that I couldn’t really argue, but it’s just so much more comfortable
in my bed that I just wanted to eat in there. I think I stood there for
at least two or three minutes having this conversation back and forth about
staying or going until I just got tired and decided to sit and eat with her.
She immediately perked up and we went back to chatting like we did before.
This was when I realized that Maggie hates being alone. I never thought
about it since I love being alone and having my time to myself, but
this moment made me learn something about one of my closest friends.

n very rare occasions, during what we call “crackhead hours,”
or basically just times during the night that all of us have insane
amounts of energy, we all just sit and talk about how our lives
are going. This was one of those occasions. Through these conversations
come jokes, a lot of really loud laughter, talking over each other, and
the like. In this instance, we were talking about Ashley’s problem with
her ex and how she was still going to hang out with him, and more frequently
even though he made it very clear that he didn’t like her anymore.
That’s when Kalynn said this quote, in which the room exploded with
cackling and Maggie trying to defend herself. “It’s totally different!”
and “I’ve made things very clear!” were a couple of the more distinct sentences
that pierced through the laughter coming from everyone else.
See, Maggie is actually a very extreme example of hanging out with an ex
since they’re practically attached at the hip. However, their relationship
is very com-plicated and they act like they’re still dating even though
they’re not. Maggie has even said herself that they won’t be getting back
together which just makes the whole thing more confusing. So even though
the phrase would make absolutely no sense to outsiders, it was very clear
what Kalynn was trying to warn Ashley of to us. I don’t think Ashley and
her ex could be quite the same as Maggie and Matt since they didn’t hang
out as much in the first place, but the idea is still the same. You have to
sever all ties or you’ll never escape.

would be lying if I said I wasn’t ashamed of this one. A few days
before this incident, I had tried to cook bacon in the oven. Apparently,
20 minutes in the oven for bacon at 350 is too much. There’s still
grease stains on the pavement outside our door. Anyway, this time, it
wasn’t me that set off the fire alarm, thank god. Actually, we weren’t
even sure it was us. Nobody was cooking or spraying anything so we just
assumed it was someone else. The worst part was that Ashley was in the
shower when the fire alarm went off so it was another chaotic fire alarm
scene as she rushed to get out and get herself together. Once we were
standing outside, we watched as the Campus Police and the firemen
all made their way up to our floor and down the hall. Our hearts sank.
There’s no way it could have been us, right? What could have even set
off the fire alarm in our apartment? We weren’t doing anything. It was
at this moment as we were all confused and talking it out when Maggie
turned to me exasperatedly and said the famous line. It relieved us of
all our tension and we laughed. I think the best part about it was that
it was so obvious that it wasn’t, but it reminded us that these things are
pretty silly and don’t really matter. In the end, the steam from Ashley’s
shower had set off the alarm. We were afraid that the whole complex
was going to hate us since this was now the second time we had set off
the alarm that week.

h, Maggie. This quote right here is the first one that turns this
book R rated. If you would have asked me what the most unexpected
sentence I would ever hear was, I would have never even
thought of this order of words, but here we are. This time, all of us except
Maggie were hanging out in the living room at the kitchen table like usual,
doing homework, talking and eating. I think we honestly forgot that
Maggie was even there. Usually by the time this happened she was at
Matt’s house to stay the night. So, when Maggie emerged from her room
and headed towards us, we were all caught a little off-guard. Before she
reached her destination, we all greeted her and I asked where she was going.
For some reason, I thought she was leaving and I was a little concerned
since she was only wearing an oversized t-shirt. Looking back at it, it was
so obvious that she wasn’t leaving the apartment and I think I just thought
that because it was so late and she was usually already gone. In a sweet,
higher pitched voice, she said this quote and then went into the bathroom,
laughing. We could actually hear her giggles through the door after
she closed it. We all laughed at the shocking statement and agreed that
that sentence would only come from Maggie’s mouth. I’m not sure how
could get in anyone’s head for a day, it would be hers.

his is another kitchen table conversation in which we were talking
about our bodies. When we all conversate, the train of thought
bounces around in a way that no one can trace how we got from
one subject to another. So, I’m not sure why we were talking about our
bodies but there we were. I was talking about how I looked like a 12
year old boy with my chest, even going so far as to tighten my shirt around
my torso just to get the whole effect. Don’t worry, I joke about my chest
all the time. It’s not a rare occurrence for me to be doing this kind of thing.
Maggie looked shocked after I showed it off. I don’t wear tight clothing
often for obvious reasons so she didn’t know the full extent of my flatness.
She said quietly, “oh my god, you really are flat,” in which I responded
with sad nodding. Ashley said something about her butt not being round.
It was after this comment that we felt some odd tension in the air and
turned to look at Maggie. She had her brows furrowed in anger and was
staring daggers at Ashley. When we asked her what was wrong, she bursted
out with this sentence and turned around as if to prove her statement true.
Kalynn tried to argue and say it wasn’t but we all knew the truth. Although
Maggie doesn’t have the most voluminous behind, she still has a supermodel
figure and looks beautiful in anything she wears. I think all of us
rock our respective styles and look great with the bodies we have.

y relationship with Maggie is quite the complicated one. We’re very
open and honest with each other which somehow translates to
us also being able to make fun of each other all the time. Maggie
and I have roasting contests against each other where we just throw
increasingly harsh insults at each other until someone gives up or we’re
laughing so hard we can’t continue. I promise we’re friends. We show
our affection by insulting each other; it’s fine. In this case, we were knee
deep in a particularly harsh battle and neither of us were letting up.
We would giggle a little after each statement and then have one slightly
worse prepared. This went on for longer than usual until Maggie threw
one at me that I didn’t really have a comeback for. So, instead of me
having to admit defeat, Matt said something that was pretty funny and
on par with us toward Maggie. We all started to laugh- or so I thought.
Maggie chuckled a little bit with us fakely until we realized she wasn’t
really laughing. After me and Matt fell silent, Maggie was still giggling
softly and through her smile she uttered this quote and started pushing
him playfully toward the door. We all started genuinely laughing at the
disposition between what she said and how she was smiling through
it all. She’s done something similar a few times to him since this and I
swear she deserves an Oscar everytime. She’s so good at acting like she’s
actually mad.

ou see, this conversation happened so close to the beginning of
this book that I still had some old habits. During this conversation,
I won’t lie, I missed the first half of it. I think I was trying
to do something for a class and even though I was sitting right there
on the couch, I wasn’t paying attention to any of the conversation. My
roommates last year would always yell at me for doing this as they would
have to say my name several times to actually get my attention. Regardless,
I will recall, to my best ability, what happened in this moment because
this quote is too weird and funny not to include. Ashley was on the phone
with someone talking about going to the doctor. I will try not to put
too much of her personal issues in writing to be read about over and
over again, but I will say that she was having some problems. When Ashley
got off of the phone, she explained to the group what was going on.
This then turned into a debate on whether or not Ashley really had to go
to the Urgent Care for her issue. That debate then turned into a different
discussion about how bad it would be until you would go to the doctor.
Maggie’s response was quite extreme and when questioned, she yelled
out this quote. I even remember half-listening to the conversation until
this point and then hearing this quote and peering up from my laptop
to question where that sentence came from. This story was all I really
got out of everyone talking over each other.

e’ve got a heavy one here. During this whole time, I had been
talking to this guy who is honestly amazing. He’s smart, funny,
a little annoying sometimes, but he’s a great guy. The only
problem is that he just got out of a long-term relationship a few months
prior and wasn’t ready for another one. He specifically had told me that
he didn’t want a real relationship with me and didn’t even think that we
could have one in the future. At the point that this conversation happened,
we were pretty much acting like a couple and I was getting pretty strong
feelings. So, what do I do? I tell him I can’t see him anymore. Yep. I know.
But, I knew that if I didn’t end it, it was going to hurt a lot worse later.
I’m too old to be having fake relationships. I can’t waste my time falling
for a guy who will never be with me. After I ended things with him, I
came back to my room bawling my eyes out and Maggie’s just sitting at
the kitchen table, eating chicken nuggets. I remember wishing I was on
her level of chill. We had a really long, deep conversation about the whole
situation while I’m trying to take off my makeup and get into some
comfy clothes. She’d been sitting on the sidelines for every one of my
non-relationship relationships (there have been many), watching me mess
up every single one. Throughout this whole conversation, this quote is
the one that sticks with me because she’s right. I’m sure I could make things
work somehow, but I always run away when things get hard. I didn’t
even realize I did this until she pointed it out.

his quote is the reason I asked Maggie if she wanted me to change
her name in the book, but she insisted that I keep her name the
same. Bold choice. For reference, I used to play golf pretty much
my entire life and just quit this year to focus on myself and my career.
I had to dress for the course every single day and pretty much owned
two entirely different wardrobes for on the course and off. The weather
this particular day was absolutely perfect to go golfing in. It was warm
but not too warm and there wasn’t much wind. Instead of going outside
though, I was in my room doing some homework when Maggie came
waltzing in. She asked me if her outfit looked cute. I remember it was
a really cute outfit: jean shorts and a tank top. I told her it was cute and
asked where she was going. When she replied she was going to the golf
course, I almost spit out my drink. “You’re going to the golf course
in that?” I remember asking her. I didn’t mean it in a rude way, but I
thought it was common knowledge that you can’t wear jeans and have
to wear a collared shirt to the golf course. After I told her this, she came
into my room several times with different outfits and I kept having to
tell her no. After around the sixth time was when she frustratingly blurted
out this quote. Turns out they were going to one of the more run down
courses in the area so it was actually acceptable the whole time.

his one is really going to date this book. If anyone is reading this
100 years from now, everything might seem plausible to happen
at any moment in time except this. McDonalds just came out
with the Travis Scott burger. Everyone was raving about it. There were
memes everywhere about it. One night, out of pure coincidence, we
were all super hungry around 11pm. What’s the only place open that
sells food at 11pm? McDonalds. So, we all hopped in the car to go try
the Travis Scott burger. When we got back, we distributed the burgers
and were pleasantly surprised by how good the burgers were. With our
hunger satisfied, we closed the cardboard boxes that the burgers came in.
At a closer look, we were amazed by the fact that the cardboard burger
box wasn’t the normal red as the branding usually is but was, instead, black.
I think we all expressed how cool it was that the boxes were black. As a
lover or neutral colors, I had expressed that I wanted to keep the box forever.
That’s when Maggie’s lightbulb went off and she delivered this line in awe.
I’m not sure how she reached that connection, but the sort of on-topic,
sort of off-topic comment sent us all into a laughter frenzy. We were
reaching crackhead hours and so we were all a little loopy. The way that
she said it was also what made it so funny. The way she suddenly whispered
like someone would hear and get her trouble after saying the first bit at
a normal volume was probably the weirdest and funniest thing we had
heard all day.

rare appearance from Ashley for this one. Just recalling it makes
me laugh. I thought I was super competitive, but this incident
made me realize that I’m not the only one. It also made me realize
why me and Ash are best friends. We were all playing Uno and the round
became very heated, very fast. When you play Uno with only three or
four people, there’s always someone that gets targeted. I don’t make the
rules. Ashley was getting the short end of the stick with draw 2 and
draw 4 cards, skips, and the like. She was becoming visibly frustrated
and would exasperatedly draw her cards. After this went on for a good
five-ish minutes, she got another draw card. She stood up and pointed
her finger angrily, shouting this line with all of her might. I remember
her face getting all red as she drew her cards and sat back down. Apparently,
this scene was all she needed to reverse her luck. Because shortly after
this, I started getting all of the draw cards and ended up having almost
the entire deck in my hands. I don’t think I’ve ever played a game of Uno
where you have to keep drawing cards until you have one to put down
but you can’t stack the same numbers in your hand on each other in the
same turn. Because I slowly realized how unfair this predicament was, I
ended up slamming all the cards and my hand down on the table, calmly
said, “I’m done,” and walked into my room to scream into my pillow.
We never played Uno again after this.

h fall, a girl’s best friend. With the changing seasons, so changes
the fashion. Cozy sweaters and multiple layers, beanies, and a lot
of muted colors are seen during this time. However, that is not the
fashion that a straight girl looks forward to. While straight guys look
forward to summer with crop tops, booty shorts, etc, straight girls are
always thinking about fall with the plague of light grey sweatpants incorporated
into every guy’s outfit. Sometimes, we just can’t help but look.
That’s why I understand when guys just take a little glance at girls. In my
opinion, that’s fine. As long as nobody lingers; then it would be creepy.
I mean, everything is just out there. Your brain just can’t concentrate
until the little glance has been fulfilled. Again, I don’t make the rules.
For this quote, Ashley and I were laying in bed, having a lazy day when
Ashley realized a lot of the guys on her Tik Tok and Instagram had started
wearing the infamous light grey sweatpants. She gasped so hard she
coughed right after. When I asked her what was wrong, she started
chanting this phrase, getting increasingly louder. Suddenly, from the other
room, Maggie could be heard giving her little comment in the background.
It was most definitely one of the more spontaneously chaotic scenes.
I immediately asked the boy in our room if he owned a lot of grey sweatpants.
The answer didn’t matter, which was good because it got drowned
out with giddy laughter.

alynn gets her time to shine here! It was an off-day for Kalynn in
which she was caught up in all of her classes and had some free time
to hang out with us. With all of our wonderful addictions to Tik Tok,
we talk about the videos we’ve seen all the time, or send them to each
other on a daily basis. In this case, Ashley was talking about a series of
videos someone was making where the girl pretended to be a kid who
believed she was a vampire. It was something most of us can relate to,
but would never admit. Kalynn hadn’t seen it, so Ashley pulled it up
and showed it to her. This brought up the question of whether we did,
indeed, pretend to be vampires. Their answers were yes (which was a
little surprising to me for some reason). When they turned to me for
me to answer the question, I told them that I had convinced almost
everyone I was in contact with during elementary school that I was a
werewolf and I went to werewolf school at night. That’s when they both
cracked up and Kalynn said this line to me. To be fair, I do pull pranks
on people just to test if I’m still good at lying. Turns out I still got it.
My most recent one at this time was how I convinced someone that
hung out with us all the time that we were running a marathon to cover
up something else we were talking about. It took a few days, but I did
eventually convince him that we were, in fact, running a marathon. It’s
things like this that made Kalynn say that to me.

his one is probably one of the more obscure quotes in this book.
I am going to try my best to paint this picture, but no words
will be able to describe the Willy Wonka-esque scene that was
unfolding. Basically, I was in my room doing homework or something
as usual. I heard the normal amount of commotion coming from the
kitchen. Maggie and Kalynn must be having a little roommate break
fast together. I thought it was pretty cute. It was at that moment that I
realized that I needed a potty break. So, I got up to go to the bathroom,
as one does. As I turned the corner out of my room and into the hallway,
I saw Maggie and Kalynn standing there, perfectly framed by the hallway.
The morning sunlight was trying to peek through the blinds behind
them, creating a certain angelic glow. They were both wiggling their
arms and slowly twirling. Kalynn was pointing to Maggie’s neck/collar
area. Everyone was just vibing in the moment. I took a second to take
the whole scene in. They both paused their singing and dancing to redirect
their eyes at me. When I just blinked and entered the bathroom and
closed the door slowly behind me, they went right back to where they
had left off. Now, I know what you’re thinking. No, none of us are on
drugs. It was so early in the morning that nobody was drunk either.
Sometimes, we’re just really freaking weird. And you know what? That’s
what makes life so damn interesting.

nother crackhead hours conversation, just with Ashley this time.
This night was the beginning of me and Ashley starting to go insane.
The semester was going along with more and more work and no
breaks to catch our breath. Everybody was getting pretty burned out and
this turned into stress-induced insomnia. We would stay up talking for
hours just because neither of us could sleep. In this case, we were talking
about boys. I was complaining about how boys stress me out with how
much work they are just to get them to think about dating you. You have
to put so much time and energy into them just to maybe have a chance.
Then, the conversation morphed into complaining about toxic exes.
Some boys just really like to put ideas in your head that aren’t true.
Some boys want to tear down your self confidence because they know
that you’re way hotter and smarter than them. They’re insecure so they
want you to think that they’re the best you can do. Even though these
things aren’t true, when you’re already struggling with mental health, it’s
a lot easier to be manipulated. This was basically the sentiment she was
going for, but since it was crackhead hours it came out a little different.
She was even laughing through saying it. Since we both have similar
mental problems, we understand each other in a way that we can joke
about it in ways that other people might not understand. It’s kind of
like dark humor and it’s what makes our bond so much stronger.

he insomnia was in full force now and we were staying up pretty
often. This resulted in more funny quotes than I expected. Normally
sleep deprived conversations are mostly incoherent and would not
make any sense even if I tried to explain it. But for some reason, probably
because of the stress, our brains were working more than usual. This time,
we were talking about mental health and how it’s becoming increasingly
rare for someone to be mentally healthy. It seems like more kids our age
at least have anxiety. Maybe it’s not that more people have it, but that it’s
okay to talk about it now and feel the ways we feel. With our increasingly
accepting society, talking about anxiety or depression usually comes with
more understanding instead of being shipped to a hospital for a lobotomy.
But, of course, since it was crackhead hours the conversation was more
light-hearted. Ashley expressed that having a less than ideal mental balance
adds some spice to our lives. It’s like a conversation starter. On the
other hand, being mentally healthy is super boring. After a slight pause,
this sentence came out of her mouth. I’m honestly not totally surprised
that this was her train of thought. We hadn’t been eating like we should
either and I think food had been on both of our minds as well. It’s just
the juxtaposition of talking about something heavy and comparing it to
food that made this so funny. It’s not really a “it’s funny because it’s true”
moment as that’s completely an opinion. It was just funny in the moment.

he only reason this is funny is because it’s Maggie. I don’t think I’ve
ever seen this girl talk about politics even though the rest of us talk
about it pretty often. If she’s present when we’re talking about it,
she just laughs along. In addition, the only time I’ve heard her talk about
America is when she talks about being adopted. She really only cares
about the fourth of July for the parties. I think it would be super weird
to find her throwing a barbeque. The only super american thing about
her is that she lives in the suburbs. So, when she walked into my room
with blue jeans on and a red tank top and asked this question I couldn’t
help but laugh. Of course she would be worried about it. I think she
thought I was laughing at the outfit because she got a little quiet and sunk
her shoulders, but as soon as I said “that’s going on the list,” she started
laughing too. I told her that she would look fine as long as she doesn’t wear
white shoes and she looked a little dejected. She told me in a quiet voice
that she was planning on wearing her white Converse. This made the
whole situation so much funnier and she immediately tried on a different
combination. She came back with a black top and then different jeans
only to end up in the same outfit she first had on. Maggie is always really
indecisive about what she wears and even if we told her that every outfit
looked good, she would make her own mind up anyway. She ended up
wearing the first outfit, just with different shoes.

ovie night! Since it was the October spooky season, we watched
scary movies almost every night. However, the weekends were
special. The weekends were when we watched the really scary
movies. The movies that gave you nightmares. The ones that make you
keep all the lights on. We don’t mess around with the Halloween season.
We saved the super scary ones for the weekend so that we could sleep
during the week for classes. We’re still responsible. This particular night,
we were about to watch Maggie’s favorite scary movie, Lights Out.
Usually before we start watching movies, Maggie sets out some candy
or cookies. Just generic movie snacks.However, since it was her favorite
movie that we were going to watch, we had to go all out. Before we got
settled in to watch the movie, Maggie was gathering snacks for us to eat.
She was listing off things like popcorn, Kit Kats, and cookies (the usual)
when she paused for a second, pulled out a box, and then looked at me
with a sparkle in her eye. She said the whole line with a British accent.
It took everything in me not to pat her on the head and praise her for
her efforts. Instead, I giggled and put the box on the counter with the
rest of the snacks. It’s times like these when you forget all of the super R
rated things she’s said and just look at her like a pure angel. That doesn’t
usually last very long though as soon after she reminds us why we’re afraid
to let her meet people.

his is only funny in retrospect since this happened in the moment
that ruined our semester for reasons completely unrelated to this
quote. We had decided to stay in the dorm and have fun on a Friday
night instead of going out to house parties like we normally would.
Because of the pandemic and how it was getting increasingly closer to
campus, we decided to stay safe and stay in the dorm. Of course, we
were playing music and everyone was drinking (except me because I’m
a little bitch when it comes to alcohol). The idea was to bring the party
home and do what we normally would if we were going out. We were
playing pong when we got a knock on the door. As is every college student’s
nightmare, it was Campo. He was coming to check about a noise complaint
and searched our rooms. He found some alcohol in our freezer and took
down all of our information. Since Ashley is 21, she took the blame for
the alcohol and said that none of the rest of us were drinking. That’s when
the officer looked at the rest of us and said this. It took everything in my
soul not to burst out laughing. Moments before, everyone was stumbling
and dancing wildly. It was incredibly obvious that they were, indeed,
not sober. Because of that moment, none of us got in trouble for the
alcohol. It just shows that through our years of going out to party and
having to walk back to our dorms through campus has trained us to act
sober when we really need to.

fter the incident that happened previously, we were all sent home
because I had an unauthorized visitor in the dorm that didn’t
go to our school. There were certain restrictions on who was allowed
on campus due to the pandemic and even though we weren’t having a
gathering, they didn’t care. They sent us all packing that night for two
weeks, or until or hearing (which actually ended up being three weeks).
Because of this, we were all scattered away from each other in our respective
homes. Since me and Ashley are best friends, it’s incredibly hard for
us to be apart, especially after three months of living in the same room.
We had gotten used to each other’s company and the sudden change was
really difficult to adjust to. Ashley would randomly text me everyday and
just talk about random stuff. In this instance, she had just started spam
texting me with messages about how she missed me and such; the usual.
I’m not even sure where the whole LB thing came from. There was no
train of thought leading there. Normally I can see where her thought
process came from but through all of the spam messages, none of them
fit together. It was like a puzzle with thirty different pictures put in one,
or like those photos where you can’t identify any of the objects in the photo.
I’m honestly still confused about it. I think the whole situation mixed
with our stress about school made us so much more crazy.

ay 5 of being separated. We have entered pun territory. Not a
good sign. The next stage will be cannibalism. Jokes aside, Ashley
and I really started feeling the distance. The random messages
started becoming more frequent and more grasping for something to
talk about that wasn’t our doomed futures. It’s hard going from breathing
the same air as your best friend everyday to being hundreds of miles away.
I think the hardest part is the distance. It’s not like we’re right down the
street from each other and we can just go over and see each other anytime
we want. It’s not even close enough to be a day trip. It’s so far, in fact,
that I would have to stay the weekend and only do it, like, once every
season. Just going up to school and back for breaks (when we had them)
takes a lot of planning and preparation. So, the fact that we both knew
that we wouldn’t be seeing each other for an indefinite amount of time
was really starting to sink in and make us crazy. I know I’m making this
sound incredibly dramatic under such a silly sentence, but that’s how it
felt. We were using our humor to cover up the uncertainty and sadness
and eventually we started reaching for jokes so hard that I feared that
we would break our backs from reaching before we could actually see
each other. To finally explain where this came from, I made a joke about
something being iconic. Ashley flipped what I said to compliment me
and simultaneously create the worst pun I’ve ever heard.

his quote comes from a text conversation in our group chat
for once. We don’t really use our group chat very often except
to send Tik Toks that pertain to the group or that everyone
would find funny, but I guess since we were all ripped apart we felt that
we needed to talk somehow. Someone brought up the topic of boys and
just revived the group chat. Since Maggie and Kalynn both basically have
boyfriends, I’m not sure why this was a group chat conversation, but I think
they were just chiming in for moral support or to express their laughter.
Me and Ashley were telling the group about the boys we had met on the
online dating app, Bumble (they will be referred to as “Bumble Boys”).
We kind of had this back and forth comparing different guys when Ashley
took the cake. She said that this boy that she matched with almost immedately
asked for her Venmo and would send her money for things that she
mentioned she was doing or just if he thought she needed some money.
Some examples would be shots at the bar or a caption with “to brighten
your day.” When you think of a sugar daddy, you normally think of the
old, rich, white guy, but in this case he was 23 and attractive. It was only
natural for her to question this in the most blunt way possible. It did seem
sketchy after all. She hasn’t talked about him since so I don’t think they’re
still talking, unfortunately. However, it still makes for a good quote to
put in here.

h man, I’m gonna start laughing again just writing about this one.
It’s one of those auto-correct fails that just are so out there and
completely not what you wanted to say. Me and Ashley were
talking about how this boy that I had been talking to was really nice
and sweet. I was describing every little thing that he’s done and said that
was really nice and how he treats me better than any other guy I’ve
talked to. I told her how he was coming to visit me even though I live
so far away. As I described before, it’s kind of a big deal to drive from
where they are to me or vice versa. Nobody had even ever visited me
before so it was an even bigger deal. She was giving him praise and since
I had pretty much filled her in on everything, I meant to say, “we stan
bumble boys,” which basically means that guys from Bumble are better
and we like them more than regular guys. Instead of saying that, I sent
“we stab bumble boys,” which is pretty much the complete opposite of
what I wanted to say. I immediately started laughing thinking my FBI
agent had flagged me in that instant and the SWAT team was going to
burst through my door for questioning at any moment. Through my
laughter I corrected myself and expressed how much I was laughing.
She sent back how much she was laughing as well and said, “watch out
bumble boys, u finna get mirked,” and I think it’s the funniest thing I’ve
ever read. I did, indeed, laugh through writing this whole paragraph.

his one might be kind of boring, but to me it’s really funny so
I’ll try my best to explain. They say a joke isn’t funny if you
have to explain it but it’s not a joke is it, Steve. Anyway, my
dad and I were talking about how credit cards work since I told him that
after college I wanted to go straight to buying a house instead of renting
since it was better and cheaper in the long run. When you buy a house,
especially when you’re a kid straight out of college, you’ll have to take
out a loan. To take out a loan, the bank has to check your credit score.
I told him that my credit score was really good, but it won’t go any higher
because I only have one credit card and I hadn’t had it for very long either.
This is when he said “your mom isn’t gonna like this, but you need to
get more credit cards.” For some background information, my mom
is extremely frugal and manages her money very well. She has always
expressed to me to be careful with credit cards because they could be
dangerous with the whole concept of borrowing money and interest if
you accidentally miss a payment. My dad, on the other hand, uses credit
all the time and uses the whole system to his advantage. He always has
Amazon packages coming to his house. Growing up, even though my
parents are divorced, they had never said anything along the line of
“your mom isn’t gonna like this,” or “don’t tell your mom I said this,” so
it’s just funny that the first time I heard it was in the context of money.

ogs are funny creatures. Even when I was getting my puppy
trained, the trainer had to make sure my puppy was okay with
all kinds of people since she was training to be an ESA/service dog.
Whether it be people with glasses, long hair, hats, different skin tones,
and genders, she had to be okay with all of them. Dogs are like kids in
that they have their preferences that they make very obvious and that
need to be trained out. With that being said, apparently these preferences
don’t only pertain to humans. My mom boards dogs and house-sits them
on the side. She basically just houses dogs when their parents are away
for several days at a time. Often, she’ll have multiple dogs at once in the
house since, for some reason, everyone travels at the same time, even if
it’s not a holiday. These dogs come in every color, breed, and size, kind
of like how I was describing humans earlier. In this case, she had one
white, teacup puppy, a white medium-sized dog, a black medium-sized
dog, and a yellow lab. She was telling me how the white dogs that she
was taking care of didn’t like the black one. Apparently they would bully
him and ignore him. She has a loud Texas voice so when she was telling
the story, it filled the air, but suddenly she stopped talking and leaned in.
In a hushed tone, she said this sentence and nodded to herself. She’s always
had this odd political humor, but in this case it was surprisingly funny.

e had gone several days without thinking about the fact that
we had gotten kicked out of the school. It had given us time
for the initial grief to wear off. We had almost started accepting
the situation when it had come to light that we could request to see the
report that the officer had filed regarding our incident. I didn’t really
care about what it said, as we were going to tell the truth about what
happened at the hearing anyway (with some slight adjustments). I suppose
Ashley wanted to see it, though. She sent the document into our group
chat with the message, “it makes a great read on this lovely monday
morning and goes nicely with a hot cup of joe. Recommended for all
ages who enjoy being enraged while reading their literature.” When I
read through it, it honestly didn’t seem that bad to me. It was unbiased
and didn’t exaggerate anything that had happened. If anything, it downplayed
the incident and helped us in the long run. I think just having
to relive the night while reading through it was what upset her. I was
pretty much at the point where I didn’t really care anymore and whatever
happens, happens. But, for them, it was their everything. Of course they
would be having strong emotions about the whole situation since they
had a strong desire to go back. So even though I wasn’t feeling their
frustrations or panic, I understood where they were coming from.

his quote is a recurring one. It’s honestly the theme of this semester.
We say it for minor inconveniences, like when there was a serial
cheeser at our dorm complex that threw single slices of cheese at
our door. Or when some boy at a party says something weird, we turn
to each other The Office style and just say, “I hate it here.” It can also
be said for major wrenches thrown in the plan of our lives. For example,
Ashley was in the middle of her senior thesis project and all of her fish died.
She had to order more and it wouldn’t come in for several weeks. In that
moment, she said this quote as well. Most of all, I think we all said it
when we got kicked out and we’ve said it the most since then. The school
has had some really questionable rules and policies set in place that no
other school is doing. They’re being unnecessarily harsh with the veil
that it’s for our safety, but there are too many inconsistencies for that to
be the case. The school is all about money. It’s always been about money.
These things only make sense if you look at it that way. Otherwise, everything
looks super unfair and slanted. I mean, think about it. They sent
four roommates home to four different houses when they were the only
ones “exposed” to the visitor. If they really cared about the spread of the
disease, they would have had us quarantine in the room until our hearing.
Instead, they sent us home. It’s things like that that really make us say,
“I hate it here.”

ere’s where the graphic designers come in. As art students, most
of us are wired a little differently. I know that I, for one, had to
have a parent-teacher conference in third grade because my teacher
said I was becoming the class clown. I’ve been called unique as a nice way
to tell me I’m a total weirdo. I’m okay with that stuff now that I know
that there are other people like me. We’re not the stuck up type of art
kids that are elitists and think we’re the best at everything. We all learn
from each other and take advice when it’s given. However, we all do
have wacky personalities. This is especially displayed in a group chat
in which we all talk about what’s due or anything that we’re confused
about from class. Since we’re juggling so many things, it’s easy to get
confused with the wording of assignments, or even a professor saying he
wants something turned in the next class but not having it in writing
anywhere. These things happen a lot. Sometimes, people bring up announcements
or invitations to do something together. In this instance,
someone was inviting us to an event and said, “be there or be square.”
It’s a common phrase that was said to be quirky and funny. However,
Jake one-upped this person in the quirky and funny department and
replied with this statement. It was so unexpected that I stared at my
phone for a minute and just giggled in awe. I don’t even know why I
was surprised because Jake always comes out with these types of statements
that are just so out of left-field it’s almost normal.

e have reached voting season. A scary time, indeed. My mom
and I both went to vote early since we didn’t know if I was going
back to school the next week or not. As we were walking to stand
in line, the people working the place advised us to stand six feet apart,
as was becoming the norm these days. I think we probably would have
stood six feet apart just from muscle memory even if we weren’t told to.
It just so happened that a nice, big, orange cone was about six feet behind
the people in front of us. As we were walking up to it I said, “hello cone,
you are now our friend.” The insanity was becoming real at this point.
I’m officially talking to cones now. After what happened next, I realized
where I got it from. My mom chuckled a little bit and I thought it was over.
Oh, how wrong I was. After a second, she looked right at the cone and
said this quote to it. I was incredibly embarrassed as, like I said before,
she has a loud Texas voice and the last thing I wanted was for someone
to be a Democrat around us and be offended. I hate upsetting people,
especially when it comes to politics. As I looked around to see if anyone
was giving us dirty looks, she questioned what I was doing. She laughed
when I told her and she scolded me for caring about what other people
thought. It was quite obvious that she didn’t since she kept yelling, “Trump
2020,” the whole way there and back in the car.

ake said something funny again. Are we surprised? No. This time,
we were playing Among Us, the most popular game to play at this
time since it was free on mobile and easy to play. The concept was
extremely simple and was basically glorified “Who Dunnit.” Since I was
home, I figured I would take advantage of this time and try to start up
my streaming career. I have this really nice PC, why not use it, right?
Streaming can be kind of hard when you basically have to talk to yourself
when you can’t talk to others. A way to relieve this weirdness is to talk to
the people who are watching you through the chat. Since nobody else
was streaming, I could read and interact with my chat during the game.
However, even though I had a few people watching, nobody was talking
to me. During the game, I mentioned something about how my chat
wasn’t very active and it made it lonely when we had to mute. Jake asked
if I was streaming. I guess he missed the part in the beginning where I
said that I would be streaming so please don’t say anything that will get
me cancelled. I told him I was and he got all excited and said this quote.
Even though I could only hear him, I could see his face and his demeanor
in my mind as he said it. There was pure joy behind his words that was
so wholesome it’ll be one of my favorite things I’ve heard while playing.
It’ll at least be the most memorable. I mean it’s going in writing forever
to be read in my family for generations to come.

fter I was officially exiled from campus and forced to stay home,
I decided that wasn’t going to stop me from having fun. In my
willful mind, I would make the five hour trip back to school every
weekend for some reason or another and just crash with someone off
campus. This actually wasn’t the plan, but it happened to work out that
way. I had to gather my things the first weekend, forgot something important
the next, and then got invited to formals the next two weekends
after that. However, to make it sound like I was doing this in spite to
get back at the school, we’ll pretend that I decided at the moment they
told me I couldn’t come back that I would anyway. During my visit one
weekend, I had to stop by the dorm since I left something important
before a party. This was, of course, not allowed and if I got caught I
would be in an incredible amount of trouble but it’s all about the thrill,
right? I’m having my rebellious teen stage in my 20’s. As I was gathering
my things, Maggie was also getting ready for the same party. We were
chatting about the regular stuff as we were both running around trying
not to run into each other in the process. When I had what I needed, I
did one more check around to make sure I wasn’t forgetting anything else.
Before I left, I turned to Maggie and said “Bye, see you never.” Her
response was this quote and we laughed before I walked out the door.

You’ve made it to the end of the book! Thank you for reading the craziness
that was this semester. It was a wild ride to live through and I hope that
shows throughout these little windows of quotes. Since I wrote this book,
my roommates have read it to look over it and they had a great time
reliving the moments in page form. I hope this book will be a great
artifact to look through for years to come!
33

Warning:
Explicit Content