…and your dhall, JCR, basement area near the gym, etc. where everyone has infiltrated and converted into a library in order to “study.” (YES, THERE WAS ACTUALLY A DUDE STUDYING ON AN AN ABANDONED DESK IN THE BASEMENT OF OUR HOUSE GYM. I see you.)Studying for finals at our elitist Ivy League institution is so hard, ya’ll.

Someone’s VES thesis was a graphic novel. 1. Who is this person? 2. How do I meet them? 3. Why the hell am I in Gov? FML

(Source)

Last Friday, I had the honor of seeing such thesis and the wonderwoman who created it in person. As part of Dunster House’s Senior Theses Series, Mariah Bush, a senior VES concentrator, presented in front of a 20-odd person audience Elite, a graphic novel about a group of elite superheroes that was inspired by her time at Harvard. (We would inspire a superhero story, what with our fighting Gov, Math, five thousand extracurriculars and a horrifyingly non-existent dating culture at the same time. Duh.)

After a good 10 minutes struggling with the JCR door, I finally managed to get in by realizing that I was, in fact, supposed to pull. Just in time to see someone take the last piece of Finale dessert. Great. But I digress.

Usually, a thesis isn’t the kind of stuff that generates excitement. Conan O’Brien wrote a thesis during his senior year at Harvard concerning the use of children as symbols in the works of William Faulkner and Flannery O’Connor. In his words, “nobody is ever going to care.” That is perhaps putting it a little too harshly. But as I stood outside of Dunster JCR and saw a guy presenting his research project on a bug-eyed insect, I felt like going home (or more precisely, back to my comfy chair in Lamont, where I was cramming for my HAA 1 final the next day).  I’m sure it is all hard work that might potentially turn into something monumental, but it definitely isn’t the stuff I would joyfully jump out of my Lamont chair the night before a final exam and take a shuttle to see. (But I’m also a humanities nerd who’s too lazy to walk to Annenberg, let alone Dunster House, so what do I know?)

(Image: Mariah Bush ’10 with her senior thesis, Elite – A Graphic Novel)

Read the rest of this entry »

Noice presents the first installment of its “Diary of A…” series.

12:45 a.m. – I think I have had at least twelve cups of coffee and successfully checked my Facebook more than I have showered this week in the span of an hour. I had to move out of the café because there was this study group there talking about how they found Zimbabwean money in their pockets this morning and then all I could think about was Zimbabwe and realized that, that had nothing to do with a paper on Virginia Woolfe. So, now I’m sneaking this cup of coffee upstairs.

1:17 a.m. – Oh my God, I swear the chairs on the third floor are laced with Ambien. I immediately nod off when I sit down in them. This is not going to work. Coffee I.V. anyone? Invent that. This is Harvard damn it. It’s times like these where I can’t decide if I should just go watch eight hours straight of A&E’s Intervention to feel better about my life in that I’m not snorting cocaine off of an elephant’s tusk or simply get into the zone and do some actual work. There is a kid across from me right now with a blanket and pillow. He’s in here for the long haul. I think I see food in his bag. Real breakfast of champions right there. Read the rest of this entry »