Princeton Places

May 6, 2004

Self portrait

Frank O’Hara writes a poem about why he’s not a painter, and in it he writes a poem called “Oranges” with no orange. So I’ll write a self portrait without myself. I’ll write instead about what I like: the opera, … Read More

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Whitman College: The College Years

So apparently they’re making a TV show about Whitman College, the new four-year residential college projected to open in 2006.

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June 8th, 1973

On the last day of classes at Forest Hills High, Ernest Acherbaum is finally ready. A group of students from his senior class plans to travel to Rockaway Beach as soon as the last bell rings, where they will play volleyball and coo over their yearbooks and smoke into the night.

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Ten Rules to Live by in the Trustees Room of Firestone Library

1. Always substitute the uncomfortable wooden chair at your table for one of the more comfortable computer chairs.

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Stephens Fitness Center

So it is cozy. You might say small. Or even absurdly tiny.
And it is busy. Teeming, if you prefer. Perhaps you stand a greater chance of being struck by lightning while clutching a winning lottery ticket and barebacking flying swine than eyeing an open elliptical machine during peak hours.

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Legacy

I walked into the University chapel with a group of white-haired men in blue suits. I paused in front of an usher who wore a nametag with an orange and black ribbon pinned to it: Somers K. Steelman ’54. I extended my hand for a program. He looked at my unbrushed hair, sweatshirt, jeans, and flip flops.

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To Be Held in Place

Two test panels, perhaps six feet tall by four feet wide, one of argillite, one of Wissahickon schist, stare blankly over the rubble of the torn up tennis courts just south of Dillon Gym. They prefigure the coming radical transformation of this open space, which, before it was covered with tennis clay, was landscaped as football and then baseball fields, but which has never before been built upon.

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Verbatim

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Overherad at Frist Late Meal

Student: Hi...
Frist Employee: (nothing)
Student: So whats the sauce on that chicken?
Frist Employee: Well I don't know...maybe its chocolate.
Student: Chocolate? I'll take my chances.

Overheard on IM

Guy #1: Is there an obnoxious party going on up there...I hear Britney Spears?
Guy #2: By obnoxious party do you mean a high schooler performing unspeakable acts on me?

Overheard at Frist

Mrs. Gilliespie's 5th Grade Clase, PS. 174.

Mrs. Gilliespie: Now class, here is the student center of Princeton. Look at all the interesting quotes on the wall!
Kid 1: What the fuck are we doing here?
Kid 2: Hey, look that one has a pocket protector!
Kid 1: If our teacher wasn't here I would kick the shit out of that kid over there.
Kid 2: That kid actually has a rolling backpack.
Kid 3: Wow, it's like a nerd safari.

Overheard in the Nassau Weekly’s Inbox

Re[2]: XX3NICAL__ CI@_LiS__ ULTR@M__ F0RIC3T__ V1AGR0__ TR_AM_AD0L and more!! N0 Pr1or PRESCR!PT!ON Needed...

Is this a dagger which I see before me, The handle toward my hand?
Come, let me clutch thee! I have thee not, and yet I see thee still.
Art thou not, fatal vision, sensible To feeling as to sight? or art thou but A dagger of the mind, a false creation Proceeding from the heat-oppressed brain? I see thee yet, in form as palpable As this which now I draw.

http://thesemeds.com/

My people too were scared with eerie sounds, A footstep, a low throbbing in the walls. A noise of falling weights that never fell,
Weird whispers, bells that rang without a hand, Door-handles turn'd when none was at the door, And bolted doors that open'd of themselves;
And one betwixt the dark and light had seen Her, bending by the cradle of her babe.

Overheard in Blair

Girl: And he was like, 'Blah blah blah Cottage.' And then he was like, 'Blah blah blah baseball.' And then he took his pants off.