Fear and Loathing on the Learning Curve: Observations on Life, Tech and Web Design from a Slightly Misanthropic Mind

One Down…

Strange feel­ings on this June after­noon. Having been home since Saturday, I’m still try­ing to shift out of the stu­dent paradigm, and face up to the real­it­ies of being short on cash, return­ing to the Old Job, and still hav­ing innu­mer­able tasks to take care of.

Saturday was weird (as was Friday Night: Stoned Adventures in the UV Room, but that’s another story). My “I’m pretty sure I could tear this whole room down in 2 hours” con­tin­gency turned, pre­dict­ably, into real­ity (as tends to hap­pen when large amounts of alco­hol are imbibed instead of pack­ing), so I got up around 7am and, break­fast­less for the fourth con­sec­ut­ive day, wandered over to cam­pus to retrieve my car. I arrived back just in time to see Josh and Andrea off to catch their red-eye out of Birmingham, and then I had the place to myself.

And thus began the pack­ing up of the last year of my life which had, like a giant uncoil­ing spring, gradu­ally spread itself in increas­ing depth across the room. The posters alone took about an hour to take down, so need­less to say by the time my father arrived I was not too far in to the task. I man­aged to rustle up some cof­fee, and in true boy-scout style he man­aged to loc­ate what must have been the last edible breakfasty-type food in the kit­chen: four bur­ger buns. In about two hours we packed the rest of my stuff, and man­aged to fit that — and the assor­ted crap I had kindly agreed to take for my flat­mates — into his and my cars.

Walking down those hall­ways for the last time — to drop off my keys — felt utterly strange. The place had become com­pletely dehu­man­ized — every­one else had left; no more strange cook­ing smells eman­at­ing from the flats, no more strange sounds from behind closed doors. I sol­emnly checked our mail­box for the last time, dropped my keys into the des­ig­nated box, and that was it. So long, Lakeside. Never again shall I run scream­ing down your cor­ridors in the dead of night; no more shall I scar your walls with uni­cycle, foot­ball and diabolo; no more shall I explode beer cans in your bathrooms.

It was a nasty feel­ing to say the least. From this point on we are out on our own, no more under­paid clean­ing staff to clear up the big bits after our scream­ing, vomit­ing, bottle-smashing pas­sage, no more reg­u­lar linen change, bath­room clean, safe haven by the water. It’s up to us next year, God help us.