I suppose this is what I get for being old and grumpy and living in dorms at my age and trying to squash the indomitable spirits of those younger and more carefree than I. But is it really too much to ask that people not put foil in the microwave and then operate said microwave? Failing that, would it hurt them to do this in the daytime, instead of at three-thirty in the morning?
Fuck. Hit submit too soon.
This place has a history of fire-alarm related shenanigans. There was the little group, the first semester I was here, who thought it hilarious to pull the fire alarms about three in the morning every day of finals week. There was the person last year who stuffed a washer far beyond capacity, causing some sort of motor burnout and a nasty smell for days. And as always, there are the ten-minute popcorn microwavers and foil users.
I loved the dorms.
Except for the fire alarms.
The dorm I lived in had fire alarms a couple times a month, and then every so often we’d have a flare-up of every night for three or four nights (at, oh, anywhere from 2-4 in the morning). People stopped leaving for the alarms, so then they started checking every room before letting us back in. In a dorm of nearly 1,000 people. In December and January.
Another fun thing was the night when half of campus lost power for a few hours. I sat in my RA’s room playing board games with him, his girlfriend, and another friend of his. It was fun, especially with the combination of flashlight and the fire-alarm strobe that went off automatically when the power cut out.
I have a little sympathy for you, but not much. I had some great times in the dorms doing stupid shit.
Oh, there are lots of fun things that go on in the dorms. Just not the fire alarms.
It was rather amusing seeing everyone’s three-thirty in the morning states of dress and undress.
The culprits were the ones standing closest to the building, loudly discussing that no one ever told them not to put foil in the microwave.
The fun part of fire alarms in the dorms I lived in were the overnight weekend alarms - the ones after people had been out drinking and managed to hook up…well, you got to find out who hooked up with who (and this was a small college, so you mostly knew people by sight if not always by name).
The worst thing about them was when they happened in January or February - in Maine.
We only had the alarms go off twice last year, and one time it wasn’t so bad, aside from the wind and the rain. It was about 11pm, and we were being hit by a hurricane, so they ushered us all into the dining hall. Where people proceeded to fix themselves snacks. We eventually got let back into the dorm.
Later that night, the alarm went off in another building. Those people got dumped into our building for the night. Except for the top floor. They unhooked the alarm and stayed up there all night. Bet they had a great laugh when the bathroom window got sucked out.
I still have sympathy though. The other time the alarm went off it was a bit later, a bit after midnight, and I had been asleep. Woke up, grabbed my glasses, shoes, and housecoat in the dark, then went outdoors. I really did not want to be outdoors at that time of night, I wanted to be upstairs asleep. So we got let back in, I go back upstairs to my room…and find myself locked out :smack: At this point in the year I was still locking my door at night, and in my half-awake departure, keys had never crossed my mind. So I had to wait for our don to get back up there so she could let me in.
You know what, I don’t have a lot to complain about. Just about any mischief that went on was good to laugh at. Except the birthday party on the first floor in September. With a live band. I pity the people in the basement that night. (I still laughed at them when they got fined though. The people holding the party, not those trying to sleep downstairs)
Last year I got caught in the shower during a fire alarm. I started a thread about it. My next door neighbor’s boyfriend was definitely ogling me, as I remember it. Creepy.
Well, we brought our own microwave (Shhh! Don’t tell my RA [It’s hidden under a table with a sheet draped over it… apparently during room checks they can’t come into our room, just look in it. ]) and the fire alarms haven’t gone off yet, but… umm… there are people who golf on our floor. Our floor is not a golf course. They don’t understand that. At least once a day, they’ll go out there with putters and hit the ball down the hall and run after it screaming and whoo isn’t this fun?
My roommate and I went down to dollar tree and got some 1 dollar plastic putters and balls and went out there and made fun of them, but they didn’t get it :smack:… they thought we wanted to play. This was the night after they were out there at 11pm (everything’s supposed to shut down so people can sleep at 10 pm…) golfing… I took my biggest hardcover book and threw it down on the ground twice yelling “Wow! I like making noise so people can’t sleep!!!” in the hallway (it’s tiled)
I really enjoyed the general chaos of the dorms except for the late night fire alarms. I simply don’t understand why the idiots who do this think it’s funny to wake everyone up in the middle of the night.
“Ha ha! You’re tired!”
After two and a half weeks at U. Pitt…
Six days until half our floor got busted for drinking, in the dorms, with the door open, at one AM. Our RA was in there with them up until someone, two floors above, complained about the noise. Then he went to the elevator to head off the RD and buy them a few minutes to clean up, and they still managed to get caught. I hear of all this when I come down from four floors up, where I could hear something, and find a girl signed in by one of them hiding in my room, trying to talk my roommate into stealing the original signer’s ID so he can sign her out.
And the first power outage here, two weeks to the day after I get here, comes right after midnight on a weekday. I have a flashlight on my desk, so I’m the only person on my floor who can find theirs, and I get to hold it for all the half-naked people who need help finding theirs. Then, after about 20 minutes, once I’ve gotten around to joking about going looting, a fire alarm goes off.
Most of the restraunts here are 1/2 off from 11PM-2AM, but they close at midnight (follow that logic, if you can). The exception is The Original Hotdog Shop, which just seems to never close, but since everyone else figured that out, it took about half an hour to take advantage of the situation. Luckily for me, it took about two and a half hours for the dorm to start letting kids back in.
Overall, it’d come out not-bad if it weren’t for the fact that it left me with four hours to sleep before my first class.
Well at least people aren’t starting fires all the time, and then the alarm is pulled when someone on the top floor notices the smoke smell.
This happened to me. I lived in an apartment building and every Sunday between 5 and 6 someone would start a fire by dropping something that was lit down the garbage chute. Sometimes they would wait until the fire trucks had left and do it again.
Well, that stinks. Not as badly as being forced by university policy to live in a $500/month dorm when $150/month apartments are available 2 blocks away, but that’s pretty bad.
That does stink way more, chaparralv8. I’m just whiny.
Graduation cannot come soon enough.
You have $150/month aprtments where you live!?!?!?!
I’ve never heard of such a thing! Wow!
ZJ
Huh. We’ve yet to have any fire alarms in my dorm, and I’m not complaining.
On the other hand, my window looks straight out into the courtyard, so I either shut the window, close the blinds, and don’t get distracted, or leave it open and don’t melt.
Also, the drunk people on the balcony of the building right across the (tiny) courtyard at 3 AM don’t understand “Guys, can you shut up? I’m trying to sleep.”
Oh! U Pitt?
Ever live in the Copper Top Dorms (aka Towers)?
Those miserable hell holes of insanity, involving living on floors the elevator did not go to, and the ridiculous inability to put anything in a corner.
And then there was Lothrop, the old ass building with elevators that broke daily.
The security guards, who more than once gave me a hard time about a guest…
I loved Pitt, but I hated their dorms.
Why couldn’t you put things in the corners?
Our elevators break down about twice a week, down from a high of every other day. I live on the fifth floor because I am an idiot. All these stairs should be great exercise.
You people get/got elevators? There are no elevators in any of the dorms here, just stairs. Though I suppose the tallest dorm is only like four stories, but still. No elevators.
The elevators at my school get used for laundry and luggage, as they go as fast as the stairs. And really, that shouldnt’ be plural. There’s five Bays, which are four-floor staircases with four rooms and a bathroom on each floor. No elevators there. There’s also the female res, where the elevator only goes up to the third floor, and those on the forth have to take the fire escape to their rooms. (And the elevator shut down at a certain time each night. But that’s a rant for another day).
Then there’s Angel’s Roost, which is the top floor of the Arts & Administration building. There is an elevator in that building, but like the one in the girl’s dorm, it only goes up to the third floor…and lands you in the middle of the journalism school.
I got my exerise last year, and I will again this year. I have close friends one the top floor of three of the bays and the female res. Plus I’m living off campus. I’ll have buns, legs, and thighs of steel by the end of this year. At least my apartment building has an elevator worth using