..."F**k!" It might even be fun.
Okay, so yesterday we received our calendar of furlough days, and it reminded me of this story (which my friend the Piper Ph.D. will recognize, and correct me on details, if necessary): Grad school friend D. and his wife C. were in their 50s by the time we met in grad school, so they had already had a whole 'nother life by then, one that seemed to involve a lot of partying. When they were in their 30s, they and a group of their friends had the custom of getting together once a year out in the toolies for what they called the "Other Games," a sort of Olympics of bizzare, often antisocial, and likely very inebriated competitions.
One of these was the "Yelling 'F**k!' Competition." The participants would sit around together, and take turns saying "F**k." Each person had to say it louder and/or longer than the last, and the one who did so loudest/longest was, by acclaim, the winner. D. told us that everybody was pretty much hoarse the following day.
Even better than the competition itself is its origin story. Apparently the originator grew up spending a lot of time with his near-deaf granny. He and his brother made a game of sitting at the breakfast table, each saying "g*ddammit", starting off as a whisper, but getting progressively louder. The loser of this two-person competition was the one who said it loudly enough that granny finally heard and smacked him on the head.
Anyway, it occurred to me yesterday that a "Yelling 'F**k!' Competition" might be just the thing for tough budgetary times like these. We could invite faculty, staff, and students, and gather on the quad to vent our frustration. Maybe we could even give the winner an "I [heart] [your dysfunctional school or state here]" t-shirt...
8 comments:
I <3 this.
Forget the tough budgetary times, it would be an awesome stress reliever at the end of a semester. Faculty vs. Students vs. Staff; elimination rounds, until each team has a winner. The winners then face off for the F**K ULTIMATE DEATHMATCH - 1 faculty vs 1 student vs 1 staff. Winner gets bragging rights and a cheap trophy. Anyone who is offended or thinks it is too silly can just stay home :P
My college in fact had a ritual primal scream at the end of each semester. No competition, just hundreds of college students screaming at once during finals.
I like the grandmother story: it gives that objective edge to the decibel-measurement.
When I was in grad school, my medieval history seminar was a peculiar form of torture. (Cross a history grad seminar with law school and latin drill sergeant and you have a sort of idea) We learned that a student a few years ahead of us had dealt with this seminar by going home and typing F**K over and over again. And, in the days before computers, she'd fill one or two pages. It would have been physically very satisfying!
I love everything about this post other than the fact that you're having to go through the furlough stuff. I am hoping that my tenure year won't be an occasion for a continual, solo shouting f**k contest.
*Yelling*, not shouting. Yelling.
Yep, that's pretty much how I remember the story. Perhaps you could score an invite to the real "Other Games" and actually participate? I think that with your strong motivation, you'd have a good shot at winning!
M
This is hilarious. And shouting is probably healthier than pouring a martini, which is how I sometimes like to deal with the nastiest sources of academic stress.
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