What’s up Class of 2023? We know you’re all excited to enter the Orange Bubble and begin your new lives as Princeton students. Obviously, you’ve got a lot to learn, so we’ve put together a little schedule to show what the average school day looks like around here. With very few exceptions, this is what every single day looks like for every single student.
9:00 A.M: Wake up to the sound of your roommate’s back getting blown out. Give a half-hearted wave to the half-dressed lacrosse player.
10:00 A.M: Get on an elliptical in the Stephens Fitness Center next to an octogenarian who is impossibly more ripped than you. Check your phone. There’s an e-mail. Your funk band didn’t get the gig. God damn it. Not again. You can’t bear to deliver the bad news to the guys.
11:00 A.M: Introductory Econ lecture. You get some excellent doodling done and even the professor compliments it.
12:00 P.M: Lunchtime! Head on down to Lake Carnegie and catch some fresh trout. There is nothing else to eat.
1:30 P.M: You’ve got an hour before classes. Get in your room and take off your backpack to the sound of your roommate’s back getting blown out. Give a half-hearted wave to the half-dressed Anthro professor.
2:30 P.M: A humanities precept. Your class spends the whole time ripping a 70-year-old journal article for its outdated gender politics. They make some really good points, and you’re too embarrassed to admit you wrote the article.
3:30 P.M: COS 126 – Computer Science: An Interdisciplinary Approach.
4:30 P.M: Go to Whig Hall, and tell all your troubles to the floor-to-ceiling portrait of Woodrow Wilson. He responds, giving tough love and constructive advice, unless you are a student of color, in which case he scowls and mutters about miscegenation until you leave.
6:00 P.M: Dinner time! Head on down to the Whitman dining hall and have some Cracklin’ Oat Bran. There is nothing else to eat.
7:30 P.M: Writing Seminar. The professor knows his section was no one’s first choice and spends the whole hour apologizing.
9:00 P.M: “Funkee Dialektik” practice: a few minutes in you break down and tell everyone you didn’t get the gig. The next couple hours are spent weeping, holding each other, and drinking some sour Chanukah beer your dad gave you.
11:45 P.M: You’ve arrived at “The Street.” Go to one of the eating clubs that’s rejecting people at the door, like Ivy or Campus. When you get to the front of the line, a bouncer may ask to see a pass, or if your name is on the list. Just inform him that you’re really really cool and he should let you in. If that doesn’t work, try getting belligerent.
3:00 A.M: Time for bed: stagger into your room to the sound of your roommate’s back getting blown out. Give a half-hearted wave to your half-dressed mom. Go to sleep.
And that’s your standard day at Princeton! Go forth, and tell your roommate I said hi.
-NP ’21