you've gotta be kidding me

To avoid having to pay the extra $.25 for laundry (and the fact that 3 washing machines for the whole building just isn't enough), my friends and I have a laundry ritual that involves dragging (or driving, really) all of our dirty clothes and washing them in the dorms. I mean, with laundromat-like facilities and a washing machine price that's a whole $.25 less than our machines, it's just more convenient.

Anyways, we underwent one of these laundry rituals the other day. Everything seemed normal, we had some unsuspecting student open the doors for us to the building and later into the laundry room, we put our laundry in, and basically chilled there for the complete 106 minutes that comprised the washing machine and drying time.

(Get to the punch line!)

Yeah, ok. So, this kid enters the room, walks up to one of the washers and dryers (they're a single unit with the dryers on top), and opens both doors of the machine. After a second of speculation, the kid looks up at us and asks us "so what do I do now?" A little shocked at first, we hesitated to answer, and confirmed that he wanted to dry the clothes that had just finished the wash cycle. We explained to him that he had to put the clothes in the dryer. So he did so. His next question shocked us even more: he asked if he should close the door to the dryer. We were of course friendly and understanding about the whole situation, and naturally assumed he was a a freshman learning to do laundry on his own for the very first time. We then asked him to confirm that. but the answer was even more shocking: he was actually a second year.

Let me warn you that from this point on, it gets worse.

Um, ok, so how did he do laundry all his first year? He told us his mom comes over every couple of weeks to do his laundry. Not only that, his mom lives two hours away. TWO HOURS. He told us he thinks it helps keep their relationship together or something.

SERIOUSLY?

I dunno. I think cases like that just epitomizes all the stereotypes that college students (regardless of book smarts) are still helpless little children whose parents baby them and who are incapable of taking care of themselves on their own. I mean, I've run into extreme cases before (I heard once of a student calling their landlord once so he would change the lightbulb for them), but this is up there. If it's one thing I've learned, it's that alot of students are smart, but they're not intelligent. They're learned, but they're not bright. Well, most of them aren't anyway. Now, I may not be smart enough to be at the top of my class or to have intelligent conversations about global economics in a post 9/11 world, but I'm glad I've got some common sense in me.

Parents, teach your kids to take care of themselves. Teach them how to do laundry, teach them how to change light bulbs, teach them that they should shower daily or at least enough so their roommates won't put a petri dish in their bed to attract fungus for their microbiology class(and successfully grow said fungus).

"Kids, if you really wanna piss off your parents, buy real estate in an imaginary place."
-Imaginary Places - Busdriver