There used to be an old 'Ren and Stimpy' skit where one cowboy says, "I'm bored" to which the other responds "You smart enough to be bored?" and I have been thinking about that lately--are we? Are we smart enough to know when we are no longer entertaining ourselves but rather just following an old routine or an old habit? Do we have the consciousness to make such a decision? I think it takes a concerted effort, no doubt. I guess this has come to the forefront of my thoughts because of the repetetion of weekend activities in college. No one ever seems to do anything new or interesting. There are always keg parties with the same bad beer, same games of beer pong, same songs on the stereo, same drunken conversations; same outcomes to the same actions. Rare are the students who dare to challenge that with alternative avenues. I had a good friend who lived near me last year who was fantastic at it; she knew where all the local artists/bands were playing, knew all the people downtown and elsewhere and could make the weekends a time for exploring rather then for complacency. Now I know many feel that the parties are always entertaining and always different but I can almost guarentee that they are either a junior or younger and that they are most certainly under 21. Not to be elitest, but by the fourth year of it the redudency becomes sickenly obvious and the option to go elsewhere under the might of 21 has its draws.
So why aren't people going elsewhere? Why aren't more students finding the open mikes, the tiny karaoke bars, the blues bands in smokey bars, the traveling troubadours at the coffee houses? Laziness? Fear? I don't know. Maybe it takes too much energy to search out the fun rather than take what's spoon fed. I just don't want to regret missing all the facinating opportunities that this place might have to offer because I was simply too caught up in the little shallow song and dance of the rager scene.
