I don't have time for this update.

That statement should be made abruptly and matter-of-factly, à la Collin, also known as Collin (column) Space. I'm not taking math this quarter, but you can attribute that geeky moniker to half my hallmates. Anyway, there exists a story of how this statement has been rendered—to West Wingers, at least—a completely inoffensive statement. Amidst the strident peals of the fire alarm last month, Collin was still concentrating on his paper. When everyone else finally realized what was going on and began filing downstairs, calling to him that there was a fire, he responded, "I don't have time for this," and returned to his paper. Eventually, though, they managed to coax him out of his chair.

So, I don't have time for much communication. Online conversations with most people have devolved into a standard
      "hey, how's it going?"
      "it's going. how 'bout you?"
      "yeah, it's going."
In fact, you do have much to say about the trials and tribulations of the end of the quarter/semester. It's just that, since, noone has enough time to fully develop an idea or listen to one be developed, we're all better off not initiating any real conversation in the first place. Sad, sad. I guess that's the main reason why I can't wait for break: so everyone can snap out of this Academic Automaton state and retrieve their personalities.

It's just past five am now. Ridiculously late nights are a fact of adolescent life, I suppose, though some take it to unhealthy levels. There's a not insignificant population here who regularly turn to No-Doz. At Stern, PepsiCo recently held a massive free giveaway of its new energy drink AMP. Now, this doesn't scare me because it's a selling-out representative of this school, since anyone smart enough to enroll here but dumb enough to be brainwashed by a slick advertising or publicity campaign deserves to be so. Nope, the real reason is that it's rumored to have been banned by the NCAA. This, of course, may be false, but they very fact that this rumor has been perpetrated is even possible is kinda freaky.

I'm awake right now because I chemically independently can. These substances scare me; I prefer the organic alternative: H2O. The idea is to drink enough water to fill your bladder to uncomfortable extremes, keeping you awake and more than fulfilling your daily hydration quota at the same time. It's a highly-recommended practice which hasn't yet failed me since the beginning of senior year, and I don't forsee it doing so in the near future. If I finish off this last bottleful, I'll have marked 6 liters in the last 8 hours. Yummy.