Nothing screams “self-loathing” quite like choosing to live in Southside for the third year in a row. But it’s not all that bad, although maybe I’m just saying that because I never leave. I swear I’m returning to a primitive amoeba-like state now that all my classes are virtual. We’re only three weeks in and already I’m going crazy. The only time I leave my suite is to pick up my weekly Connections soup, left in a small package at my door by either my neighbor or whoever I bullied into doing it via the WRUR Discord server.

What doesn’t help my slowly creeping insanity is that every night, around 12:16 a.m., the person living above me drops a pen on the floor.

Of course, this seems very small and insignificant, and I don’t technically know that it’s a pen either. But despite all logic, THIS is the main culprit of my fury. Not the sludge that continues to leak from my ceiling onto my toothbrush. Not the light switch that turns back on if you push it down too far. Not the noise of the elevator that sounds like a gremlin moaning (from pain or pleasure I’m still not sure). No. The pen that drops above my head and taps across the floor every night. THAT is what drives me loony.

And apparently, the person living above my suitemate’s room ALSO does this, but it occurs around her bedtime, 11:12 p.m.

So what’s the deal? Is it code? Are the two suitemates living above us communicating? Are they competing to see who can make the person below them psychotic first? Do people even live above us? Is it all in our heads? Maybe there’s something in the Southside water.

The noises have gotten weirder lately too! I mean last night it sounded like they had snuck a six-footed elephant into their room (Hey! No guests allowed!), given it a jar of peanut butter, only to find out it had a nut allergy, and rushed to find its EpiPen as it wheezed and crashed to the floor.

I would LOVE to know what is happening up there, but like I said, I don’t leave my room and that floor is completely off-limits. So I guess I’ll never find out. 

But still, it’s really f***ing annoying.



Mystery upstairs: What’s that noise?

As is tradition for the University of Rochester Campus Times, I’m going to take advantage of this Spring’s first print edition to introduce myself and to update all of you on our goals for this coming semester. Read More

Mystery upstairs: What’s that noise?

A new dining option for Southwestern cuisine has come to campus, as announced in a URochester dining Instagram post at the beginning of the semester.  “Fresh. Fast. Flavorful. These aren’t just words; they are the standard our team is ready to set,” the Instagram post read.  The establishment, named Blue Cactus, sells Southwestern quesadillas, burritos, […]

Mystery upstairs: What’s that noise?

This creates a dilemma. If we only mandate what is easy for companies to implement, emissions keep rising. If we pretend everything can be decarbonized quickly, climate policy collapses under its obvious failures. A serious approach has to accept two tenets at once: we need full decarbonization everywhere that it is possible, and  we need honest promises from sectors where it is not. Read More