History of Drugs: Part I

Something that was passed around in the lab on a holiday card, proving my ultimate association to geekiness.

Patient: Doctor, I'm in pain.
1000 B.C. Doctor: Eat this root.
250 A.D. Doctor: That root is heathen. Say this prayer.
1700 A.D. Doctor: That prayer is superstition. Take this vial.
1900 A.D. Doctor: That potion is snake-oil. Smoke this powder.
1950 A.D. Doctor: That powder is addictive. Take this pill.
1990 A.D. Doctor: That pill is not efficacious. Take this bioengineered drug.
2000s A.D. Doctor: That drug is artificial. Eat this root.

Luckily, alcohol is the drug of choice this season. Happy holidays!

In Mourning for Mr. Plow

Apparently the best way to prepare for a Nor'easter in Boston is to let out every student and government worker at 2pm on the main roads and highways...right before the snow plows and salt trucks are on the road. Let's just say it was quite exciting watching cars not move on Boylston Street for three hours. The old-timer New Englanders, who've been here for years, just simply didn't go to work or send their kids to school and stayed at home. They've gotten used to the idea that it is not going to stop snowing right away.

I'm finished with exams, but since every form of frozen precipitation has fallen in the past 96 hours, it's obvious Mother Nature wants me to celebrate indoors. And like any normal American, I say to her "Screw you" and venture outdoors to take pictures while doing errands like grocery shopping (was sober) or exploring the Transcendentalist quality of snow falling (was drunk.)


On my street in South End:


At Harvard's main quad:


The Massachusetts State House:


Boston Common:


Union Park:

Analogize

I said, "Great, I'm going back to the kingdom of the blind as the one-eyed man."
Nick said, "Well, if you want I could poke out your other eye."
I said, "Uh, I need that eye to be king. The point is I don't want to go back to the kingdom of the blind."
Nick said, "Why not? You could tell them you have two eyes. Better yet, three eyes. They're blind, they can't tell!"
I said, "Wouldn't they brand me as a witch or something with the three eyes."
Nick said, "They're blind, what can they do?"
I said, "Yeah, the forming of the lynch mob with pitch forks and torches would be hard to organize."
Nick said, "They'd probably grab a lot of brooms...

Seven Ivy Leagues in Search of a Sense of Humor

At the Harvard Coop
JL: "Excuse me, do you know if any of the houses sell their own Harvard t-shirts?"
Sales Representative #1: "No, no, all of the official Harvard merchandise comes through us. None of the houses have their own shirts unless it's a special discount from the COOP. It simplifies the process."
JL: ( in sotto voce )"Yeah, getting rid of imaginative houses does simplify things."

At the Harvard Shop
JL: "Do you have any Harvard shirts with the logo that are funny?"
(Blank expression from girl at counter. Looks to guy stocking hoodies)
Guy:"Sorry, I don't think so. We're very sober here."
JL: "Nothing? Nothing like 'If it were easy, it'd be Yale'?"
Girl: "That statement's true, how is it funny?"

At Hidden Sweets, also in Cambridge, MA
JL: "Are there any funny Harvard shirts here?" JML
Sales Representative #2: "Harvard? Nah? But we got alot of funny Boston shirts, like one that's says 'Wicked Pissah'"
JL: "But none from Harvard?"
Sales Representative #2: "Don't think so."
JL: "How about a Harvard shirt that's spelled Hahvahd?
Sales Representative #2: "How's that different from its regular spelling?
JL: "No, with like h's for the r's."
Sales Representative #2: "Oh yeah, we did have shirts like those, but we ran out of them."
JL: "Any time you might get them back in stock?"
Sales Representative #2: "Probably not. We got them that way cause the printer made a mistake."
JL: (Runs out and gives Harvard campus middle finger)

I think years of blue-blooded elitism and also blue-blooded inbreeding has rendered the parts of the neural limbic system associated with laughter obsolete with some of our Cambridge brothers. I miss UChicago's witty self-deprecation. With that, you knew you were nerdy, your school is soul-crushing, and you're damn proud of that.

*Am fully aware there are eight schools in the conference, but Yale seems fully equipped to make fun of its other Ivy League fellows.