Matt Keally's Blog

A lot happened since Wednesday. Too much, it seems. Thursday went well, but I’ve got some really strange professors. My English professor is an extreme left-winger, practically a communist of sorts. Some of the first stuff out of his mouth was a rant about global warming and pollution. What does that have to do with American Writers? He tried to connect it to Thoreau and Walden, but imo he failed miserably. Obviously he was trying to shove more liberal propaganda down our throats. We actually did some work in that class — poetry analysis. I haven’t done stuff like that since I took AP English 11. It’ll take me a bit to get used to that, not that I don’t like it, but that I’ve mostly taken science courses so far. It will be a good change of pace.

I had some extra time in between so I wound up just going back to Ludwell, and then went back to Old Campus again for Computer Organization. They stuffed us into a funny looking room with no windows on the third floor. I mention no windows because as soon as I went in, the professor turned out the lights, causing me to trip on the steps leading up to the seats. The lights came on just in time for everyone to see me fall. At least I caught myself before it got worse. Anyways, the professor in this class was crazy. He was at least 70, but the walking around and animated personality defied his age. He skipped about six or seven slides during class and told us not to worry about them. That really seemed odd. Most of the lecture was about how memory was addressed on different operating systems and some quick conversions between decimal, hex, and binary.

Immediately after was Linear Algebra, who was taught by a prof with a Russian accent. I’ve heard that some of the Russian professors in the Math department are real hard to understand, so I was a little worried. It turned out he was easy to understand, and the stuff we went over was a twist on the system of equations stuff I did way back in Algebra 2/Trig.

On Thursday I also got to run again, about 20 minutes continuous. It went pretty well despite all the heat. I don’t remember doing much else except starting my reading. I also realized that I didn’t have one of my history books so I would have to dole out some more cash for that.

My Friday classes had nothing unusual in them, and like on Wednesday, I swam in between them. This time the pool was packed. I had to time it right because my roommate wanted to use his goggles, but as soon as I got out he was there. At practice I just biked out past the brewery and Busch Gardens again.

Friday night sucked. All my roommates went out to a party across campus at a house that some of the guys on the team have been renting for a couple years. I’ve never been much for parties. I don’t drink — I really don’t see the point or what attraction it has. Most nights I talk to my girlfriend online, do work, or play computer games. Well, just after they left some random girl shows up at the door, walks in when I open it and sits down in the living room. What the heck? Apparently she was there to see Pat. I just told her she could wait there in case Pat got back soon, which he did. In the meantime, the girl follows me back into my room and sits down in Chris’s chair. She starts this lengthy conversation about who she is — a sophomore transfer from tech who lives in Dillard, and then insists that I put her on my buddy list. Okay. Then Pat and Gaffney get back (they must have gone to get beer or something) and they all leave.

I messed around on my computer for about the next two hours or so, and go to bed around midnight. Just when I think it’s going to be quiet with everyone gone, everyone comes back. It seems about 20 people cram into the living room and are all shouting at the top of their lungs. With the door closed, my earplugs in, and my pillow over my head, I can still hear everyone. It just never seems to stop. Some girls keep laughing and screaming. After two hours of not being able to sleep I walk out in the living room and shout over the din to tell everyone to be quiet. Of course it doesn’t work. It seems all my attempts at this sort of thing fail, so after yet another hour of sleeplessness, I resort to another option.

At around 3:00 it seems most of the people have left, except for the most annoying ones. Pat was now having some kind of orgy in the living room with several girls. I guess they had lost all respect for anyone else who might be living in the complex, much less the same apartment. They were still yelling and screaming. Consequently, I was left with no choice.

The circuit breaker for the apartment is in our room on the wall opposite the beds. I get up and switch everything off, thinking that will get them to either shut up or leave. Neither happens, at least at first. They continue on, doing whatever kinky practices they were engaging in before the lights went out. Finally, about 20 minutes later, things start to calm down, but not before Pat comes barging in the room, fumbling with the circuit breaker to try to get the power back on. Being completely wasted, he failed to turn it back on, and he finally goes to sleep (or at least I can’t hear him).

What a mess. The nerve of some people. They had better not do that again.

I turn the power back on in the morning, sleep for a little more, read the Virginian Pilot online, and get the heck out of dodge to get my run/bike in. Both actually went well, except that my left knee bothered me a bit when I first started running. Other than that it was fine. They had set up some kind of a rope around Barksdale because of a soccer game or something, but it wasn’t too much trouble to get around since it sagged in the places where I needed to get through. I got to run 48 minutes with one minute of walking for every eight minutes of running. I stopped at the campus center afterwards to get some water since there wasn’t a cloud in the sky and it was at least 95 degrees. I got back to Ludwell around 3:30 after biking, talking to my coach, and stretching. I talked to my parents after dinner, but there really wasn’t anything interesting to discuss, just my classes.

There weren’t any orgies that night, since we had to go to Newport News Park in the morning. I was at the hall by 8:50 and we left 10 minutes later. I got to run for 30 minutes on the trails, and I didn’t feel any pain at all. That was good news. I also biked from there to the York River, along the Yorktown Naval Weapons Station, and turned around at the Coleman Bridge. It was a good ride — it wasn’t hot, only two traffic lights the whole way, and no real bad hills.

I went to the bookstore around 1 after practice was over, but they didn’t have the two other books I needed, so I just ordered them on Amazon with the fast shipping. I hope they get here soon because I need them for the readings. Most of the afternoon I did laundry and my other homework, which wasn’t a big deal.

After dinner we had a ‘hall’ meeting as required by the college, but not much came of that. After that, it happened. I knew it was coming, and it would have to be dealt with…

My other roommates cornered me about shutting off the power. As I expected, they claimed it was rude and disrespectful. That was the point — they were doing the same to me. If they won’t have respect for me, then I won’t have any for them, either. If they want to make noise and wreak havoc, they had better be prepared to deal with the consequences. It pisses me off that people will do stuff like they did. I don’t see how they can justify staying up to all hours disturbing the peace. Brendan seemed to be the one making most of the arguments against me, although it appears as though he had the least to do with it. He said he was in his room the whole time too and didn’t hear a thing except for when I yelled at everyone to be quiet. Bull crap. There was no way you couldn’t hear anything. The guys downstairs even heard it all because I had talked to them earlier about it. Even some of the stuff he tried to use against me worked in my favor. He claimed that my past experience with dealing with these problems automatically made him disrespectful. That was my point — if you are making all that racket, you obviously don’t care. In Dinwiddie, guys made all sorts of noise, and the only way to get them to be quiet was to be a little aggressive. If you weren’t, then nothing would happen and you would be miserable the rest of the night.

They don’t have any business doing what they did. I could understand if they weren’t as loud and/or didn’t stay up as late, but all the screaming and the noise was just rediculous. Nobody should have to go through that. My roommates acted as though it was their God-given right to make noise and have disgusting orgies. They seem to think they can do anything they want. I live here too and they should give me a little respect when I am trying to sleep. Once again, I wouldn’t have a problem with them having parties if they weren’t as loud. Losing sleep really screws me up, but that’s besides the point.

Apparently, I wasn’t the only one who was pissed. Lauren, the girl who came over before the whole thing went down, left some time on Friday crying because Pat kicked her out. Brian, from downstairs, had to walk her all the way back to Dillard, which took an hour. I guess Pat didn’t want to include her in the orgy. Once again, more evidence that they just didn’t care about what anyone else thought.

I’ll admit that I should have been a little more assertive, at least at first, but experience has told me that assertiveness doesn’t work when it’s You vs. The World. Live and Let Die.