Coffee talk...

Minutes after deboarding a clammy (and smelly) bus to prematurely end this summer's adventure, I bought a laptop. Spending as much time as I do in coffee shops, I've often pined after the sleek accessibility and transportability of the laptops many cafe-brats carry with them like so many alcoholics who carry their sanity in a cheap bottle of vodka. I simply carried a spiral bound notebook. The laptop I was able to afford is not some uber-new, super fancy monument to modern technology. In fact, very few coffee drinkers will look to my laptop and drool. The laptop I ended up with did not "break the bank" (as they say), nor will I be forced to make payments on it from now until my salt and pepper hair turns silver (yes twenty somethings do grow grey hairs - in fact I've had them since I was 17). Truth be told, I scored my new laptop for the small price of $50. Its old. Its noisy. Its slow. But, hey, I could afford it.

Personally, I don't think my laptop makes me cooler. It doesn't give me special powers. It connects to the internet and it has a word processor. That's all that matters to me.

Every semester that has gone by, I've had to learn the hard way that the computer labs close at 10pm. Until now, it seemed that all the forces working against my homework habits had been culled into being. Now I can pull all-nighters to finish papers without calling everyone I know to find a computer to use. Yes, oh yes, now I can caffeinate while fervently working on assignments. It is oh-so-grand to embrace the world of educational convenience.

Prospective students, if you've hung on this long, allow me to offer a modicum of unsolicited advice: (assuming you don't have one of your own) try to get a computer that connects to the 'net and that allows you to complete assignments at your leisure before starting college. Don't skip college for a computer, but please acknowledge that your life will be SO MUCH EASIER with one, than without.