Happy Halloween, CollegeCandies! We hope you started your morning off right: with a Pumpkin Spice Latte and a bowl of candy corn pumpkins. Mmmmm.

We know that most people count down to birthdays and Christmas, but Halloween is our favorite holiday of the year by far. I mean, there are costumes! And candy! And scary movies! And candy!

Oh wait…we said that one already.

Since we love this day so much, this week we asked our writers to weigh in on their favorite Halloween traditions. Some are old, some are new, but all are reasons to make this our #1 holiday.

Olua: Since my family never let me celebrate Halloween, I used to love watching all the cartoon specials they showed Halloween week. They also used to give us candy in class. Good times.

Kathryn S.: Getting wasted in a vinyl dress. Spill all the beer you want on me, it’ll slide right off!

Erica - Kent State: Carving pumpkins. This year my roommates and I did it surrounded by Carlo Rossi, pumpkin shaped cookies and our kittens. Then we baked the seeds. Delicious!

Carly - Grinnell: I love handing out candy to kids at the door. I just think it’s so fun to look at their costumes. Oh, and watching scary movies. Yessss.

Kelly - UMass: Keg stands in a slutty costume Read More »

I am one of those random girls who will wear dresses and skirts and too pretty/impractical shoes to class more often than not. Don’t get me wrong - I will absolutely show up in my gym clothes on occasion, but for the most part, I just prefer dressing up. Strangely enough, what I wear elicits quite a wide range of reactions and people often feel more than comfortable sharing their opinion of my clothes with me.

Here’s the general breakdown:

Pro: Being known as the fashion plate. I like that after a meeting with my cool, young English Prof she said, “I love your style. I was waiting to see what you’d wear to our meeting.”
Con: Being perceived as the girl who tries too hard. No, I actually didn’t wear this dress to impress any of the lame guys in our poly sci class. Really.

Pro: Compliments abound. I’m not vain but it is nice to hear people say that they like what you’re wearing.
Con: Criticisms abound. My best friend will never let me live down this exchange:
BF: What are you wearing?
Me: What’s wrong with what I’m wearing?
BF: Other than the fact that you’re wearing sequins at 10 am? Nothing.

Pro: It’s a conversation starter. I feel like I don’t have enough female friends/acquaintances in my life and I can be sort of shy, so if my shoes get a girl to start talking to me then that makes me happy.
Con: People thinking that you did the walk of shame to class. Someone asked me once if I was wearing last night’s outfit. Um, no. Very embarrassing. Read More »

We’ve almost hit the twenty four hour mark on the countdown to 2008 and you’re still standing there scratching your head.

What the HELL will you do to celebrate?

No enticing invitations, no parties planned in the small town suburb you’re forced to revisit for an entire month.

Sure it’s home and of course it’s nice to be back, catching up with old friends and of course the good ol’ folks, but new years back at college seems like such a more reasonable route to F-U-N. So now what? How do you ring in the new year when there’s absolutely nothing cool to do?

Don’t give up just yet. No matter what you do there’s three important things to boost your boring bust of a bash.

1. Be with Besties
If you’ve got nothing to do that means all your friends are stuck too, right? As cliche as this is, the fun is not where you are it’s who you’re there with. You can stand around all night in your friend’s basement, garage, wherever you’ve all hopelessly congregated and cluck about how much ‘this sucks’ OR you can have a little lack-of-plans-laugh and make the best of it. Read More »

The end of August is rapidly approaching. Your room is filled with overflowing boxes, you’re hugging your friends goodbye and you finally feel as if you’re fully prepared to launch into collegiate life, especially after reading Solmaaz’s wisdom on What Not to Do in College.

If you plan on attending a college anywhere besides New York City, Sol’s tips should be read like the Bible.

For those of us who have been granted the opportunity to spend our four years of academic growth (ha!) in the greatest city in the world, things must be done just a little bit differently.

Things you must do in order to survive in one of the toughest cities in the world:

1. Spend your money buying a good, solid wardrobe before you head off to school (because God knows you can’t afford anything at Bergdorf Goodman).

On a regular college campus, you would be able to sport a pair of sweatpants or even (gasp!) pajamas on a typical day. In New York, your 8:30 class will be chock full of girls in full make-up and carefully calculated outfits. Even the majority of male students will appear as if they have stepped away from a runway show for an hour and a half to attend your Level I Spanish class.

Don’t be that schlumpy girl hiding in the last row. Buy the basics and add trendy accessories when you arrive at school. Read More »