I came to college up north because I insisted on going to a school with all four seasons. I chose Syracuse because I tend to do things in excess. Why have a few days of snow every school year when I can spend 8/9 months at Syracuse freezing and wearing the somehow-still-popular Ugg boot for the majority of the year?

Four years ago I ran outside as the first flakes fell from the sky. I spun around and around with my tongue out reveling in the snow not because it came naturally but because that’s what people always do in the movies. I stayed spinning until a bus pulled up in front of the dorm, almost ran me over, and my friend asked me to come inside and stop embarrassing myself. Even as the winter wore on I got delight out of hearing the crunching snow beneath my feet and writing my name over and over again on ever snowy surface.

But nothing good can ever last and now as the first snow falls, I’m sitting inside wrapped in fourteen layers chugging a large coffee. I made a list of everything in the kitchen and rationed it out so we can survive five months without having to go outside and to the supermarket once. I haven’t been this prepared with food since I won the Oregon Trail in fifth grade.

So I guess the magic of snow has worn off. The first sign was probably when I put a hat on and everything remarked that I looked unmistakeably like a penis. The second sign is when my boots stopped working and I had to wrap plastic bags around my feet so the 3-foot ice puddle wouldn’t give me hypothermia. The third sign was when I made a snowman last year and someone ate the skittle eyes. Ever since then I just can’t look at snow the same way.

So here goes hibernation ‘09. It should be a blast.

In the late eighties, Barenaked Ladies frontman Steven Page promised (in song no less) that he’d buy me and every other lady ever lots of frivolous and unnecessary items like a llama, Art Garfunkel and a monkey.

Looks like he forgot all about the little ditty that made his band famous and spent the money buying a ton of cocaine and marijuana. Page was arrested in New York last week for possession of a controlled substance.

The best part? When the cops showed up, Page and his female friend tried to hide the mound of coke under a napkin. I can’t believe that didn’t work! That’s how I hid a quarter pound of parmesan cheese when I spilled it at Pizza Hut 10-years ago. I guess the Syracuse PD are a little more thorough than the hapless staff at my local “Italian bistro.”

The news of this arrest is disappointing but not exactly surprising. Despite putting out a very good last effort and a popular kids album, Barenaked Ladies have been trying to run away from irrelevancy since “Pinch Me.” It looks like it finally caught up to them. Read More »