Man in the dorm!

Bridget and I have a bit of a tradition for the Saturday night after graduation: packing her stuff. For the past two years, she has left very early Sunday morning for the airport. For the past two years, we spent Saturday evening/night/early morning packing her stuff. Calling it a challenge might be an understatement. The students of TAC are very lucky because, unlike most universities, they allow us to leave a few boxes of stuff in a storage container in one of the parking lots for the summer. Girls, however, need more than a few boxes... especially girls like Bridget. She collects a lot of stuff and brought a lot of stuff from the get-go. Freshman year, we were up til 4 am packing, but we weren't quite done with the boxes. She had to get up at six, however, so I insisted that we go to bed and I'd finish it up the next day. Sophomore year, we were up til 3 am packing, and were actually done packing. The furniture still needed to be moved and the room needed to be cleaned, but I told her that I'd find some boys to help me with that in the morning.

The rules of our campus are very clear when it comes to boys in the girls' dorms: a strict no-no. Move-in and move-out weekends, however, the rule is bent to allow the girls some borrowed arm muscle. It must be cleared with a prefect and be between the hours of 10 am and 5 pm, but it's nice that they allow it at all. So Sunday morning, after Mass and brunch, I wrangled my God-brother and "big brother" (both conveniently named Chris) into helping. Wrangled is the wrong word; I asked, they acquiesced.

(For clarity, I will, hereafter, call my God-brother "Chris 1" and my big brother "Chris 2")

I met Chris 2 outside of Monica's dorm. He was very confused. "Why are we here?"
"Uh, because you said you'd help me move boxes."
"But don't you live in Therese?"
"Yes, I do."
"Then I repeat, why are we here?"
Cue little lightbulb over my head. "Because we're moving Bridget's stuff, not mine."
He laughed. "Oh, that explains things... I was wondering why you were referring to yourself in the third person."
I walked him into the courtyard and led him up the stairs. I told him to wait a minute outside. I popped my head in, looked around, shouted "Man in the dorm!" and waved him in.
"This is really awkward. I'm in a girls' dorm. Ahhhh."
"Don't worry" I told him. I popped my head in the bathroom to shout again. "We expect it during these weekends. Just keep talking and they'll hear the man-voice and stay in their rooms if they aren't properly dressed."
A look of mild horror/amusement crossed his face. "Er, I guess that's a good thing."

We got to Bridget's room and I propped the door open. I explained to him what needed to be done and that Chris 1 would be driving around the back of the dorm in a minute to pick up the boxes to be dropped off in the parking lot. Michelle walked in at this point. Chris 2, impatient to start helping, started moving furniture around. I protested at first, wanting him to wait for Chris 1, but he insisted. We started sliding the bed so it would be in a good position to re-bunk it. My phone rang. "Hello? oh, hi, Mum. You're on campus? I can't hear you, my signal is terrible..." Chris 2 was still pushing the bed and I became caught between it and a pile of stuff on the floor. The bed stopped moving due to this obstruction. "I'll be down in a few minutes, we're moving Bridget's... OW!" Chris 2, not being able to see the obstruction that was causing the bed to not move, had given it a hard shove and knocked me over with it. "Watch it, buddy!" I shouted at him. "No, not you, Mum, you're fine. Chris just knocked me over with a bed. I'll call you back." I untangled myself from the mess of stuff I had fallen into, he apologized, citing a deficient line of vision, and I went outside to check if Chris 1 had showed up yet. He had, right on time.

I walked out so I could escort him in, shouting about the presence of a man. I brought him to Bridget's room, where Chris 2 and Michelle were waiting. Chris 1 and 2 high-fived each other. "Yes, we did it! We got in to a girls' dorm! Yeah!!!" Michelle and I laughed at the boys and we all finished up the stuff. We arranged furniture, vacuumed, and got the boxes to storage. It provided many amusing moments... one of which was that while they lifted the top bunk up, Michelle and I pulled the pins from the bottom posts. Michelle, naturally, picked this side her brother was on. To reach the far pin, she had to scootch between her brother and the posts. That meant I had to scootch between Chris 2 and the posts... slightly awkward. Of course, being immature college students, jokes were made about it. Other jokes were made... about how we were weak inferior females and needed men to do the real work... about how men couldn't vacuum... about the amazing amounts of stuff girls have...

Those two are very silly boys... love them both (but not in a creepy way)