It's been a rough couple of weeks. First, RAMONA QUIMBY, AGE 38 faced a midterm that was so difficult that the only answer she completed was a crude anatomical diagram with an arrow and the caption "I've got your demand curve right here." She received partial credit. Next, RAMONA had to leave her tent in K-Ville following an unfortunate allergic reaction to body paint. RAMONA'S departure had been a long time coming; there had been whispered hints and cruel innuendoes for months of RAMONA having enjoyed a brief romantic liaison with Brad Daugherty and the consequent possibility of a conflict of interest. In the end, it was probably for the best that she left, as tensions had been running high. There isn't enough room in one Fisher-Price "Lil' Pioneer" tent for 12 headstrong college students. Or, for that matter, two golden retrievers; it's a pretty small tent.
But the straw that slipped the camel's disc was this: the cancel of Annual Review. RAMONA QUIMBY, AGE 38 was a big fan of Annual Review; its "member-led programming" requirement is really the only time anyone in her selective house is willing to look at the slides from her trip to Newark over the summer. In case Monday, Monday is the only reason that you read The Chronicle, RLHS Director Eddie Hull cancelled this long-standing tradition, thereby dividing campus bitterly. There is one group (the selectives) who feel that this move is a nefarious, hubristic and power-hungry tactic aimed at ending selective living at Duke. This group views Eddie Hull as the sort of top-hat-wearing, mustache-twirling villain of the type that can be seen tying nubile maidens to train tracks in "Mighty Mouse" cartoons. The other group (the non-selectives) do not care as much about this decision as they do about finding hidden meanings in the comic strip "The Campus Beat." They view Eddie Hull as a member of the St. Louis Blues.
But that is a digression, a precious, precious, precious, word-consuming digression.
What RAMONA QUIMBY means to say is that it's time for a break. And luckily for her, Spring Break is just around the corner. There are a number of options available to a young woman looking to kill a week and spend some money. RAMONA'S first option is to take a cruise through the Caribbean. For only a few thousand dollars, she'll get anything she's ever desired. High-stakes bingo. Shuffleboard 'til you drop. Every song you've ever heard played on steel drums (we recommend the Goo Goo Dolls' oeuvre; it translates well). Track suits of every hue known to man. Skeet shooting. A kitchen that tries to feed you chicken cutlets and apricot sherbet at all hours of the day until you are found one day dead in your cabin, pale and enormous-belly-up, like a goldfish who was fed once too often. Horrible stand-up comedians. Everyone getting their hair-braided, regardless of however tragically ill-advised that might be, given their hair-situation. Absurdly sculpted European sexagenarians asking "Eef you want to meet for a dreenk later, in the deescotheque?" Basically, good times.
In the past, RAMONA QUIMBY has satisfied her desire for spring break fun in other ways. Like many people, RAMONA's vision of spring break has been slanted by the raucous, hedonistic pool parties cum whipped cream sexfests made popular by music video countdowns on MTV, travel shows on E! and several short-lived claymation programs on Nickelodeon. Not that RAMONA watches that much TV; in her opinion, there hasn't been a show on television worth following since Daphne Maxwell Reid replaced Janet Hubert-Whitten as Vivian Banks on "The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air." As if no one would notice. Nevertheless, it was the repeated small-screen images of bikini-clad co-eds drunkenly carousing like caged gerbils in heat that inspired RAMONA to book a spring break trip to sunny Florida last year. Unfortunately, RAMONA's travel agent didn't exactly have his finger on the pulse of the young single's life, and ended up setting her up with a 5-night stay at a trucker-frequented Econo-Lodge in land-locked Gainesville. After two nights of ignoring a creepy voice coming from the other side of her room-adjoining safety door asking her if she wanted to "slither on over to Gator Gus' Reptile Farm and see what develops," RAMONA checked herself out.
Hitching a ride with a wayward truck driver turned out to be a piece of cake, but after climbing aboard, RAMONA began to think that accepting the transportation was a mistake. For 15 straight hours, the trucker demanded that they recite dialogue from "B.J. and the Bear" (RAMONA was the Bear) while she wore a mesh hat the trucker referred to as a "Justin Timberlake cap." Later, RAMONA was forced to sing every verse of "Roll On (Eighteen Wheeler)" by country super-group Alabama. When she couldn't take anymore, she jumped from the moving vehicle, and after coming to three days later, surprisingly found herself in sunny Daytona Beach. Unfortunately, all beachfront hotels were booked, and she ended up staying in a distant Ramada Inn inhabited nearly exclusively by Shriners in town for a convention. The rest of the week was spent playing tetherball with a guy who looked suspiciously like Higgins from "Magnum P.I."
Of course, if sun and sand seem like more trouble than they are worth, a girl can always go home for a much-needed respite. RAMONA QUIMBY has not decided if this is her best option, however, because her family life is getting a little hectic. Mother and Father QUIMBY are taking some time apart, and things are changing. Her dad has grown a chinstrap beard and taken up rollerblading. He asks to be called "Chip" these days, though his birth name is definitely Roger. Her mother has a new suitor who may or may not be that question mark guy from the government money program commercials; he has requested RAMONA refer to him as "Uncle Bingo."
It's important to keep one thing in mind on Spring Break: a bad day on vacation is better than a good day in class. RAMONA has a shirt that says this, but she stopped wearing it after last summer hiatus, when she had a very bad day on vacation involving food poisoning, a messy breakup, and someone giving away the ending of The Sixth Sense.
RAMONA QUIMBY, AGE 38 is going on Spring Break and all you're going to get is this lousy column.
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