Cancer says what?

Concordia College may just be a small Lutheran college in northwest Minnesota, but it is still full of many a rich traditions. Take for instance in the first week of school all incoming Freshman are required to wear yellow "beanies" to create some comradery (and allow for easier selection of hazing victims). There is also the assumption that if you walk under the bell tower alone you're doomed to never get married and live the rest of your days in squalor and more than likely a puddle of your own tears.

There is one more tradition that I had the pleasure of partaking in this evening and it was a hoot. It's known as "Smoking Away The Semester" and it consists of anybody and everybody that wants to grab a cigar and light up just outside the main doors. A nice sized crowd of about 30 or so people were huddled just outside the Erickson concourse, in true Lutheran fashion, smoking up a storm.

I had been confused about what night it was going to be on and I had assumed that it was to happen Thursday night so to my surprise when I got done taking a Spanish 111 final and saw Ellens and Darin with cigars in hand I knew I had made a terrible mistake. I jumped into my car and drove down main street and stopped at the local (there are 3 in a mile and a half radius of Concordia and MSUM) head shop "Mellow Moods" and bought myself a nice fat grape flavored Phillies Blunt for $1.25 which more than likely would have faced a very different fate if it had been bought by anyone else at the store.


With cigar in hand I dashed back to my dorm to grab my zippo that had been engraved with the Jegermeister and Bacardi 151 logos (thanks troy), but to my horror there wasn't a drop of fluid in the lighter. What's a boy to do? Well thanks to Chemistry and having lived in Crosby for about two years I knew that alcohol over 100 proof will light the fuck on fire if given a spark or a flame. Low and behold I had remembered that when Bob Lee came up a few weekends ago he had been nice enough to bestow upon me about 1/4 of a liter of Everclear which I had been trying to drink for the past week, but fuck dude... that shit is intense. Anyways I put 2 and 2 together to get 5 and filled up the Jegermeister Zippo with Everclear and what do you know? It lit up.

After all that tribulation I rushed down to the group of studious smokers and lit up... It was cold and I'm not a big fan on cigars, but you know what? It was a good time.

Highlights...

I had a certain satisfaction helping my RA light up his cigar with my everclear lighter and at one point he asked what kind of fluid I was using because the flame was a deep orange/blue flame that was nearly transparent. I told him it was Zippo brand.

Dude #1 - " I smell marijuana. Which one of you bastards are smoking marijuana?"
Dude #2 - "Dude, you are"
Dude #1 - "Oh yeah, that's right. What the fuck happened to my short-term memory?" followed by a fit of lighthearted giggles.

Dude #3 - "Man, I've got a solid buzz going right now."
Dude #4 - "That's probably the acid I dipped your cigar in the other day kicking in."
(Look of sheer panic on Dude #3's face)
Dude #4 - "Nah man, Just playin'"