-In three weeks, I will be returning to where this column began – the University of Pennsylvania – for my five-year reunion.  While I don’t expect quite the shit show that was my first Homecoming, when I fell one girl short of the hook-up cycle (a freshman, sophomore, junior, and senior in one week), I am excited to see old friends I haven’t kept in touch with, then later make fun of them with the friends I have kept in touch with.  But there will be one major distinction between myself and the rest of the members of the Class of 2001:  both in mind and body, I’ve never really left college.  For the past few years, I have been traveling the country, performing stand-up at schools big and small, and even waking up in the occasional sorority house.  Therefore I thought it appropriate, on this landmark occasion of my five-year reunion, to ruminate on the current status of college life in America, and how much things have changed – and remained the same – since I graduated.  This is my State of the Student Union Address.

-The most salient trend on college campuses these days (besides ogling FSU chicks on Facebook) is the misguided attempt by administrations to curtail full-scale drunken debauchery.  My favorite example of this is the ads I’ve seen in a half-dozen schools’ newspapers and dorms that say something like: “67% of Students Have Four or Fewer Drinks When They Party.”  I mean, is that not pure comedy or what?  You know who these ads are reaching?  The 67% of students who have four or fewer drinks when they party.  The other 33% –  i.e. the kids having fun – are way too blindingly drunk to read a newspaper or make it back to their dorm anyway.

-Statistics!  Oh the statistics they’ll show you to prove that the War on Alcohol is working on campus!  Well let me share some compelling anecdotal evidence that it’s not working at all – in fact, kids are getting drunker than ever, and creatively so.  At Northwestern, I discovered a group of students that actually invented a solitaire-style drinking game.  That’s right, a drinking game you can play against yourself.  It’s basically flip cup, but instead of two teams, you play your right hand versus your left hand.  Long live higher education.

-And let’s just say that college students are drinking less – if only because of the increasing inconvenience it is to even purchase alcohol without getting hassled.  You know what kids are doing instead?  Drugs.  Lots and lots of drugs.  I never even saw cocaine until I was a senior in college.  Now freshmen are blowing rails like Amtrak.  The first time I ever took prescription painkillers was when I had my appendix out six months after graduation.  Now fraternities are electing Presidents, Treasurers, and Pharmacists.  That’s right, administrators.  Your alcoholic kids now have a drug problem.  Good work!