The 10 Guys Every Girl Dates In College
Ladies... am I right?
If there’s one thing I know about women, and believe me, there is only one thing I know about women, it’s that all of them, regardless or orientation or personality, dated these ten guys in college.
Billy Frenzo
You know da guy. We all know da freaking guy. Dis is the kinda guy who will eat a big, heaping plate of your spaghetti… and will want more. You will eventually run out of spaghetti and you will have to resort to grinding up your books to make flour to make more spaghetti. He eats the book spaghetti and inadvertently absorbs every Elena Ferrante novel you have on your shelf. He gains pride in Italy’s literary tradition, becoming more Italian by the second, therefore transitioning out of being Billy Frenzo and into -
Guiseppe “Guiseppe” Guiseppevani
You probably met this guy behind your dumpster. But don’t be fooled—behind his impish wink and lewd hand gesture lies a fiendishly focused brain. Ah, to be a fly on the wall on your dates with Guiseppe… to see him rakishly sweep his tousled curls back behind the lip of his toque… to hear his diamond tongue and razor sharp wit cut the night with peals of your laughter… Alas. All good things must come to an end, and though Guiseppe may be a great boyfriend, he was never interested in anything serious.
Friedrich Von Dyson IV
The boy is heir to the Dyson Empire. The Dyson money flows freely — vacuum cleaners, fans — whatever you want, this boy can get. Friedrich and his friends, Jacques de Maytag and Reginald GE Jr., are an unlikely trio. There’s something thrilling about sitting on the edge of Friedrich’s dorm room bed, listening to him wax poetic about his class angst. “If only I could slip the surly bonds of my station,” he would propose, “then I shan’t be relegated to this life.” The last you heard of Friedrich, he was working in the Bush White House… in 2018.
Ranjit “List Item Vampire” Gangapalli
On your first date with Ranjit, you went to the fanciest restaurant near your college. But instead of ordering any food… he simply ate the written items off the menu. It turned out Ranjit had been bitten by a Scrum Master in his youth, and can now only consume written items that are part of lists. This one was pretty out there, so you dumped him after one date. But Ranjit still haunts you, eating items off of almost every list you see…
Yuval Noah Harari
You met at an early screening of “The Boxtrolls.” You were both in the elevator after seeing the movie, and in an attempt to make conversation, you asked him what he thought. “I thought it was a great attempt at collective mythmaking,” said Harari, pausing for dramatic effect, “but not as great as doing a transaction with money.” Your mind exploded, and from then on, you were his. While your relationship was never meant to last — he, a gay Israeli vegan, you, the woman reading this newsletter — you shared something primordial and deep: the idea that we would all be happier had we just stayed in caves and ate little berries and stuff.
Craing “The Nugget” Felch
This one was your longest college relationship by far, mostly because you forgot that you were seeing Craing for months at a time. That wasn’t because he was boring, though — it’s because your friends were all going through really hard stuff. Jern’s ferret died, Chence transferred schools, and your roommate, Marlk, was put on academic probation. Forslom lost his car keys, Trionf got deported. Kenpi slept in and missed his Practical Lamps final, Lazlorf’s laptop broke his heart. I mean, even Hunce, who is normally rock solid, was being investigated for arson. It’s not your fault that things fell apart. But you probably didn’t help, either, did you? And that’s how you lost Craing “The Nugget” Felch to the sands of time.
You Fool, What Have You Done?
By reading this list, you’ve set in motion an inexorable chain of events that will eventually lead to this message being sent back in time. But nothing else bad happens — just this message gets sent back in time. It’s not for any particular rhyme or reason. This message just represents a closed time loop. You’ve seen it, so now, one day, you will send it back in time, therefore completing the loop.
If a future version of you from ten years in the future appears and gives you the time machine that they used to go back in time, and then you wait ten years, and then go back in time and give yourself the time machine, it means no one ever created the time machine, it just sort of exists. That’s a pretty basic time travel paradox but it’s probably my favorite one and is very fun to think about.
“Hope you are staying well and healthy in this MASSIVE WATER CISTERN.” - me talking to a guy I trapped in a cistern during the 2020 Coronavirus Pandemic
Thanks for reading,
Ritam
Nabeel’s Footnote
The funniest thing that ever happened at my middle school involved a guy whom I hope, truly, someone had the chance to date in college. Whenever I think of Guys—just good, memorable Dudes—I remember this one.
The school was always plagued by packs of seagulls during lunch, and this one kid, [redacted], was always known as the kid who threw shit at them. At lunch, a flock of seagulls would descend on the JLS Middle School campus, and without fail, all day, every day, he would stake out his own corner of the blacktop and absolutely pelt stuff at the birds. Just annihilated them—sandwiches, pennies, rubber bands, etc. It was wild.
One day, we see a crowd forming around him, and they’re all looking down at the ground. It turns out [redacted] had unleashed a cannon of his 12-pack of glue sticks. And, miraculously, he had lodged one of these bad boys
directly, squarely, perfectly, perpendicularly in a seagull’s beak, propping it upright and killing the bird. I know this isn’t funny, but to be honest it kind of is. [Redacted] got suspended for a while, I think. What a Guy.