I require eight hours of sleep a day. That's not negotiable. If I don't get it, you may not want to be around me before I've found a shower, some food, and a toothbrush. Granted, not too many things wake me up. I lived beside railroad tracks 16 years of my life, and Norfolk and Southern would often come out at 8 am on Saturdays to beat at the tracks with sledgehammers. I don't know a darn thing about train tracks, so I never knew exactly what they were doing, but I slept through it. The only thing that wakes me up is the telephone.

Here's an example of what goes on in my dorm room life. I'll call my roommate "Bob". Keep in mind that this is around 3 a.m.

Caller: Hey, is Bob there?

Me: Mmmf.

Caller: What?

Me: ::clearing throat:: No, he's not here.

Caller: Do you know where he is?

Me: ::hack hack:: I dunno...

Caller: Just tell him I called, aight?

Me: Wh-wh-wh-who is "I"?

By this time the caller has already hung up, leaving no number, no name, no nothing. Bless my roommate, however; he doesn't get agitated even when I almost never know who's calling. "Hey Bob, some guy called." "Thanks, man." As if I'm supposed to know the names of all his friends. I'm the human copy of Microsoft Outlook. The nanny/doormat who knows where my roommate is at all times. Whatever. You're great, Bob, but some of your friends really tick me off.

Now, theoretically, I could ignore these people. But who's to say it's not one of my best friends calling from the middle of nowhere and needs me to rescue him or her? I don't know how much rescuing I can do when half of my body is temporarily numb from my awkward sleeping position. I've often fell and hit my head on my desk after losing my balance.

"You sure do buy a lot of aspirin, son."

"Yeah, well, I get a lot of phone calls."

Let's not forget answering machine messages. Sometimes these are in a drunken stupor, and when heard in the sun-is-out morning are funny, but in the moon-is- out morning are just plain annoying. When I was a freshman someone called for my roommate at around 4 a.m. The entirety of the message is as follows:

"Yo, Bill, what the hell, man, like, what up, like, yo, gimmie a gimmie a call when you get in man like yo ah be baaaaaaad what the hell see ya whenever yo like what up lop me some boogie yo yeah."

This was the morning after a girl I really, really liked said she was going to call me in the middle of the night just to look at the full moon with me. I fought so, so hard to stay awake that night, but no, she never called, but I did get this message on the machine from a guy whose voice my roommate had never heard. A prank call, most likely.

And, of course, no name, no number. What a waste.

I should start unplugging the phone, but, then again, all these drastically important phone calls my roommate and I get at o-dark-thirty won't be received.

Name: Sarah
Year: Senior
Major: Finance
Comments:
I really like this Vent section. I saw an advertisement in the "Birth of a College" magazine, so I decided to check it out. I think this is a good way for students to relate to one another, and laugh at their problems. Great Job!

Year: Junior
Major: Media Studies
Comments:
There are times when phone calls wake you up in the middle of the night, and you are okay with it. However, as the year rolls on, I must agree with your negative view on the butt-crack of dawn phone calls that are becoming more and more frequent. The polite "No, they are not here" is turning into more hateful comments that tend to end with expletives. Am I over-reacting? Try getting a phone call at 3:30 AM on a Monday night from someone wanting to talk to your roommate who has been in bed since 10 pm. And he KNOWS that she will be in bed. i mean, what is this?! More and more I dream of nights where phone calls are non-existant, and the only noise I wake up to is the chirping of the morning birds. Ahhh....but could I ever unplug that phone? It will never happen. But I will join you in your musings of those sleep-filled nights, void of name-less phone calls.

Name: Michelle Hamblet
Comments:
I definitely agree with you on the late night phone calls. My roommate and I get so many drunken calls at god knows what time of night. We get them from people we haven’t talked to in awhile; boyfriends, ex boyfriends, but our sorority sisters are the worst. We all know that we care about each other and will miss each other when we graduate but for some odd reason when we all drink we feel the need to tell each other. We got a call from one of our sisters who is graduating in May at 4 a.m. just so she could tell us how much she loved us and doesn’t know what she is going to do without us. I mean like you said this could wait till morning

Name: Spider Monkey
Comments:
If that credit card guy calls me again, I will go ape on his ass and he will call me Monkey Mom!

Name: WhimElder
Comments:
I remember those days...I had the most friggin annoying..stupid...waste of flesh (and there was a lot of it)roommates ever. From NJ. And yes she had a Fran Dreshner voice...she made a habit of not only making phone calls @ 3am..but watching TV, and playing her radio. Oh but the real joy was the next morning...2 hours before I had to get up...her alarm would go off...to which she would hit the snooze button....FOR 2 HOURS!!!!!

Name: Jen
Comments:
forget chivalry, what happened to romance? *hears the church bells and looks for copy of eulogy*

Name: Jeff
Comments:
Jealous, jealous, jealous.

Comments:
I agree with that sentiment

Comments:
"This was the morning after a girl I really, really liked said she was going to call me in the middle of the night just to look at the full moon with me. "

I think I'm going to puke now.