College students and crazy antics

There are times in every college student's life when boredom reaches a maximum, and extreme actions are necessary to shake things up.

Never mind the traditional drinking, dancing and the nightlife. The adventurous student aspires to do something no one has ever done before. Something ridiculously funny. Something to tell the grandkids.

Aaron Stopa, who will be a freshman pharmacy major in the fall, had a few grandkid-worthy stories to share.

"This one time I was riding bikes through a store, and then this little boy came up to us, and I bet him five bucks that he couldn't fit into a bin, and when he got inside of it, I shut the lid and ran off," he said.

In his spare time, Stopa has taken up the hobby of taking pictures of random objects - something that turned perilous on one occasion.

"I licked poop the other day, but it was sort of an accident," he said. "Me and my friend found some dog poop on the sidewalk, so we took pictures of it, and we took one of me pretending to lick it, and she pushed me. It wasn't good."

Above all, Stopa said his favorite boredom buster was a prank phone call.

"We called someone's house and said we were from the Waste Management Company, and we told them that there had been a lot of problems in their area, and we were wondering how many times they (had bowel movements) weekly," he said.

"They were like, 'Are you kidding, or is this real?' We told them they were crapping way over their quota," he said.

Stopa said he proceeded to tell the person there was a 12 bowel movement weekly limit, and questioned them about their eating habits, even asking if they ate wrappers.

"I was like, 'We have some fun sayings around here: Too many poos, we all lose. Hold it in, we all win. Don't be a hog, hold the log,'" Stopa continued. "It was funny. They were being very nice about it, they thought it was real."

Valerie Brittin, a freshman mechanical engineering major at Binghamton, has gone traying in her spare time.

"(It's) sledding using a dining hall tray," she said. "We were bored and my friend had 2 trays so we said, 'let's go.' She had just brought them back periodically from the dining hall."

Natalie Bragg, a freshman math major at Rochester Institute of Technology, said movie making has been her boredom buster.

"My friends made a sperm video," she said. "Girls on our floor were the sperm and the lounge was the egg. Certain people were deformed and stuff."

The idea emerged when a friend had to make a video about competition for class.

"It looked really good in the end," Bragg said.

Tom Hutchison, a freshman computer science major at Niagara County Community College, said his group has resorted to bridge jumping in the past.

"Well, one night we decided to go bridge jumping, and we drove to like every bridge between Middleport and Lockport, and jumped off of them all," he said.

"Yeah the last one we all did minus clothing. My friend lost his boxers and a sock into the canal," Hutchison added.

In one extreme instance of boredom, Hutchison fell back on a favorite childhood game with a twist.

"One time I played with wrenches as if they were action figures for like an hour," he said.

Jason Lang, a senior business major, said Friday nights as a freshman were spent standing around the dorm lounge boxing in three minute intervals with friends in real gloves until they were threatened to be kicked out of Governors.

"Someone got a bloody nose once, but it was more a fun thing than anything else," he said, adding, "There were no hard feelings going in and no hard feelings coming out."

Jenna Hawkins, a sophomore linguistics and psychology major, said her friends went sledding down the bleachers in Alumni Arena.

Stephanie Tin, a sophomore communication major, said some fellow dorm tenants resorted to drastic measures to remain sane.

"Someone in my hall last year built a castle out of Dominoes menus," she said.

Ben Blankenship, a freshman math and biology major, said he survives on pranks and crazy stunts.

On past ho-hum weeknights, Blankenship donned a Bruce Lee costume, and his friend, a clown or gorilla costume. The pair then traveled to Clinton in Governors and staged a fight scene.

"I would slowly walk in a lounge where students were sitting and not say a word for a minute or so, then either a strange clown or a 'Horny Monkey' would sprint in and attack me," Blankenship said.

"Then it was similar to a scene out of a Bruce Lee movie with the kicking and loud screaming until the clown or gorilla was defeated and the (Asian) students were running around laughing and yelling," he added.

Encouraged by their reception in Clinton, the duo made their rounds throughout all of the dorms, traveling door to door.

Blankenship said he also revels in covering those who fall asleep in the dorm lounge with water or garbage, including "banana peels, old food, starburst wrappers, dirty sweaty underwear, or anything sticky."

Blankenship and his floor mates have also gathered snow from outside and pelted unsuspecting students with snowballs.

When not throwing things at fellow dorm mates, Blankenship and his pals keep boredom at bay with dorm dodgeball, theme parties - toga and pimp-and-ho parties being their favorites - and their very own Lounge Fight Club, a mixture of Tae Kwon Do, boxing, and wrestling.

In one of his proudest college moments, Blankenship spiced things up Dane Cook-style.

He was with friends at a party when the cops arrived. Everyone went scurrying for the fence.

"I was one person away from jumping the fence because the kid in front of me couldn't get over so I helped him. I gave him a good lift but his shorts caught on the sharp top of the fence and he went head first over the fence. He didn't make it. He was hanging upside down by his shorts when he got caught by the police," he said.

"My other friend did almost the same thing except his shorts tore along with his legs and he fell into a neighbor's garden. He landed on a wooden garden stake and broke it, then passed out for a while until just before the last bus came," Blankenship continued.

And in a moment that makes all crazy college stories exciting, Blankenship remembers, "Like Dane Cook put it, 'We almost got arrested.'"