Exploring the lodge-istics of the lodges

I know that "lodging" is a celebrated tradition here at the University of Richmond -- it is an unexplainable phenomenon that shows nothing if not the class, grace, integrity and general respect for personal space that every Richmonder possesses as a general condition of his/her being. Jokes.

You know as well as I do that lodges are a total shit-show, and no one enjoys observing Richmond students in their height of drunkenness rubbing up on each other and using far too much tongue in their public displays of affection more than myself.

However, since our apartment is literally out in the boondocks and I don't know if my quads could make it all the way to the lodges and back, especially with my liver working overtime, the lovely ladies of 905 have not been frequenting lodges nearly as much as we did in our sophomore glory days (we are all transfer students, so lodging was a foreign concept until last year ... who knew that a whole other world of fist pumping, far too much cleavage and bad decisions existed outside of the Jersey Shore?)

Maybe it's because I'm getting older, maybe because my morals felt like making a guest appearance this weekend or maybe because my BAC was on the lower side, but lodges seem to have lost just a bit of their glow (or maybe there just weren't enough black lights on Friday, who knows...).

First of all, there are certain rules of hand placement that the males at Richmond seem to have some difficulty comprehending.

Under no, no, no circumstances is it OK to rest your hands on a chick's fat pouch when you are dancing with her.

Maybe I liked lodges better last year when my college weight was still spread out, but now that it has settled in that annoying spot right under my bellybutton, there HAS to be another place you can keep your hands besides on the chubbiest part of my body -- hips, abdomen area or even getting dangerously close to the tots is better than holding on to my food baby.

I know that if I'm at lodges, I'm probably not focusing on holding it in, so please, do my self-confidence a big one and latch on somewhere else.

However, when I say somewhere else, I do not, repeat, do not mean my crotch.

Just because I agreed to dance with you, and when I say "agreed to dance with you" I mean, when you came up behind me, grabbed me and tried to suck my face the second I looked back to see if you were cute, doesn't stand as an open invitation to paw at my lady parts.

What is that doing for anyone? Really all you're getting is a handful of jeans and causing some unnecessary and uninvited friction.

I'm seriously considering wearing a cup next time I go out to lodges ... women certainly need some kind of protection from the occasional man who takes far too many liberties when it comes to exploring her territory.

Secondly, the lodge make-out. Enough said. Nothing is sloppier, more disgusting or absolutely hilarious than the lodge make-out.

It ALWAYS seems like a good idea at the time, and in retrospect you're left wondering "What the heck was I thinking?" especially when you have to see the kid whose face you sucked off walking through the Commons every Tuesday and Thursday on his way to his 1:30 p.m., hopefully in the B-School, because you'd like to think that in your Friday night haze you still had the common sense to keep an eye out for potential husbands.

Thirdly, when you try to dance with a girl and she says "I gotta go find my friend" and then walks two steps to her friend, this is not an invitation to follow her and try to grab her again.

This means that she doesn't want to dance with you. "Gotta find my friend" means no the first, second, third and fourth time you try. Ask Lauren Butler. It is, after all, her go-to move.

However, everyone who makes the conscious decision to go to the lodges should expect the sort of groping, invasion of personal space and general messiness that characterizes frat star Richmond Friday Night.

It is simultaneously disgusting and phenomenal -- if you're looking to blur the boundary between completely outrageous and hilariously fantastic, then get over to American Apparel, buy some bright pants, cut up your crappiest Hanes white t-shirt and put it on over your most intensely colored sports bra, find a crappy cross-body bag at Target and make your way over to the frat lot.

Nothing says "welcome to college" like neon hot pants, risque behavior, squatting to avoid sitting on lodge toilets, frantically searching around the dance floor for the phone that just fell out of your sweaty hand and waking up to shower the bad decisions off your lodge-sludge-covered body.