From the moment first years step out of their luggage-filled minivans and SUVs, their lives change instantly. They are about to embark on a college journey that will shape the rest of their lives.
This astronomical change, however, often comes in more subtle spurts. It sneaks up on you. And every once in a while, it happens at the most inopportune times.
It's called living on your own - and it may just be a disaster.
"I think it's a combination of living alone for the first time and sleep deprivation as to why students have so many mishaps," third-year College student Jenny Kennedy said. "When you are focusing on classes and meeting new people, there is a lot of time for absentmindedness."
And a lot of experience to gain. What follows is a compilation of mishaps by older students - their explosions, injuries, hunger pains and awkward introductions.
Check for warning labels
Many of the items students bring with them to college come with ridiculously obvious warning labels.
Take for example a box of staples. Caution: Staples have sharp points for easy penetration so handle with care.
Or a soda bottle. Warning: Contents explode under pressure. Cap may blow off causing serious eye or other injuries.
As obnoxious and trite as those alerts may seem, there never seems to be a warning when you really need it.
Move-in day tops them all.
By most accounts, this nerve-wracking and stressful day moves along somewhat smoothly with only normal amounts of sweat and tears.
No blood you say? Quite the opposite for second-year College student Jess Melnicove, who saw her roommate's dad slice his hand open during a valiant effort to trunk a 28-inch television up four flights of stairs last year.
"While my roommate and I were at our first hall meeting, the door suddenly bursts open and a frantic mother is screaming out for band-aids, gauze or anything to stop the blood flow," Melnicove said. "We weren't even moved in but a few hours and we already had blood all over our new rug, in our new hall, at our new school."
Where was the warning label when the dad really needed one going up the stairs?
Caution: Roommate alert
By move-in day most first years and their roommates have had a chance to speak on the phone, e-mail and possibly even meet in person. Still, nothing can quite prepare a new student for that first impression as his or her stuff welcomes its way into the 12- by 16- foot common space.
Second-year College student Aimie Mitchell, who lived in the Alderman Road dormitories last year, had a reality check when her final suitemate arrived.
"She seemed like a really cool girl, very friendly and talkative," Mitchell said. "She did the usual introductions, but with a surprising addition, saying, 'This is my son, Brandon.'"
For Mitchell and her other suitemates, their initial shock at the statement gave way to laughter when she announced she was only joking. The boy was really her little brother. But the moral of the story is to be prepared for anything.
Danger: Walking on eggshells
Once roommates have passed the meet and greet stage, real hazards are sure to follow.
For college students, there are only three important things: eating, sleeping and socializing. The middle necessity is accomplished the least. The few hours of shut-eye awarded each evening to the weary are savored, and interference is less than welcomed.
Imagine that it's 3:30 a.m. You are fast asleep with the fans blasting wind at gale force. Oddly you wake, struggling to squint through the pale moonlight only to find your roommate standing over you, floor fan in arms, dead asleep. It happened to Melnicove, who also was victim to the bloody hand scene on move-in day.
Although she found it unnerving to wake up to her sleepwalking roommate, "what's even more strange is that she simply climbed back into bed, still grasping the fan to her chest," Melnicove said.
Do not disturb
Every now and again in the utopian-style first-year dormitories, a perfectly good night's rest will be suddenly ruined by a blaring - and almost always false - fire alarm. In those cases, you must, in your sleepy state, remember a sweatshirt and your key.
In a less common case of combining sleep and fire, second-year College student Andrew Wilson got heated when his roommate's alarm went off during a post-exam nap.
"My roommate's alarm clock went off and woke me up in a very disoriented state," Wilson said. "I figured out that the alarm was buried underneath his pile of dirty clothes next to the refrigerator, and so I started pulling on the cord. It created sparks that turned into a small gout of flame right in my face."
Uninjured and successful in terminating the alarm, Wilson went right back to bed.
Proceed with care
While some of these situations seem extraordinary, other disasters when living on your own for the first time may seem inevitable. If you are lucky, situations such as locking yourself out of the room while standing in a towel or having a swarm of bees vacationing on your ceiling will be the biggest trauma you have to deal with.
But regardless of who you are and where you come from, living on your own is a whole new ballgame, but if you read the instructions first, you'll be less likely to strike out.
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