College may have ended for me in December, but my experience at the University of Tennessee concludes today. And now I will bestow the best ways to enjoy the rest of your years.

Parking

If parking woes have you down, then change the tactic. Do not purchase a parking ticket.

Instead park at the meters on the street. The University of Tennessee does not own the public streets, so the Knoxville Police Department are the only ones who can write tickets. Plus, the tickets are substantially less than the ones UT writes. If there is not a parking meter available, then park in yellow zones on the roads. There are a few yellow spots on campus that are easily accessible and do not tow. Here’s a few: Beside the rock, in front of the College of Nursing and by the Hearing and Speech Center.

I only had two tickets from 2007-2008.

Lunch

Make a friend who has a meal plan.

Why? Because he or she has the ability to buy you lunch or dinner at no cost to them. Most students do not come near to finishing the allocated meals in their plans. I didn’t.

Ask them to buy you food using their meal plan rather than dining dollars. Why waste free food? This only works at the all-you-can-eat cafeterias.

Dorm Life

Late night partying in the residence halls sometimes leads to disgruntled hall-mates, and that leads to disgruntled Resident Assistants. The RAs will march up to your room and knock on the door.

By this time, there is panic amongst the guests, but before you open the door and submit, remember you have the right to refuse entry. If someone “less aware” opens the door and welcomes the RA, that RA is not allowed to touch, move or open anything.

Granted, if the guests are out of control and the RA can smell, see or hear anything suspicious, the room can be searched. The RA will contact the hall director and the hall director will contact the Dean of Students office for authorization to search. This does happen, so try not to be like sophomores John Chalmers Thompson and Erik Benson Kenney. They lived in Melrose Hall and had a dimethyltryptamine lab.

That is all I have. Enjoy life. And if things get you down, then stay up late, get a cheesecake and start a pot of coffee. It always worked for Dorothy, Rose, Blanche and Sophia.