A few of us UT students are lucky enough to call The Howard Johnson, aka the HoJo, home. No one else gets maids to come in, vacuum your room, clean your bathroom, change your sheets, and make your bed for you. The HoJo is like a little community away from all the hustle and bustle of campus. In order to make it to classes you have two options, take the incredibly unreliable shuttle, which is like the hunger games trying to get on, or to walk. Most of the time, the second option is usually the better option. Here are ten things that the HoJo kids think about while walking to campus:
1. Is it going to rain?
This is a question all of UT students have to answer before leaving their rooms. But for kids who live in the HoJo, they are about to embark on a 15-minute walk and getting stuck in the rain is not the best way to start the day.
2. I hope nothing is going on at the Straz Center, I really don’t feel like having to walk around it.
Often times, the Straz Center holds fancy events with valet service and they don’t want a bunch of college freshman walking through and crashing the party, so they block off the pathway to cut through. Walking through the Straz is the quickest way to campus, and when they block it off, you are forced to turn around and walk around it, and it’s a huge inconvenience.
3. Hey ducks, if you don’t bother me, I wont bother you.
Walking through the Straz Center, there is always a flock of ducks that you are bound to run into. I don’t know about anyone else, but I was always terrified that one of them was going to turn around and start attacking me.
4. Does walking to campus count as going to the gym?
The walk to campus is almost a mile, so if I walk there and back, I wont have to go to the gym, right?
5. No cars better drive by while I’m on the bridge. I’m not trying to have it shake and break and end up falling in the Hillsborough River.
The scariest part about walking to campus (even scarier than the attacking ducks) was walking over the bridge. Whenever a car, or god forbid a bus, would drive over it while you were walking on it, the entire bridge would shake uncontrollably. Your best option is to walk over it as fast as you can.
6. I should’ve taken the shuttle
By now you’ve reached the point where you’re hot, tired, and sweaty. You are having second thoughts about this whole walking thing.
7. What is that smell right by the prep school?
At some point between the end of the bridge and Tampa Prep, an awful smell arises. It is a mixture between rotten eggs and cow manure. You ever really get used to it.
8. It’s going to take me four years to cross the street
9. Why is Plant Hall so far away?
Walking to Plant Hall is basically like climbing Mt. Everest. You think that once you reach the gate by Stadium you are home free, until you realize you still have to walk all the way across campus.
10. I’m taking the shuttle back
After you monumental walk to campus, you make the executive decision to take the shuttle home. You’ll just have to throw a couple elbows to make sure you get a seat.