Oh, to be young again.

It’s tough to describe the feeling of entering your first year of university. It’s scary, it’s exciting and it’s liberating, all in one fell swoop. It can be either the greatest eight months of your life or the worst, depending on how you go about it.
But fear not, young frosh, for we at the Gazette are here to help. Here are the 10 things we wish we had known when we were in first year.

Take advantage of DC++
While we at the Gazette do not condone the illegal sharing of copyrighted music, movies, applications and pornography, we do recognize DC++ is the single greatest invention known to mankind and is essential to advancing your procrastination habits. Ask your res soph about it.

Watch what you eat
While eating nothing but chicken fingers and pizza — washed down with four tall boys of Milwaukee Ice, of course —may seem delicious, your liver and arteries would beg to differ.

According to Health Canada, females and males 19 years of age or older should be consuming 7 to 10 servings of vegetables and fruit per day.  We know — that’s ridiculous.  But maybe you should consider throwing in a banana or two between cramming down that grilled cheese and those wonderful little meatballs they have in the cafeteria.

Everybody gains weight in first year — it’s just science. But if you don’t manage your consumption properly you’ll quickly balloon into a colossal, hideous, over-sized version of yourself that no one likes because you sweat all the time and smell like cheese.

And for those of you who were wondering, Health Canada doesn’t provide a recommendation for the number of beers you should consume per day. We ballpark it at about six, but we’re not doctors.

Floorcest

This is the piece of advice you will receive almost unanimously from upper-year students — because we were idiots once too. Don’t do it. Don’t think about it. Don’t consider it. Don’t drink yourself into a stupor in order to lower your inhibitions and make it seem like a somewhat plausible idea.

Just don’t do it.

And don’t say we didn’t warn you.

It’s okay to say “no”

Okay, buzzkill alert. We’re going to get all after-school special on you.
First year can be a whirlwind of new experiences — translation: there’s a lot of partying. And it’s easy to get caught up in a mess where everyone else is doing this or taking that and you feel that if you don’t follow suit you won’t be accepted. It sounds like an episode of Degrassi, but it happens.
If you think you’ve had enough to drink, say no. If you feel uncomfortable in a sexual situation, say no. If you’re not sure about the drugs everyone is doing, say no.
Saying no can mean the difference between a great night of socializing and having fun with friends and a terrible night spent vomiting in a residence washroom while your R.A. gives you a lecture about abusing drugs and alcohol. And we haven’t even mentioned the pictures of you that will appear on Facebook the next day.

Be friendly with your profs/TAs
This is the one piece of advice we could conjure up that is actually related to academics — why are we here anyway? — during your time at university; so you know it’s going to be good. Go out of your way to talk to, charm and ass-kiss all of your professors and teaching assistants, no matter how insulting or revolting they may be. Getting on your educator’s good side does wonders for receiving an extension on an assignment and getting those extra couple marks to push you over an 80 average.

Get involved with the Gazette
Sure, you could use your time in first year to get involved with some silly student council or lame special interest club. Go ahead, throw your university career away.
Or you could step up to the big leagues and get involved with the most legendary, hard-working bunch of party animals on campus. The fact of the matter is, when it comes to campus media there is no other outlet that compares to the Gazette. We are Canada’s largest student newspaper and the only one in the country that publishes daily.
Do you have an interest in writing, graphics, the web or photography? Why not stop by room 263 of the UCC and see what we’re all about.

Dump the long distance boy/girlfriend
Living in residence is a whole lot more fun when you don’t have to spend your weekends travelling great distances on a smelly bus to see your high school flame and your weekdays having endless telephone conversations about your feelings.
Trust us, it’s not going to last.

Go see Rick McGhie at the Spoke lounge on Wednesday nights
Monday’s suck — the weekend is over and the harsh realities of a new week have set in. Tuesday is just a lackluster, watered-down Monday in disguise. But Wednesday — sweet, glorious Wednesday. We at the Gazette like Wednesdays.
Every Wednesday around 10 p.m. you can find the wisenheimers from the Gazette and about 200 other inebriated regulars at the Spoke singing along as local legend and Western alumnus Rick McGhie plays classic tunes like “American Pie”, “Leaving on a Jet Plane” and “Heart of Gold”.
McGhie has been playing your favorite songs since before you were born — we’re not exaggerating — and once you get a taste of Wednesday nights with McGhie you’ll be hooked for the rest of your university career.
If you only manage to do one thing in your first year at Western, make sure this is it.

Look for second year accommodations early
When we say early, we mean early. Like, December early. The best off-campus housing is gobbled up extremely quickly come the new year, so figure out who you’re going to live with, target an area that you would like to live in and scour the real estate listings as soon as possible.
You don’t want to be left with the scraps.

Hold off on buying your textbooks
There are numerous reasons to delay buying your textbooks until at least the third week of the semester.
First, anyone who goes to the bookstore in the first week of classes is stark-raving mad. The unruly mob that descends upon the lower level of the UCC, madly scrambling to acquire that last copy of the course pack for Advanced Microphysical Formulas of Metaphysics and Sub-Linear Equations, is vicious and should be avoided at all costs. We heard last year one kid lost an arm.
Second, oftentimes books are listed as required but are only used for one reading. Save your money and photocopy the reading at the library. You don’t want to spend $500 on a bunch of books that will remain in their original wrapping until Christmas and end up being used to prop up your wobbly coffee table.
Third, talk to your sophs and see if they have any friends who have taken your courses in previous years. They likely still have the textbook and will be willing to unload it for a fraction of the price you would pay at the bookstore.
Finally, beware any professor who puts his/her own book on the list of required texts. Some professors do, in fact, teach from books they have penned — see Psych with Dr. Mike. However, some cheeky professors are only including their texts on the list to pad their wallets. If you suspect a professor of doing this, raise your hand in the middle of lecture and ask them what charitable foundation they will be donating the proceeds from the class’s book sales to.