Saturday could have been a great day. I might have awakened to the sound of birds chirping outside my window, the light of the sun streaming through the blinds, and the smell of freshly brewed coffee. Instead, it was blink-182 cover bands, the dim light of a chilly, overcast, sporadically rainy day, and the stench of portable toilets that greeted me that morning. Some Lawrentians look forward to Octoberfest as a chance to mingle with Appletonians, eat fried Twinkies, and immerse themselves in a carnival-like atmosphere. For Lawrentians like me, however, Octoberfest incites a fury only tempered by the knowledge that the whole affair will be short-lived. I spent most of Saturday morning gazing sulkily out the windows of the conservatory upon the sweaty, mustached guitarists in cutoff jeans who were performing for a crowd of crapulous hooligans of various ages. These men will earn more money in one afternoon of crotch grabbing and power chord strumming than any serious conservatory musician can expect to see in a whole season of recital performances. I winced as I witnessed Main Hall Green being trampled into a brown, matted muck. I whined as my normal pilgrimage to Downer was turned into a half-hour gauntlet between rows of corndog-wielding children. I wallowed in my sorrow at this invasion of my campus. All this frustration stems from the fact that Octoberfest bursts that precious Lawrence Bubble, reminding me that the world which I will enter upon graduation is not one of symphonies and symposiums, but of Britney Spears and Budweiser. Octoberfest is an annual celebration of the victory of the popular over the elitist, and for that I hate it.
ARGHtoberfest
