Steve EM - BYU Drove Me To Drink!
[9:45 AM | 3 comments ]

The best snark material is stuff I can't make up. Yes, Steve EM now puts the blame for his dalliance in controlled substances squarely at the feet of the Brigham Young statue in front of BYU's Smoot Administration building.

I must admit, BYU drove me to drink as well - large quantities of Diet Coke.

3 comments

Steve EM said... @ March 17, 2006 at 11:37 AM

Good one Snarkey. In the end, we’re all responsible for our actions and I probably would have had LofC issues and drank wherever I went to school, especially given some serious self esteem issues I carried post mission. But BYU’s coldness was definitely a contributing factor.

Booze does make people feel better about themselves, and greatly facilitates casual dating, which makes you feel even better about yourself, at least most of the time, unless the encounter is on the awful side, like the engaged gal I commented about once. I was sick for days after that. But the long term effects are most problematic. Mine carried well into my marriage and reactivation. To young people: if you need help find someone you can talk things out with. Don’t self medicate.

Now Speed is far more effective than caffeine in promoting studies. A little coke snorting to get through finals does wonders too. I hear kids today use Ritalin for this. Although, ground up and snorted, what’s the difference between that and coke?

I suggest students today try Modafinil, which Clark turned me on to. That wasn't available in my day. It’s about as effective as Speed, and you don’t get the jitters.

Stephen said... @ March 18, 2006 at 7:56 PM

Here’s my 2 cents, and 2 cents, and two cents……..:

BYU is not a friendly place, spiritual or otherwise. The sterile campus says it all. I’ve attended three universities: BYU, U of Michigan and Princeton. BYU, the only religious school, was by far the least friendly and least accommodating of students. I’ve sometimes wondered if my drinking/drug problem would have been less severe had I not gone to BYU. BYU Hawaii seems much more like what BYU was meant to be in terms of blending higher learning with spiritual pursuits.

There’s an obvious a conflict among the apostles on whether the church should even be in the higher education business, hence the stalemate on expanding church education with the growing church. I wish they’d expand it or sell it off, the stalemate is maddening.

Having the BYU mandatory religion classes be of a different caliber than local institute is also problematic, given the church’s encouragement to young people to stay at home and commute to a local university rather than come to BYU.

On the money issue, when you're a parent in your early twenties, early career money is extremely important. Although, I can’t imagine earning an engineering degree, for example, if you didn’t have a passion for it.

Geoff B. makes a good point that the university and trade school experiences should be blended. That would combine the luxury of pursuing a liberal education and the ability to earn a living wage as a plumber, mechanic, electrician, car refinisher, HVAC, etc.

Wow.

BTW, "Modafinil" and "Clark" -- care to expand some more?

Steve EM said... @ March 20, 2006 at 6:23 AM

Stephen E.,
For background, Clark Goble has done a post or two on cognitive enhancing drugs, including Modafinil, which I've tried on Clark's recommendation. I’ve been long putting off doing a review of my experience with the stuff over at Open Forum, a site I've neglected for months. Anyway, I’ve only used it so far to cheat sleep for report writing and all night driving from our vacation home rather than to specifically boost IQ. Before anyone jumps in, let me warn there are sexual side effects along with a paradoxical heighten sensuality and euphoria, sort of like a mild version of Ecstasy. In other words, you probably wouldn’t want to take this stuff to get over jet lag while vacationing with a lover. And if your lover happened to want the heightened touching pleasure w/o sex experience, you’d be using Ecstasy, not Modafinil.

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