It is four a.m. I have been asleep for roughly two hours. I can still smell and taste this really disgusting pizza we had a few hours earlier. Suddenly the fire alarm goes off throughout the entire building. I decide I'm going to go back to sleep until a tiny voice in my head starts shouting like a computer nerd during a power failure, "you're an RA! Get the heck out there!" I kind of wish we had a costume we could wear underneath our clothing with the letters RA (Resident Assistant) in the middle like Superman's. This way I could hurl myself out the window, land on my feet, and report for duty without breaking a sweat.

Unfortunately I'm not that lucky. It's four in the morning, and when it's that early, nothing wants to work, not even your brain. After tripping over my cable wire, I manage to grab whatever clothes I can find and put them on. As I go the door I realize I live in Potsdam, and in this wonderful town of ours, it is most likely freezing outside, even in the middle of April. So I stop, take a deep breath, and grab my winter jacket as I go out the door. I have the feeling it could be a long one...

On my way down the stairs one of my residents points out there was some smoke drifting in from the 5th floor. I stop, poke my head in, and then that little voice goes off again, "Hey Jerk, since you got out of bed late, it is likely most of the people are outside. You should get your ass down there." For once that little voice had some sound advice. Usually he is telling me to pick fights with small children in front of their parents. I make my way down the stairs, check in with my fellow RAs, and go to work making sure no one runs back into the building while the fire department does their thing. This gives me some time to reflect on common occurrences I have experienced at different colleges during a fire alarm. I would like to share some advice for those of you who find yourself outside during a fire alarm:

1) Shut up.

Seriously. Shut up. And I don't mean shut up if you're talking to your friends or privately bitching about being outside. That's ok with me. It's cold and it's early. No one wants to be outside, not even your Resident Assistants. But every time students have to go outside, there is always someone who has to be the center of attention. And that person must think they're hip, cool, and original for being stupid. Shouting stuff like "Whoooo" or the ever popular "Let's rush the door, they can't catch all of us!" is just stupid. Go play Frisbee or something if you have that much energy so early in the morning. Of course, the worst example of this was at Alfred State during the semester's first fire drill. Everyone filed out, the RAs did their thing and blocked the door until it was safe, and everyone was quiet. And then suddenly out of the great void one idiot decides to shout, "Let's play the hokey pokey!" I won't lie; I was hoping someone would kill him. No one cares or wants to hear what idiotic things you have to yell during a fire drill. You know what they do want to hear? "It's OK to go back inside." Anything before that is just white noise. And I don't mean the kind where the dead people speak to you.