Welcome to the Greatest Birthday of Your Life
Biggie Smalls once said, “Birthdays was the worst days, now we sip champagne when we thirst-ay.” In Lloyd House, however, Birthdays are always the best days, and we eat cake instead of champagne, at least once per week to celebrate.
The Upper Class Counselor (UCC) is responsible for all of the members of his/her alley. One integral part of this job is celebrating birthdays!! A few days prior, the UCC will ask the soon-to-be birthday boy or girl about their favorite cake or dessert. The day just before, the UCC uses their supreme baking skills (not a prerequisite for the job, but definitely a perk) to create the confection of choice.
One of our frosh, Sophia, was given the Job of “Loud Frosh” at the beginning of the year. Just around 11:57pm, when the UCC pulls the cake out of the kitchen and sets it on the table in LC, the Loud Frosh announces to the house that a birthday is about to happen! How, you ask? Well, how else than by running around the house yelling at the TOP of their lungs, “BIRTHDAY IN LC!” We all crowd around the coffee table in LC admiring the cake until someone starts.
“Haaaaaaaaaaaaaa-“ More join in.
“HAAAAAAAAAAA-“ We all start to scream! “HAAAAAPY BIRRRRRTHDAAAAAAAAAY- As loud as possible, screaming at the top of our lungs, completely out of tune, all at different tempos, we sing to the Birthday Boy/Girl. The sound is unbelievably loud - but with a bunch of friends, it’s so much more fun than a regular birthday celebration! At the end, we all clap, woop-woop, hoot, and cheer. Then, we EAT.
Sitting in your room, tearing your hair out over some problem, the call for “Birthday in LC” is simply refreshing . It means it’s time to take a break. It’s time to let out a little stress. It’s time to go talk to someone else, regroup, and then get back to work with a new, fresher perspective. Sometimes we feel that we have so much weight on our shoulders, too much work to even handle.Working long hours without breaks is hard on the body and on the mind. We often forget that we do have to stop sometimes.Birthdays are a simple way that the whole house is able to reinforce our support network. We come together,take a little pause in our work, have a snack, and restart.
Enjoy pictures of some of our most recent cakes:
Andy’s rainbow cake was definitely one for the record books. Kudos to UCC Grace! ^
Nick turns 19 with a gourmet chocolate - ganache cake! Mad Props to UCC Katie! ^
The most recent birthday so far! Happy Birthday to Ritwik and Happy Cinco de May to you, Dear Reader!
Stan’s amazing longboard Rice Krispie cake, courtesy of Caltech Dining Service (CDS) ^
“And Many Moooooore!”
Until Next Time, Alison
