Off-campus: Themed House Parties

Once upon a time at a party in some college town, some kids were sitting around the keg and thinking. They decided that while this beer tasted good, and the music was nice, what would make this party a million times better is... costumes.

You login to Facebook one afternoon and see five event invitations. After declining to attend to the Autism Awareness 5k Fun Run and an Investment Club Social, you find invites to three house parties, each with a different theme.

Toga Party

Ever since you were ten, the media has told you that college is going to be off-the-chain awesome all the time. They even made a movie about it called Animal House. Besides littering dorm rooms nationwide with posters of ugly-as-sin Jim Belushi, this cinematic masterpiece gave us the toga party.

How amazingly original, you think upon reading the invite, but after looking at the guest list you notice half your friends and that one hot girl from sociology class are going. You then realize that none of your sheets are white. You don't feel like going to campus bookstore and pissing away $49.99 on another set of extra long sheets for your dorm bed just so you can go to a toga party. What else can work?

After some hard work and ingenuity, you arrive at the party. Everyone is looking at you, possibly because using some safety pins, you managed to MacGyver a white bath towel and two white sleeping shirts into a toga. And you looking absolutely ridiculous.

Naughty Office Party

Also known as a "CEOs and corporate hoes" party, this theme is particularly popular with business students and other professional majors. This party exists for one reason, and one reason only: to give guys opportunity to try and fulfill every office-porno fantasy ever. One girl will clearly outdo them all when she arrives in nothing but jaw-dropping black panties, a suit jacket, and black pantyhose.

Gentlemen will be expected to wear shirts and ties, or in some cases, a suit. You will party hard, of course, and some time around your fourth shot you will forget you are wearing a suit. You will only remember this fact the next day when you receive your dry cleaning bill thanks to all of the spilled beer and chip dip. And did some asshole burn a hole in your jacket with a cigarette?!

Stoplight Party

Your final invite is for a stoplight party. Your host explains that you are to wear a piece of clothing in one of three color choices: green if you are single, yellow if it's complicated, and red if you are taken. You will likely think to yourself, what better opportunity than this exists to mix alcohol and social humiliation?

You are obviously very single, but don't rush for your green shirt just yet. If you wear green, everyone will think you are a desperate loser who can't get a date. If you wear red, not only are you full of it, you might miss out on the fun. Yellow could work, but that's still bullshitting it. Against your better judgment, you decide to be honest and don your green shirt.

Lo and behold, at the party almost no one is wearing green. Awesome, now you look like a total tool. Either everyone but you is getting it, or this party is full of liars. You start for the keg, but then turn to flee when you notice a girl with the face of a troll is already there filling her cup. Run faster, maybe she didn't- awww no, it's too late. She's noticed you, and guess what- she's wearing GREEN.

After you peel yourself away from that awkward conversation, you head for the kitchen. In there, a bunch of girls in yellow are swooning over some dickwad wearing a red Chicago Bulls jacket, who smirks triumphantly in your direction. They're obviously thinking that he must be taken for a good reason, and that you must be single for a different, but equally good reason. Hiding your jealousy, you go to the living room where you notice a girl in red sitting on her boyfriend's lap, and all the time she's definitely giving you the look- you know the one that says "don't you wish you could have this" along with a coy smile.


Reminder: A good party shouldn't even need a premise in the first place, and there are always plenty of those to bounce to if you ever find yourself in one you don't want to be in.