If you go to the C-Shop in the morning, you'll discover a rare find: businessman. I was there at 7:30 this morning, and there were all these B-School types ordering power bagels and obscure cream cheeses. They were all really irritable, too; not in the, "my graduate thesis is killing my soul day by day" way that you usually see, but in the, "I have somewhere to be right now that is more important than your right to exist" way. The short guy wearing a suit in front of me got frustrated because the credit card machine wasn't working, and gave the woman that pained expression and tone that suggests, "your lack of efficiency is intolerable, but if I tried to suggest improvement, your intellect would be incapable of recognizing that which is good for you." Then he stepped to the side, put on his sunglasses, and waited for his bagel to toast.

It might be a naive project, but I've undertaken a project to neutralize the vast bubble of interpersonal coldness on campus. Why don't people just talk to each other sometimes? Most college students are OK, but the graduate students act like the walking dead. That's why one arm of my project is going to be the GRADUATE STUDENT OUTREACH PROGRAM.

The Graduate Student Outreach Program in action:

[scene: I'm standing next to a grad student waiting for the elevator in the library. The elevator is taking a ridiculously long time. The silence starts to become awkward.]

Me: This sure is taking a long time.
Grad Student: I know!

You see how I reached out, and made an interpersonal connection? That's helping people. After that point, I usually turn around and leap out the 4-story window.