A Rice Lexicon

Slang from around campus. Take 'em with a grain of salt! Neither O-Week nor the University has anything to do with these sayings -- you can blame students for them.

#A B C D E F G H J K L M N O P R S T U V W

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45, 90, 180: Three slabs of 3 million dollar granite in the engineering quad. You have to do something involving 180 before you graduate. Ask your advisor.

A

A: What you got on your HIGH SCHOOL report cards.
Academ: Humanities or Social Sciences major. Wakes up after 11 AM and writes serious BS papers over 25 pages long.
Academic Quad: Sacred ground, residence of William Marsh Rice's Tomb and Statue. Feel free to sunbathe or hedge jump. Avoid picking up Willy's statue and turning it around 180 degrees.
Add/Drop: What you do when you wish to exit COMP 210 or ELEC 241 and enter SOCI 386, POLI 309, or LING 200. You have a whole ten weeks after classes to decide.
Aggies: Texas A&M people who can't spell their own names.
Ajeet: This guy who used to live in the Albert Patrick College. Go out of your way to get to know him.
Albert Patrick: The butler who killed William Marsh Rice and thus enabled the founding of our noble university.
Albert Patrick College: The 80's and 90's stairwells of Will Rice New Dorm. Each spring the APC seceeds from Will Rice and has its own college night.
Alcohol Policy: We have one because we have alcohol on campus (a privilege). Under 21? no, No, NO!
Archi: Architecture majors in Anderson Building Zoo. Animals on display 24 hrs a day.
Archi-Arts: Semi-formal in late Jan / early Feb put on by Archis. Unlike any formal you've ever seen.
Autry Court: "Jungle Gym" of Rice and home of your HPER requirement and various collegiate sports events including basketball, volleyball, and swimming.

B

"Baby got Back": A song which cannot be avoided at any Rice party. Learn to dance to it. Sigh.
Bacchanalia: The fantastic Brown party. Originated in 1989 involving grapes, wine, bread, and togas, decadence, and debauchery. Just how Bacchus liked it. Held the immediate weekend after Beer Bike.
Backpage: Thresher's home of Misclass (student submitted Freudian slips overheard or craftily made up).
Beer Bike: Main competetive event at the University. Three races (alumni, men, and women) involving ten chuggers and ten bikers each.
Beyond the Hedges: Outside Rice, where you go permanently after you graduate.
Bill the Cat: A kitten who was named Rice University's Homecoming King a few years ago. Other winners in recent years for King have included Doofus the ferret and the Transco Tower. Mikhail Gorbachev won Queen last year, but "Mitochondria" gave him quite a run for his money.
Big Three, The: MATH 101, CHEM 121, PHYS 101. Freshman SE hell unless AP credit saved your scrawny little butt.
Bonfire: The Homecoming bonfire. Relatively small, because unlike the cavemen-like Aggies we aren't still fascinated by fire.
Booting: Blowing Chunks, Chunder Biscuits, Driving the Big White Bus, Praying to the Porcelain God, Projectile Vomiting, Ralphing, Tossing Yer Cookies, Yawning in Technicolor..
Bump, The (aka Room Jack): The always-fun process of fighting with 225 of your closest friends for an on-campus room at your college. Held each spring, usually after an Eligibility jack.
Bunny Grades: Mid-Spring semester progress report. See Pumpkin Grades.

C

Campanile: Rice Yearbook (one free with each $18,000 of tuition paid). Also a huge smokestack behind Mech Quad.
Campos: Campus Police. You'll learn.
Chem Lec: Once home of all the big science classes (Chem, Orgo, etc.) and $1 movies provided by colleges. Now an; odd-smelling lecture hall with the occasional class.
CHUG!: Slamming flat beer or water in large gulps, but little time. Over 5 seconds for 24 ounces? You lose.
CK: Central Kitchen , pioneer of Crispy Cod. Mmmm!
Club 13 (better known as Baker 13): Group of Barbasol exhibitionists who streak across campus on the 13th, 26th, and 31st of each month. Halloween and April 26th have the biggest turnouts, along with the Senior run at the end of the year.
Coffeehouse, The: Student-run coffehouse outside of Sammy's. Try the chai.
CoHo: Cohen House, the faculty dining club of Rice University. Work there and you'll get free food.
Cougar High: Crosstown "competition." Also known as the University of Houston.

D

Dead Week: Four days before Finals start, whoopee!
Disc: What Ultimate Frisbee players call a frisbee. The rest of us know better.
Disci Pro (diss-ee-pro): Disciplinary probation, the penalty of no life -- just classes. Behave or you get it.
Displaced, to be (aka Sexiled): When a roommate kicks the other out for the entertainment of a significant (or insignificant) other.

E

Eight o'clocks: Classes to be avoided at all costs. Don't fool yourself into thinking you'll actually get up in time. Besides, your bed is much more comfortable to sleep in than a lecture chair.
e-mail: Electronic mail. Talk to your friends at Harvard, or Lamar University, or even oversees for free. Data will be digitized. Your best friend in the entire 4 years at Rice will be e-mail.
(D)Esperanza: First formal of the year, biggest attendance. Why? The girls ask and pay for the entire date. Means "hope" in Spanish, hmmm...
Extension: Recommended for Academ classes. Your prof understands you have other classes to tend to.

F

F&H: Food and Housing. Also, Forgetful and Horrible. True story: F&H was contracted to build a kitchen for one of; the colleges. They forgot to install THE KITCHEN SINK and had to redo the job.
Fairie Fountain: Two chicks of stone, playing in water, located between Jones and Brown, you'll get to know them on your birthday.
Freshman 15: You'll definitely gain weight. All you have time to do is eat, sleep, and study. (Right.)

G

Galleria: A huge mall with Macy's, Lord and Taylor, an ice rink, Neimann-Marcus, Marshall Fields, and much more.
Gillis' Pool: Winning a Beer Bike race means a traditional dip in the University president's private pool.

H

Health Services: Rice's own quack shack, located in Hanszen college's old dorm. Make an appointment and they can usually fix what ails you. If what ails you is something like a multiple skull fracture, they'll give you a band-aid and refer you to an appropriate specialist. On the upside the doctors are friendly and the staff really cares.
Headwaiter: Runs the food line. Be sure to bring your ID card.
Hermann Park: Across the street from campus on South Main. Big, nice park complete with duck pond, zoo, screaming children, a golf course, and swings. There's also an outdoor theater that has cool productions/concerts during the spring and fall.
Hook Up: To become very familiar with someone you lust after. Often preceded by the word "drunken." Exactly what the term means depends on circumstance.
HUMA: Class the SE's love to hate. They learn more about Homer and Job than Academ.

I

ID card: Your meal card, library card, sports ticket, and entrance into buildings - don't lose it.

J

Jack: Practical joke. Pulled on colleges during O-Week and the night before Beer Bike. Usually leads to some form of retaliation.

K

Kitchen ladies: They make CK food edible. Be nice.
KTRU (91.7 FM): Pronounced kay-true, mostly good for bumper stickers. 50,000 watts of pan banging.

L

Labbie: Grad students (and sometimes undergrads) who teach your science labs and speak no English (well, the undergrads do).
LegoLab: Elec 201, a much sought-after class where people build robots out of legos. The greatest; class many engineers and academs will ever take together.
Louie, Louie: Rice's unofficial theme song. The only song the MOB knows how to play.

M

Makeup: (1) Gift from your prof if you oversleep. (2) Something Rice women tend to blow off after about a week.
Martel College: The 9th college, Martel, is currently built in the Jones College parking lot. It will have state-of-the-art facilities (more singles than you can shake a bike at!) but little history. If you choose to abandon your own college and become part of the Martel founding class, you too can be living in a little piece of paradise on the north side of campus. Don't be too hard on the the first few years; every new college has a traditional sucking period. It continues until another college is built.
Matriculation: The first formal Rice event at which you are officially inducted into the University.
Mecom Fountain: Big fountain down the street from Brown, near the Museum District. The place to be thrown into on your twenty-first birthday.
Meat Sheet / Meet Sheet: The Newcomer's Guide with all new students pictured. Used extensively for Screw Your Roomate.
Mesopotamians: Inventors of beer 6000 years ago.
Misclass: See Backpage.
MOB: The infamous Marching Owl Band. Even if you hate football, this is a reason to go to the games.
MPS: Member of the Preferred Sex.

N

NAFTA: North American Free Trade Agreement.
NOD (Night of Decadence): Jaw-dropping scantily clad people party at Wiess. Once made Playboy's top-10 parties list.
NOI (Night of Innocence): Sid Rich's pre-NOD party featuring cartoons, cereal, cookies, and milk. Wear your PJs.
NSCI (not-see): SE's have HUMA, but Academs have to go through their own private hell, where they endure the rigors of the Big Three in one incomprehensible course.

O

O/C: Off campus.
Orgo: Chem 211, Organic Chemistry. Notoriously hard and the end of many a pre-med.
O-Week: Orientation Week for new students at Rice. Held one week before the first week of classes. The best week of your life. We hope you figured this one out by now.

P

PDR (Private Dining Room): Interviews, Meetings, and Hors d'euvres are dealt with in here. Connected to the commons.
Powderpuff: Women's football. As one coach put it, "Where you can see that sweet, innocent girl you met in lab viciously knock another girl on her arse."
Pre-pub: Informal parties thrown before pub night.
Pseudoport (aka Rallyport): Rallyport: The arch in the George R. Brown building. Before the Campus Police started looking down on such things, the Rally Club used to gather there for pre-game "pep rallys." PT (aka QPT); Patio Time or Quality Patio Time. Spent on the patio of your college bonding with 225 of your closest friends. Where the Varsity Smokers Team hangs out.
Pub, The: The undergraduate watering hole, located in the bottom of the RMC. Weekly Thursday Night Scamfest!
Pub Frisbees: Pub pizza was not always the high quality food item it is today.
Pub Night: The official starting line of the weekend, where half the campus shows up at the pub (Thursday night).
Pub Rat: A person about whom a sentence cannot be spoken without the word "Pub."
Pumpkin Grades: Newcomers receive mid-semester grades around the time of Halloween.
Purity Test: A measure of your sins. The only test you don't have to study for, and getting a low score is OK.

R

RAVL: Super-duper computer graphics lab in Anderson Hall. See "Archi."
Rally Club: A 72-year old Rice club involving cheap beer, vulgar songs, and white overalls. See them directly behind the opponents bench at any varsity event.
Rice Chorale: A place where anyone can sing since membership is non-selective. Get an hour's worth of credit easy.
Rice Stadium: 75,000 seats of raw football goodness built in the 50's when Rice could beat other teams. Hosted a Super Bowl, JFK's speech about the moon, Pink Floyd, Garth Brooks, a whole lot of Texas High School football, and the long-awaited Eagles reunion (July 2, 1994).
RMC (Rice Memorial Center): Home to the Coffeehouse, Campus Store, Career Services, Thresher, Campanille, Willy's Pub, and more. If you ever don't know where something is on campus, try here. Please don't call it the Student Center.
Roll: A class that's hard to find, but easy to pass.
Rondelet (aka "Random Lay"): Rondelet (a.k.a. "Random Lay") Annual spring formal. Until Spring 2000, it was ludicrously held the night of Beer-Bike, when most people were tired, sunburnt and hungover. Now it's held the weekend before Beer-Bike as a beginning to Willy Week festivities.
Rugby Players: The only fraternity on campus, but lucky for us they all live off campus.
Rustication: Rustication: Harshest penalty Rice delivers short of expulsion. You can still come to classes, but otherwise can't set foot on campus. Is not a normal disciplinary procedure -- you can ONLY be rusticated by your college masters.

S

SA: Student Association, of which every undergrad is a member. They mostly make teeshirts.
Sally Club: Extremely formidable female version of the Rally Club.
Sallyport: That big arch in Lovett Hall that you will walk through after matriculation and hopefully after graduation. It's major bad luck to walk back out it before you graduate. Doing so may result in loss of mojo. The Sallyport is also the university magazine that your parents will get.
Sammy the Owl: Rice's mascot. Once took down the Baylor mascot. Hell yeah.
Sammy's: Expensive cafe in the RMC. Use your ID card and get GOOD (well, at least better) CK food.
Scamming: A main pastime at the Pub. Results in loss of purity points.
Scho-Pro (Scholastic Probation): What happens when your GPA dips below 1.67. You get one semester to pull it up or bye-bye Miss American Pie.
Scooter: A legend of Baker 4th entrance. Ask an upperclassman about him.
Screw-Yer-Roomate: An event in the fall where you set your roommate up with a blind date, generally using the Meat Sheet.
SE: Science and Engineering major. The people academs turn to when the bottom drops out of the art history major job market.
Self-scheduled Exams: Decide for yourself when you want to take your final. (Procrastinator's dream, and worst nightmare.)
South College: The possibly fictional 10th college. In the original plans, the building that is now being built as the new Wiess was to become a new college, referred to as South College, and a new Wiess College was to be built on the site of the current Wiess. Then, it was planned for the students who live at Wiess to move into the unnamed South College for a period of four years, during which Wiess College would be rebuilt on the site of the current Wiess. Because they felt that living for so long in a building not named "Wiess" would be detrimental to the spirit of the college, the students requested last April that South College be permanently named "Wiess College." Plans for building the 10th college on the site of new Wiess have been suspended for an indefinite amount of time. Whatever.
Spec's: Either the Holcombe location or the downtown warehouse will satisfy any weekend booze needs.
Steam Tunnels: The system of underground tunnels connecting all buildings on campus. Strictly off-limits, but only if you get caught. (See "rustication.")
Sweep: To win all three races (Mens', Womens', Alums') in Beer Bike. Only Will Rice has managed to do it. Three times, at that.
Swing: The luckier colleges have a comfortable swing hanging from a treebranch.

T

TG's: Parties held from about 4 to 6 pm every Friday. Celebrate the end of the week.
Thresher: Rice's weekly student newspaper, known for groundbreaking investigative journalism on Squirrel Obesity. Home of the infamous Backpage.
Tower Party: Sid, Hanszen, and Will Rice each have versions of a Tower Party.

U

U-Bangee: A Wiess ritual. You probably would rather not know.
U-Blue: Short for University Blue, the literary magazine of Rice, published in the spring.
Undergrounds, The: A cool, informal coffehouse in the basement of Lovett on Fridays. Open-mike and music.

V

Valhalla: The grad student bar beneath Chem Lec. Open all year, serves cheap beer. Scary.
'Vator/Vader: Elevator. Yes, we're too lazy to say whole word, especially when its door is about to close and you're on the outside. "Holda-vader, holda-vader!"
Viking Table: Eat with no hands. Wear napkin hats. Bad idea.
Village, The: Yuppie shops across the street from Rice. Every kind of store imaginable.
Village Brewery: Mmm, beer.
Virgin's Walk: The lifeline sidewalk that connects Brown and Jones to the rest of the university. So named because the colleges were previously all-female. Ask your advisor what it means to kick out the lights.

W

Walk: Your prof has 15 minutes to show up for class, or you get one of these.
Walk of Shame: Heading back to Jones or Brown in the early morning hours. Ask your advisor for more details.
Weinerhole/Weenieloft: College computer labs and libraries in the top floors of Will Rice and Hanszen.
Willy's Statue: Great place to meet your Screw Yer Roommate date. Sit in Willy's lap before you graduate.

(adapted and expanded in 1999 from a page by James H. Koh and other sources)