In an ideal world, we’d all have Instagram-worthy plans for the summer. Maybe backpacking in a foreign country with a string of attractive people and men who are in love with you. Would a camera crew be following you around, making you famous? Yes. Obviously. Or possibly, you’d have a classy yet cute job, like being an overpaid nanny and spending all of your time with adorable kids. Again with the camera crew. Whatever it was, your days would be spent getting tan, having fun, and making all of your followers jealous.

But, alas, most of us are not Instagram models/reality TV stars who somehow manage to travel to a new place daily. And while we’d all love to be back on campus, slamming $1 wine on Wednesdays, we didn’t think about signing up for a summer course until it was too late. And so, as your finals came to an end and your apartment told you that you had to leave, it quickly became apparent that your summer would be spent at home. In your house. With your parents. Here’s a general idea of how things are going to play out because trust me — you won’t make this mistake again.

1. Reconnect with your 13-year-old sister who you haven’t seen since Christmas.
2. And by reconnect, I mean tag along when she and her cheerleader friends go to the mall.
3. Realize she gets way more likes on all of her IG posts.
4. Stop hanging out with her and her stupid friends.
5. Unlike all of her pictures.
6. And tell her to return all of the shirts she stole from your room. That bitch.
7. Since you’re missing half of your wardrobe, wear all of your old clothes from high school, like your Soffees, ex-boyfriend’s sweatshirts, and dance uniform.
8. Realize you can’t fit into any of your old clothes after this past year’s diet of pizza, cheap beer, and peanut butter.
9. Figure this is the perfect time to get hot again.
10. Go for a five-mile run around your neighborhood.
11. A one-mile run?
12. A light jog around the block?
13. You know what? Just walk out to get the mail and come back. That counts.
14. Take 1,500 pictures of your family dog. A day. 1,500 a day.
15. Then be forced to choose between pictures of your family and pictures of your dog when your phone runs out of memory.
16. Delete 87 pictures of your parents.
17. Dress your dog up in your chapter jersey and take a few more.
18. Try tanning in the backyard? It always works out in movies.
19. Go back inside after you get bit by a million bugs and hit on by your creepy, married neighbor.
20. Decide to just apply self-tanner.
21. It’s the healthier option anyway, right?!
22. Cry when your knees and elbows turn orange.
23. Ask your mom to drive you to the tanning bed you basically lived at before prom.
24. Get lectured about safety, cancer, and the fact that you don’t take care of your beautiful skin.
25. Quickly realize your parents expect you to get a job this summer.
26. Argue back that they never really set that expectation before you came back from school.
27. Hear the ole, “what did you expect? To sit around and do nothing all summer” line.
28. Call them crazy because, yes, that’s exactly what you planned to do all summer.
29. Get sent to your room, even though you didn’t know parents could send you to your room after you’re legally considered an adult.
30. Go through your old memory box from high school.
31. Read the love notes from your ex.
32. And try on the promise ring he gave you. You know, *just* to see if it still fits.
33. Text him.
34. Text him hard.
35. Agree to meet up for a “coffee.”
36. Show up at his house, only to realize he actually did mean coffee.
37. Pray he doesn’t ask you to stop using his parents’ Netflix account.
38. Instead, listen to him talk about the girl he met at school this year who is ~absolutely perfect.~
39. Die a little on the inside.
40. Go home and spend the next 72 hours finding out every bit of information about his new girlfriend.
41. Redownload Tinder.
42. Find your married, creepy neighbor on Tinder.
43. Burn your phone and then throw it into a river.
44. Wonder if maybe this is hell.
45. Count down the days until you get to go back to campus.
46. Sure, it’s for recruitment but at this point, you don’t even care.
47. Check your school’s registration deadline for summer courses, and consider taking physics just to get out of your hometown.
48. Steal all of your clothes back from your sister’s closet (as well as a few super cute pieces she obviously got to make you jealous) and pack them up.
49. Stop by your ex’s house and say you forgot to mention the super great guy you’re seeing, but that you DO have a relationship and he IS a real person and you THINK it could be really serious.
50. Also, tell him his girlfriend looks sort of like a horse.
51. Tell your parents that a super riveting course just opened up and for the sake of your future and their future nursing home, you really have to go.
52. Push 90 as you drive the fuck out of your hometown. What? You gave it your best shot. But being away from home for too long is just so hard. And by “home,” yes — I do mean your favorite bar.

Congrats! You almost lasted a whole month (or a few days, depending on how your school’s schedule works). Either way, great try. Better luck let year, right?.

Nice Move143

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Rachel Varina

(yeahokaywhat) Aspiring to be the next Tina Fey, Rachel spends her free time doing nothing to reach that goal. While judging people based on how they use "they're" vs. "there" on social media, she likes eating buffalo chicken dip, watching other people's Netflix, and wearing sweatpants way more than is socially acceptable.

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