Journal 5: Profile

My dorm room is a small room. On either side of the entrance are two desks, mirrors, and closets. Behind each of the two desks are two unmade beds with navy blue comforters. Between the two beds sits a 17-inch flat screen TV on top of a microwave, which itself sits on top of a TV. The microwave and refrigerator are connected by screws and are a common site in dorm rooms at Penn State. On the front of our refrigerator are numerous strange phrases. One sentence reads, “I workout with consent”, while another reads, “I respect sleep.” These sentences are formed by numerous magnets which have words written on them, which have been pushed together by my roommate.

I look over to the left and there is my roommate, Bob. He sits there hunched over his computer for the better part of many weeknights. His computer game is pulled up on the screen. All I can see from my seat is the outline of what looks like the outline of a small town. He has on a loose, long-sleeved, white t-shirt. At the wrists the shirt is too loose and the bottoms of the sleeves droop when he holds his hands up to reveal his boney wrists. His poorly shaped beard looks like awkwardly formed facial hair instead of a beard intentionally shaped in that way. Occasionally, he yells something at the Phillies game, which is on the TV.

“He’s just, well, he’s just Bob. That’s really the only way to describe it.” – Conor McGonigle. Conor has been a good friend of Bob for several years. He also roomed with Bob in the summer session here at Penn State and knows him very well.

“I mean I don’t really care if people think it’s weird. Ya know?” – Bob. Bob said this after I was making fun of him for his this crazy hat that he has. It is made of frizzy strands made to look a little like a wig. Half of the strands are blue and the other half are white for Penn State colors.

“He does a lot of goofy stuff, but he’s one of the nicest guys I’ve ever met.” – Nate Kurylo. Nate is another friend of Bob’s from high school. I like this quote because it underlines one of the main points that I want to portray in my paper; it doesn’t really matter how odd some of the stuff he does seems because he’s really a cool and nice guy.

One thing that I found interesting on Bob’s Facebook is that he likes “that kid got mad over an A- when you just got a D.” This says a lot about Bob’s laid back approach to a lot of things because although he does well in school, he never really gets too worked up about it. Another interesting fact that I found on his Facebook is that Bob’s AIM address is soccerbert21. I found this interesting because I have never really heard him use the name Bert. Another fact that I found from his mom is that he hates the name Robert. A final fact that I learned from his mom is that he is extremely close with his family.

One area that I found that I want to investigate is the reason that Bob hates the name Robert, and where the name Bert came from. Another area that I think that I want to look into more would be talking to more members of his family because I think that they might have some useful information that I did not expect.