These people ruin Elms for everyone

Elms is a menagerie of mingers, a colony of the incompetent, an unholy gathering of the worst millennial brats that Generation Y has to offer.

As shadows of un-emptied bins and last week’s Bolognese dance around the walls, as echoes of screaming ensuite toilets sing a melancholic chorus of regret, we examine the worst of the worst of the worst.

Gym Buddies

Skipping class, skipping leg day and often skipping showers, these are the ways of the Gym Buddies. Exercise is good for the soul, but spending thousands a year missing lectures to press some benches and ab some crunches makes about as much sense as doing bicep curls in the squat rack.

But don’t mess with the gym buddies. They pack enough punch to pulverize your odds of getting that Elms deposit back.

Yes, students get drunk, stuff gets broken, we get it – but only these guys can make your flat end up looking like it went toe-to-toe with the Death Star.

Protein powder…everywhere

Disgusted at yourself

English Lit hipster chick

Equipped with Twining’s tea, Zooey Deschanel’s wardrobe and her dad’s old The Cure tapes, this is attention-craving at its peak. “Everyone’s talking about (topical event),” she tells her Facebook friends, “and I’m just sipping tea and reading.”

Bonus points if she uses hashtags or attaches an artfully posed selfie with the complete works of Oscar Wilde. Didn’t he write a book about what happens to vain people? Is it The Selfie of Dorian Gray? She’s not actually sure, she only bought half the books for the module.

They have maybe entered this building once in three years

The political activist 

You know him and you hate him.

It’s that imbecile studying Liberal Arts who thinks he knows more about the gears of government than any election candidate.  He stands, fists balled, watching any and every politician on the news, disagreeing profusely as if they were in the filthy Elms kitchen with him.

“Bullshit!” he declares, pretending to mutter to himself, it’s not like he wants everyone in the kitchen to notice that he totally gets politics,man.

An enemy of the state, he’ll be seen wearing his favourite V for Vendetta mask campaigning against “Corporate America” outside Santander, while befuddled staff wonder where he gets all the free time.

He lectures on the pros of legalizing cannabis during lunch hour and stars in the murder fantasies of his flatmates for the other 23 hours a day.

FTS man

The immature mature student

This guy personally celebrated the summer of ’69 back in his youth and as that mid-life crisis takes its hold, he’s hitting the campus to relive some o’ that teen spirit he had before arthritis kicked in.

During Fresher’s week, this veteran busts out his moves at Box, bringing back repressed memories of your weird uncle at a wedding as he shamed future generations with his interpretation of the Time Warp. Is he trying too hard? Definitely.

Watching guys in their 40s try and fit in with a crowd of freshers is awkward and embarrassing. Don’t worry though, by week 3 this spinster will cease the shenanigans and be glaring you down as he reminds you he’s “old enough to be yer da.”

You’ll be nostalgic for his old John Travolta moves within the week.

Freshaaaaaa

The ‘alright’ one

Look at them, with their “cheeky wee Nando’s”and Boojum Addict t-shirt, their name immaculately etched onto the side of a 2-litre semi-skimmed milk. You make us all sick.

Cleaning your dishes and not being a dick is the bare minimum. It’s the least you can do.

We remember our flatmates who surprised us by getting a cake for our birthdays, who offered to listen when we were overwhelmed by our studies, we remember the flatmates who made us delighted we chose to stay in halls. We remember people who add to our lives.

With no discernible contributions to your flatmate’s time at halls, there’ll be nothing to distract them from your stupid laugh, the way you put your dirty feet up on the sofa, the awful stench your crappy cooking makes and the valuable living space you take up with your uselessness.

At least the people we hate to live with leave an impression, and provide us with hilarious anecdotes for the answer to the inevitable Easter-break question “so how’s living in halls?”