How to hang out with your Lancs housemates whilst not actually being with them

So, it’s been weeks since you saw people who weren’t your parents or your significant other and seeing your flatmates spread across the country on SnapMaps brings tears to your eyes.

We all miss the reality of sofa lounging in our student pads with our friends. How are we meant to recreate that when we’re 1459760 miles apart? Luckily, we’re here with a guide on how to get your social interaction fill, from afar.

Get yourself a facetime app

Your first line of action is to download one of the trusted Facetime apps if you don’t already have one. Messenger and Snapchat work well enough but Zoom and Houseparty prove much easier and better to use.

Facetime pres

Whack on the camera and get your glasses at the ready. This one speaks for itself. Whether you bring out Piccolo or Never Have I Ever or any other masterpiece of a student drinking game, this is the top tier of uni hang-outs over facetime. It will always be a shame when the call ends and your best mate isn’t there to hold your hair back on a tactical chunder, but for the meantime it will have to do.

Have everyone get themselves a pack of cards and take turns to flip the top card for a long-distance Ring of Fire, the drinking game that’s been keeping pres alight

Netflix party

Install it for free from Chrome and sit down with some popcorn.

This app lets you watch Netflix with friends at the same time with a chat bar so you can comment in real time. With that one flatmate who never shuts up with the movie commentary nagging you in digital form, you’ll feel like you’re back at uni in no time.

Group gossip

Of course, we couldn’t have this list without acknowledging that sometimes, we just need to all get on camera and rant about uni deadlines or that fitty on Instagram. Life still goes on, lockdown or not.

Karaoke, anyone?

Miss hearing Artic Monkeys get butchered by drunk freshers in Glow? Don’t we all.

Get your drink on and load up some karaoke lyric videos on Youtube. Take it in turns to give it your all and demonstrate how you’ve artfully mastered your singing abilities since lockdown – or giggle at each other over another overplayed Queen song.

Book club

You’ve got all this time on your hands and a reading list that you’ve been trying to plough through of all the unread books you’ve been collecting over the years. Either that or you’ve discovered reading isn’t as shit as you once thought – in which case, go you!

Get together with some reading buddies and decide on a book you’ll all read. Meet back in a couple of weeks to chat about what you thought.

Fashion montage

A wardrobe of going-out clothes and nowhere to go? Big fat mood.

Set up the camera and film your own cat-walk to finally get some use out of that black lace bodysuit you bought and never wore. Bonus points if your friends on facetime do the faces they do in movies – no…no…hell no…omg yes yes that’s the one.

Pictionary night

For the classier among us, this is the perfect evening.

Load up a random movie/book/TV show generator and have a sketchpad at the ready with a felt pen. Take it in turns to draw what you’ve been told to while everyone else guesses what it is. This can be played competitively, if someone keeps score, or just for fun.

In the same breath, I’d recommend Charades Night. All the same but acting out the word instead of drawing it.

Mr & Mrs

One of the better drinking games that can also be played without alcohol.

Partner up and take it in turns for one pair to be the couple. Everyone else can ask questions (Who’s more likely to chunder on a night out? Who’s more likely to get a 2:2?) and the couple write their answers (me/them) on a notepad. Someone counts down from 3 and both partners reveal their answers – if they both guessed the same person then they both win a point (everyone else drinks) but if they guessed differently then everyone else wins a point (the couple drinks).

Try a hobby/lockdown trend together

You don’t have to shave your head but it can be fun to learn some tiktok dances, bake banana bread or take up yoga together. Have fun with it and keep each other updated or else do it on camera, together.

Facetiming your uni mates doesn’t have to mean a chat about how shit lockdown is and how much you miss each other – it has a whole lot more to offer.

Get yourself into a weekly/daily call and thank the technology gods that this didn’t happen while we all still had fliphones.

Related articles recommended by this writer: 

• The Lancs Tab Good News Column: Fundraising, TABUKI playlists and green screens

• Every final goodbye Lancs final years wish they could have said

• Lockdown can’t stop you from voting for heat three of Lancs most notorious BNOC