Brown Student Moves into 24-hour Library
And now, a break from our exhaustive coverage of The Talented Mr. Nava for a dispatch from Brown, where sophomore Grant Gilles is on his sixth day of self-imposed imprisonment in the Brown Science Library. SciLi is open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week during finals, prompting Gilles to move in and document his plight on film. In a series of emails Gilles explained his living situation and librarian-enforced exile from the group study room he commandeered as his "apartment" (and decorated with a 5-foot wall of empty coffee cups). He explains his living conditions:
- i have set up a series of shelving space for clothing in desks on the upper floors.
- i brush my teeth, deodorize, and make-shift shower in the bathrooms.
- i have been exercising by running up and down the 14 floors and around in circles, many, many circles.
- people keep calling me to take my order for cafeteria takeout. i feel bad turning people down so i got 3 lunches yesterday.
Gilles' letters from the 24-hour trenches of SciLi, and more pictures, after the jump.
On day 4, Gilles outlined his basic set-up:
on wednesday, december 12th, 8:00 am, i entered brown's scili. so far i have been in here around 109 hours and plan to stay here another 59 hours, a full week. the first two days amounted to really nomadic wandering as i did logistical planning:
- i have set up a series of shelving space for clothing in desks on the upper floors.
- i brush my teeth, deodorize, and make-shift shower in the bathrooms.
- i have been exercising by running up and down the 14 floors and around in circles, many, many circles.
- people keep calling me to take my order for cafeteria takeout. i feel bad turning people down so i got 3 lunches yesterday.
- on friday andre, another friend sophie, and i spent around 12 hours in one of the study rooms, at which point we decided to just turn it into our apartment (room in the pictures).
- to increase privacy while sleeping in the apartment, and kill the hours on end, i took empty coffee cups from students and built a wall 5 feet tall.
- this morning i reenacted the risky business scene, where tom cruise is in his underwear, on the mezzanine level of the study center.
Impressed, we asked for an update and got this one today:
i'm still chillin like a villain here. this morning i was nursing a mad hangover as a result of completing the "sci li challenge", a brown tradition (drinking a shot on each of the 14 floors). after the challenge i proceeded to the study center in the basement where i harassed studying friends and mounted one studying public health. eventually i just crashed on a couch in the middle of the center, fulfilling the role of the drunken homeless person in the societal microcosm that is the science library. said mounted friend told me this morning, after she had pulled an all-nighter cramming, that we had had two conversations before she realized i was just talking in my sleep.
my gallivanting was only possible after my apartment met its demise yesterday. for three days i told students and librarians that the coffee cup wall was a "reformative art piece about the gluttony of brown students" (so brown), which completely deflected potential criticism. yesterday, though, one librarian came in complaining about the smell. after i gave him the usual shtick he fired back with "i don't think it would be fair if a student was perhaps taking over this room completely for his own purposes", which is when i decided to ditch the flat so that my goal was not jeopardized.
yesterday i actually started studying for a final i have tomorrow after i leave. otherwise wednesday through friday was spent watching the entire series of weeds (seasons 1-3) bootleg on china's youtube equivalent tudou.com and this weekend was spent furnishing the apartment. today i'm working and then i'm out of here at 8 am tomorrow, a week after entering.
Gilles is charting his progress on a modified clock, pictured here earlier in the week:
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December 18th, 2007 at 3:39 pm
Why? He should have trucked down the hill and infiltrated J&W’s library. It’s not open 24/7, so it would have been a challenge.
December 18th, 2007 at 4:16 pm
why???????????????
is this just an attention thing?
or an experiment of… something?
December 18th, 2007 at 4:23 pm
I saw him this morning – he’s still holding up! I promise you that he’s an unpretentious, sweet guy, doing what a lot of us have wanted to do ever since they opened up a 24/7 study space.
December 18th, 2007 at 4:58 pm
pathetic cry for attention. looks like a dork
December 18th, 2007 at 5:30 pm
a cute dork though ;P
December 18th, 2007 at 5:47 pm
I really don’t see whats so special about this. Come to columbia where about a quarter of our school lives in butler during final. They bring in everything from coffee makers to curtains. Yeah trust me its weird.
December 18th, 2007 at 6:16 pm
hahahahahhahahahahahahah that article is about me.
December 18th, 2007 at 6:23 pm
you’re seriously cute. post some more scantily clad pix please.
December 18th, 2007 at 6:45 pm
no, hes not cute
December 18th, 2007 at 6:57 pm
What a fucking loser.
December 18th, 2007 at 7:30 pm
Beg to differ. He’s very cute. Keep rockin’ out, Grant!
December 18th, 2007 at 7:33 pm
There actually was some rhyme and reason behind this- Every year the office of residential life holds a video contest where people submit 5 min shorts about why they should have first pick in the housing lottery. Grant moved into the library a week ago (which may or may not been under the premise of escaping his roommate, Jack–see above) to begin production on his movie. It’s the sort of thing he could have easily been filmed in a day, so I have to admire his journalistic commitment to actually doing everything that has gone in his film. The only minor glitch here was that we heard a rumor about three days in that they weren’t holding a video contest this year, and would instead be staging a talent show. He has been undeterred from completing his project however- I suppose it does take a special kind of talent to remain inside the cement prison cell Brown calls a library for 7 days straight…
December 18th, 2007 at 8:30 pm
I’m on the fence but leaning toward disgrace. Not quite endearing enough.
December 18th, 2007 at 9:09 pm
i guarantee you that this kid is posting on this blog, calling himself cute. ive been reading this blog for some time, and never has a person been praised so often in such a short period of time on their looks. Even the self proclaimed lothario from the Today Show and the actor/mensa member/had lunch with the secretary of defense prick received no comments about their looks, and both were pretty good looking guys. four different parties called this kid “cute” within a 2-3 hour span. also, even if this kid was good looking, the picture is tiny and hes making a goofy face. this piece should be titled the boy who cried cute because i can guarantee you this kid is making up anonymous posts as different people, claiming himself to be cute.
December 18th, 2007 at 9:28 pm
wait a second. I’m not sure I follow your thesis. You think the guy on the Today show is cute? Al Roker?
December 18th, 2007 at 10:38 pm
hahah well done, but i was referring to this: http://www.ivygateblog.com/blog/2007/12/harvard_casanova.html
December 19th, 2007 at 12:13 am
Always wanted to do this. I wonder how much studying he actually does get done?
December 19th, 2007 at 2:41 am
I don’t think the cute comments are about him being disporportionately better looking than the people you mentioned — I think they were just meant to be a rebuttal to the people who called him a ‘loser.’
By the way, I think this is a very cool project.
December 19th, 2007 at 2:43 am
*are not
December 19th, 2007 at 6:03 am
whatever, I still think he’s cute.
and Brown is weird.
that is all.
December 19th, 2007 at 12:57 pm
Are you kidding? Dude from the today show is creepy and gross looking.
December 19th, 2007 at 2:08 pm
this kid is the man! wish we had more crazy awesome fun people like him at Princeton
December 19th, 2007 at 2:27 pm
The kid sits in a library for a week and you think he’s “crazy awesome fun”? Princeton must really be that boring.
December 19th, 2007 at 3:51 pm
this is bull shit. library campers like him make me want to vomit.
December 19th, 2007 at 8:36 pm
you are such a faggot, library guy. i hope you get cancer and die.
December 20th, 2007 at 12:09 am
I think it’s weird as hell but it’s the kinda thing my friends and I would do. And he is cute. Sure, we’ve seen better -looking guys than him on this blog, but they’re always douchey.
December 20th, 2007 at 2:45 am
why is this even a story? come to butler. we have dozens of people living in there for the entire week of finals. i’ve seen people with pillows and blankets, framed photos of their families, and pretty much half their dorms. they only leave their desks to go sponge bathe themselves in the sinks.
December 21st, 2007 at 10:21 am
You can tell by looking at this kid that at least he’s not having sex in the library.
December 21st, 2007 at 3:01 pm
If he is found sleeping on the floor, I hope one of the librarians calls 911 about someone passed out, and have his butt hauled away. What a jerk this guy is! After all, he could just as easily spent the week in the campus police station (also open 24.7), but he wants to impose upon librarians rather than face up to someone who won’t take his bullying and adolescent rationalizations and con-man manipulations. I think he deserves the bum’s rush.
December 21st, 2007 at 6:46 pm
Wow – Self-absorbed kid risks chastisement by a librarian. What a hero.
Yeah, he’s right up there with the 1970 martyrs at Kent State. Chump.
December 22nd, 2007 at 4:40 pm
I am a librarian and I think he is an annoying attention whore. I am certain student housing, or perhaps student mental health services will be helpful in finding you appropriate housing. Should you refuse to move out of the library I certainly hope the library staff summon the local police to assist in his relocation.
College is where one goes to learn, not where one goes to make a spectacle of themselves. Remember that employers will often search for applicants on the Web. If I saw an applicant’s name associated with a childish stunt like this I know I would not simply put it in the reject pile. I would put it in the laugh at with my co-workers and then reject pile.
You are an adult, act like one.
December 23rd, 2007 at 12:49 am
I am a librarian and I think he is an annoying attention whore. I am certain student housing, or perhaps student mental health services will be helpful in finding you appropriate housing. Should you refuse to move out of the library I certainly hope the library staff summon the local police to assist in his relocation.
College is where one goes to learn, not where one goes to make a spectacle of themselves. Remember that employers will often search for applicants on the Web. If I saw an applicant’s name associated with a childish stunt like this I know I would not simply put it in the reject pile. I would put it in the laugh at with my co-workers and then reject pile.
You are an adult, act like one.
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