Why Does it All Happen When You Are Tired and Not On Duty?

It all happened at once. This all takes place in my residence hall…a freshmen building and with me being a new RA…in the beginning of the year…me with no documentations yet…on a night when I was of course not on duty.

I had gone out with some friends, and came back around 2am. I was fine, just tired. As soon as I walked in, I said hello to the guard at the desk as a resident was signing in a guest. As I walked by the guest, a glass bottle was dropped from his coat. It looked so weird; he wasn't holding it as he was signing out of the building. It looked like it came out of nowhere, his shirt, and shattered on the floor. I quickly smelled the alcohol and we all began looking. The guard looked at the floor then looked at the guest, then looked at me because he knew I was the RA. The guest and the resident looked at the ground and then looked at me...the looking just seemed to go on and on!

I was tired; this couldn't have happened at a worse time, I wasn't even on duty! I asked if the guest lived on campus, he said no, off campus. The resident signing him in quickly began with, "I don't even know him, I just signed him in because he asked to visit a friend of his...” I told him to save it.

Approach the RD (Resident Director). He came over and saw the shattered bottle and started asking questions as to what was going on. The RD took the guest into the RHO (office) to talk to him, while I questioned the resident. The guard was sort of new and trigger happy, so he had called in a "situation" to the Security Office. They came quick and I told them all was under control.

I explained to the resident that since he signed the guest in, he was completely responsible for anything the guest did, and that he knew not to sign in people he didn't know. As I was talking to the resident, I saw one of my residents walking by with a box filled with foam peanuts. I knew it wasn't good, but continued with this problem first.

My RD had told me to take the guest to the basement trash room to get a broom. As I brought him downstairs I saw the whole box of foam peanuts thrown up against one of the doors. Wonderful! I thought...I knew it wasn't good, another documentation to end the evening.

We went into the trash room and searched for the broom but couldn't find it…the excitement continues…

When we exited, I saw the resident whose door was now trashed with foam peanuts writing on the door of the resident who had earlier delivered the peanuts.

I told the guest to wait a second, (you see we were still in search of the elusive broom).

I went down the hallway to see what was going on, and by the time I had reached the resident, he was trying to erase what he was writing. However, I did catch a glimpse of the word, "suck,". I had told him that his response was inappropriate - and I asked for his ID. He gave me his ID with attitude, and I told him to come to the office in 10 minutes to pick it up.

After finding the elusive broom, as well as a mop, I walked back upstairs with the guest so he could clean up the shattered bottle of alcohol.

I’m now on my way back to the office to meet up with the RD to report the foam peanut incident and I smell something…oh yea, definitely pot. I brought my RD out to double check and he smelled it too.

All I could think was WHY ME!

We couldn't pinpoint the room, so we thought we'd come back later, after all the stuff finished.

My RD walked back to the guard's desk to speak to him. I stood looking a little longer, and then walked back to the office to write up the guy who was writing on the door. Before I had reached the office, he was there. I guess it had been 10 minutes. When I told him I wasn't finished, he caught an attitude big time, saying a lot of B.S. I ignored him and began the write up process. The RD came back, and I informed him of the situation with the basement resident.

The RD tells me he’s going to bed when we hear the security guard calling our names. We both looked over, because our office is a glass office, and the guard points outside. We both looked and there was one of our residents covered in blood. My RD was like; "damn it, call EMS". So I called and finished the documentation as he and the guard checked out the bloody resident. He was totally drunk, had gotten jumped for money and barely knew it. He went off to the hospital (note - he is now fine).

When I walked back, the student who’s ID I still had came up and snatched it from me while I was trying to hand it to him. He tried to give me a hard stare.

The RD saw this and took care of it, then and there, through a little one on one conversation with him.

Finally, it was about 3:30am and the RD told me to call the RA on duty and do a quick round with her around the building because it seemed like the hall was hopping.

Nothing was really the matter. We didn't find the pot smokers, but we narrowed it down to two rooms.

The RD was up documenting the situation with the bloody resident.

We went to bed after the round.

The next day I wrote up the resident with the box of foam peanuts.

So in one night… it all happened…and I had my first 3 documentations…and the job has continued to be a learning experience ever since.