What to Do When Your Organization Is Building a Shack on Landis and You’ve Never Held a Power Tool Before
Despite the apparent health and safety violations, Spring is characterized by the infamous Seminole Shack Showdown. The event is designed by FSU’s Habitat for Humanity to test students’ limited knowledge about the hit HGTV show Fixer Upper and to gauge the raw willpower of organizations under the guise of raising awareness of substandard housing. While those who live in residence halls on campus should already be familiar with substandard housing, the concept of going outside and using power tools has frightened many students. Some unlucky few have even been assigned the seemingly impossible task of finding...a drill bit?
“What the hell is a drill bit? I thought a bit was something that went in a horse’s mouth, or like sketch comedy. Like ‘that’s a cute bit.’ Is that what I could say to the ACE Hardware man? Show me your cutest bits, please?” cried Bob Buildur as he drove around Tallahassee in search of both bits and cheap, loose screws. “I’m just hoping that my RSO and I can shove nails and shit into this one piece of plywood for a couple of hours and call it ‘distressed installation art.’ Our club president tells us to just pretend we’re cooler than we are and hope everybody assumes we did it to make an edgy statement about affordable housing. In terms of structural integrity, I’m pretty sure there’s more metal in this wood pallet than wood. I just want to go to my actual house. Is that problematic?”
“I don’t know how I got here but I have plywood and a hammer, and I am prepared,” echoed the voice of famed Property Brother Drew Scott from the sewers of the William Johnston Building, home to the FSU School of Architecture and Interior Design. “Many people don’t even know this event exists, let alone what it’s for. I’ve mentioned the Seminole Shack Showdown to at least ten of my real adult friends and they ask me if that’s what the kids call ‘hazing.’ It’s a great concept, the Showdown of course, but someone should advertise it better. People just see three shacks covered in paint on campus and assume Banksy wannabes had a field day. I’m not suggesting we build a donation box because these snowflake intellectuals barely built these shacks, but please, stop enabling them with tools. Why don’t we just give resources to the communities who need them instead? Whatever. I’m just pretty and talented and on TV.”
Though poor brother Drew washed away into the Tallahassee water treatment facility and was never to be heard from again, the Wellness Center made a point to dedicate itself entirely to the treatment of splinters, bone fractures, internal bleeding and yes, even the STD’s (Shack Transmittable Disease) that resulted from the Seminole Shack Showdown. Post-circulation of STD rumors, students everywhere were asked to bring protection to the shack sites. When asked if they were allowed to have a shag in these shacks, FSU officials report that they should simply “act like it’s a normal dorm room and make sure that they are as loud as possible.”