Anndddd we’re back… It’s the first day back for students and I mean who doesn’t love getting lost on uni campus because you can’t remember where stuff was 3 months ago or the uni leaders have moved it just to keep us guessing. A part from the abundance of people in the Hub, the best way to tell that University has started is students carry around the red RMIT diary everywhere. And it’s not a bad thing, actually there’s something so refreshing about the optimism of the red diaries and all the good organisation they will inhabit. The funny thing is that over the following weeks this will change as people realise their diaries are just weighing down bags and they don’t really need to take it with them to every class. But for now the red diaries are out and about living the dream.

People love stopping me on the street, especially when I’m in a rush to get somewhere. And today was no exception when someone stopped me as I was walking to class, again no better a time. As a side note, when I’m walking around anywhere in public; town, shopping centers and even on the street, I rarely walk without my phone in my hand; 1. because I don’t wear a watch, though I really should and 2. because it’s just more fun to add more risk to crossing the roads and navigating car parks. Anyway away from the topic of why I need a watch, I was walking along replying to a text someone had sent me when a young man approached me and asked, “Wouldn’t you rather talk to a real person?”

Now at the time I was more concerned on the fact that someone had made their way into my personal space than answering the question, so I just looked and smiled and continued walking. But after actually thinking about the question as I went on I wished I had come up with a better answer, because random guy, I am talking to a real person. I am texting a real person. I have no idea what the reason was behind he’s questioning, most probably he was a student conducting survey research about ‘the effects of social media’ or ‘the consequences of smart phones’, but I find the question so annoying because just because I have to use a device to contact a person doesn’t make the conversation any less real. Also he drew the assumption that I was on social media, well what if I was looking at a map or playing candy crush? Would there be a problem with that? The thing is random guy there is a time and place to talk to real people, and that isn’t on the way to a 2:30pm lecture!

Walking to uni this morning there were casually two people standing on the corner of Swanston and LaTrobe Street giving out cartons of milk (it was reputable – there were cooler things and signs just to clarify – I don’t exactly know how that makes something reputable but oh well). So if someone offers you free chocolate milk I suppose you take it, and that’s what I did. And as I soon found out even when you think there couldn’t be any catches to something as innocent as chocolate milk, there is. The catch is that when you turn around to bask in the glory of the free chocolate milk you have been given someone appears and asks you to take a photo with the milk. In that moment everything goes in slow motion, people dart in any direction to get away from the sight of a camera, and you are left confused in the middle of the shot with nothing else left to do but shrug and agree to your fate.

So the group of people I was with agreed to take a photo, I mean it’s not like after you’ve taken the free milk you can refuse the photo, the chocolate milk companies get you while you’re weak and vulnerable. The thing I don’t understand is that if you are not going to take a ‘mug shot’ (hopefully some of got the relevance of mug and milk, if not you will now) of every person that you give chocolate milk to, then don’t take it of any, let alone me. And if giving away your free milk is not already advertisement enough for your brand, as pretty much every uni student lines Swanston street with milk in hand.

I suppose the moral of the story must be like someone somewhere must have said, never trust someone with a snow jacket and ugg boots on… what are you lounging around? or going skiing?