Report: Three Months Remain Until Penn Senior Becomes Regular Unemployed Alcoholic
A new study by the Penn Institute for Underachiever Research (PIUR) indicates that local student Tonytony (Zhang) Tony (C ‘26) will be forced, in a mere three short months, to confront the harsh reality that he is no better than any other unemployed alcoholic in the United States. Tony, who currently drinks a beer before getting out of bed at noon every day and is not actively seeking gainful employment, has been managing to resolve the cognitive dissonance between his own high expectations for his future and his present disgraceful state as a leech on society by telling himself that he’s still young and that he still has time to figure out what he wants to do with his life.
“I’m only 22! 22 is still young! Besides, Bill Gates dropped out of college, and look where he is now!” said Tony at a press conference late last Thursday. “I think I’m in perfectly good company,” he concluded, as his friends and family awkwardly chuckled and offered half-hearted words of encouragement.
Researchers at the PIUR dissented. “As you all may be aware, Tonytony Tony did quite well in high school, only once getting a B,” stated lead researcher William Harrington. “But so what? The moment he came to Penn and realized that he no longer had any structured goals to work towards, we find that Tony simply ceased to apply himself in a meaningful fashion. He’s in a frat, he has a GPA above 3.8, and he plays club tennis, but has he meaningfully contributed to someone who wasn’t himself?
“Certainly, his parents are very proud of him, but when they look at their neighbor’s son who played football in high school and went to a state school and is now working as an actuary at a regional insurance company, they can’t help but wonder: can their child thrive outside the structure of an educational institution?”
At press time, Tony is alleged to be considering sticking it out at Penn for one more year and getting a Master of Applied Positive Psychology.
