I’m sick of two things: elections and one-room quads. “You were in Washington?” someone says. “So how do you think the campaigns are going?”

I hate the beauty contest, I hate the horse race, but the hard details that do matter are too boring for even the candidates themselves to learn very well. Certainly too boring for me to inflict on you here. So even though my co-Daily columnists Stuart, Sagar, Nat, Gabe, Kai, Ziv, Vishnu and even Courtney (because primaries are primaries) have all written interesting things about the U.S. presidential race, I refuse to say anything else. Instead, I want to tell a story.

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom and foolishness, Light and Darkness, hope and despair. We had everything before us, we had nothing before us. It began at the end of freshman year.

After some frantic wrangling, I was in a draw group of eight pretty cool guys, and after some frantic praying, we had a draw number of 100. Embracing what seemed to be our divine anointment, we picked Xanadu, at the heart of the Row. But then karma fought back. We were only sophomores, last to choose rooms, and I found myself in a one-room quad for all of sophomore year.

Like the process that led to it, the quad itself seemed to pendulate between awesomeness and disaster. We nicknamed it “the octagon” because it truly had eight walls, though not in any symmetrical arrangement. Thanks to high ceilings and creative bed-lofting, we found room for a 30-something-inch TV we bought at a yard sale, on which we proceeded to watch way too much South Park. We were four guys sleeping in very close quarters, with many, many alarm clocks. One roommate set his alarm every day for a 9 a.m. class he attended about seven times. As far as romance, offers to “come back to my place” were nonexistent, not only because of our (my) ineptitude, but because they were very near impossible.

But having so many roommates meant there was always someone to sympathize with me, or at least laugh at me, when I came back late at night with stories of my most recent regrettable escapade. It was easy to round people up for a run to Chipotle, a movie, a basketball game. Whatever good thing you could want in a roommate, the odds were I could find it in my quad, or in our larger draw group of eight. Xanadu was full of fun, friends and adventures. But by the end of the year, I resolved that living in a quad was a one-time experience, something that builds character, but something which should not be repeated.

During the fall in Washington, a one-room double felt spacious and airy. I began to remember what it felt like to have some semblance of privacy. But as I prepared to come back in the winter, the cycle began to repeat itself. Again, I had drawn preferred, this time alone, and received the astonishingly lucky number of 140. Again, I wanted to live on the Row, but, wary from last time, I emailed the Housing office to ask what I should do to avoid living in a one-room quad. Sorry, I was told, we don’t have a good picture of where openings will occur. (How this is possible, since those leaving file termination of occupancy forms, remains a mystery.)

Becoming paranoid, I consulted friends back on campus who assured me the Xanadu quad was not being vacated, so I wouldn’t be back there again. When I was assigned to 717, a house with nearly all doubles, I was ecstatic, and a friend who lived there informed me the double next to him had opened up completely. My fears of a quad dissipated.

But then I got the email. Due to the housing crunch, the basement common room of 717 would be converted into a one-room quad, and I was assigned to it. I recognize that the odds of getting draw numbers of 100 and 140 are ridiculously low, and even unfair. But should I really be cosmically punished for my luck by having back to back one-room quads? Like Xanadu, 717 is great, and I like my new roommates, but the quad is ridiculous. There’s a fireplace we can’t use, a fire door we might be allowed to use, and a control panel within a foot of my bed that runs the fire sprinklers for the whole house. It even has a wrench inside for changing sprinkler heads.

So here I am again. Another great draw number, another great house, another terrible room. The best of times, and the worst. Darkness and light. Stanford housing made less painful only by the great students who live there. I’m much better off than my friends in the dark, anti-social basement of Crothers graduate housing, but, for them, a one-room quad is still character building. For me, at this point, it just seems like overkill.

Michael apologizes to Charles Dickens, Eric Showen and the rest of the Crothers library. Email him at sagarandmichael@gmail.com.