The Stanford academy brims with rich offerings that engage the intellect, creates new knowledge and makes people smarter. This article has absolutely nothing to do with that.

This collection of vignettes is the off-road Stanford, the one you don’t always see or know about. It’s a celebration of the people, places and things whose contributions make Stanford a little more vibrant, a little more interesting and a little more fun.

Our selection methods were totally unscientific and our choices are ripe for second-guessing. Please send us letters complaining about them. We would love to know what we missed.

Such a Thing as a Free Lunch >

A determined student committed to eating for free could probably crash enough receptions around campus every day to do so—but a diet of muffins and bagels would get old pretty quickly. Thankfully, there is a listserv devoted to sniffing out tastier opportunities. At free-food-alert@lists.stanford.edu, students trade tips on how to track down that holy grail of student life, from Korean barbecue on Wilbur Field to a Krispy Kreme break hosted by the senior class presidents.

< Unimaginably Large Collection of DVDs

As of February 1, Green Library had 5,858 different DVDs in its collection, one of the largest anywhere this side of Netflix. The range is formidable—Hitler documentaries, Steve McQueen flicks, operas, aviation how-tos, Cars That Ate Paris. Although students may (and do, occasionally in droves) borrow disks, most of the titles are requested by faculty for educational purposes, including some you wouldn’t expect—a professor once asked for Road Runner cartoons for his Western history course. (It had something to do with scenes from Monument Valley.) Beep beep.

Music to Get Better by >

That melody you hear wafting down the hallways at Stanford Hospital isn’t coming from a piped-in CD. Every day, harpists and a guitarist alternate as roving musicians, playing near nurses’ stations, in waiting areas and, when summoned, in patients’ rooms. Funded by donations, the musicians offer comfort and a pleasant diversion from the dreary reality of hospital stays. And for harpist Barbra Telynor, the work is also a measure of thanks: 24 years ago, she received a kidney transplant at the hospital.

Henry Diltz/Corbis

< From the Course Catalog, a Mojo-Moving Elective

Watching This Is Spinal Tap is just another homework assignment in Rock, Sex & Rebellion, taught by music assistant professor Mark Applebaum, who looks like an extra in an ’80s glam-rock video. Students explore the mysteries of classic texts like Led Zeppelin’s Whole Lotta Love. “[That song] makes me want to have sex like burning,” wrote one student in her final paper, titled “(I Want a) Whole Lotta Love.” Her final grade: A+.

A Particularly Tasty Curricular Offering >

Viticulture and Oenology is a fancy name for a course better known as “The Wine Class,” which attracts about 40 sign-ups each quarter. “The class aims to take the snobbishness out of the wine world—and you get one unit towards graduation,” says coterminal student Sunaina Sinha, who headed the fall-quarter course. Besides getting to taste four to six wines at each class session and chat with wine experts, students take an end-of-quarter wine-tasting trip to Napa Valley.

Kurt Vinion/Getty Images

< Random Acts of Dorm Theming

Dorm themes can run the gamut from clever (Alondramat, Branimal House) to questionable (Durandom Hookup, Yost Infection), but they usually have one thing in common: the theme has some relationship, however tenuous, to the name of the dorm. Not so for Loro House, which earned kudos last year for its out-of-nowhere theme, Sean Connery—yes, the actor. “What better rallying cry than screaming “Sean Connery” or “Free Scotland” [one of his tattoos]?” says senior Felicia Estrada. Indeed. We’ve come a long way since “Branner sucks.”

Impressive Repository of Potential eBay Items >

An enormous storage room located in the basement of the Law School, “The Hole” is a catchall of legendary repute. When courageous facilities workers cleared it out last fall, the inventory included old luggage, a volleyball net, Class of ’71 t-shirts and one “fluffy blanket.” Project coordinator John Horton says there were 16 cases of ancient dot-matrix printer paper and a box of old course readers so badly decayed the bottom of the box had become “like fresh soil.” His personal favorite: 22,000 eight-ounce Styrofoam cups, which are now being used to restock Law School break rooms. What couldn’t be given away or recycled was tossed—it filled four Dumpsters.

< Keeping Multiple Balls in the Air, etc.

The best description of an officially sanctioned campus organization must surely be this one: “Down With Gravity is a student-based group that meets every week to juggle.” Okay, stop laughing. In addition to having a clever name, Down With Gravity is dedicated to the proposition that simply hanging out and having fun is a valid reason for existing—and you might as well throw balls in the air while you’re at it. Junior Miguel Chavez, president of the group, says DWG will perform if asked, “but the club is mostly based on juggling in a relaxed atmosphere.” You can see them tossing and catching in White Plaza on Friday afternoons. They practice tricks and teach each other, but there’s no pressure to be good at juggling, says Chavez, since that would defeat the purpose. “When you think about it,” he asks, “have you ever met an unhappy juggler?” He has a point.

Squirt, You’re Dead >

As spring unfolds on the Farm, flowers bloom, birds sing and paranoid students slink to their dorm rooms with their backs to the wall. At least, that’s the scene for anyone who plays Assassins. It’s the ultimate game of tag, as students attempt to eliminate assigned victims in their dorms using their wits and a water gun. Many dorms play a round each year, and would-be shooters can be seen lurking in hallways, sequestering themselves in their rooms, and according to Katie Miller, ’06, sitting in IHUM section with “their water guns in the ready position, just in case.” The ASSU created a target-rich environment in 2002 by organizing a campuswide game of Assassins. Some 35 hit men (nominated by their dorms) participated, accompanied by teams of informants and bodyguards. When the carnage ended, Chris Wallis, ’04, was victorious. The Daily pictured him in action, complete with a Schwarzenegger-sized super soaker.

Courtesy LSJUMB

< Ill-Gotten Band Shak Artifact

“Obtained” in 1983 from a roadside in upstate California. The LSJUMB thanks the good folks of Weed (pop. 3,100) and College of the Siskiyous for 20 years of inspiration.

Hands-on Learning Opportunity >

The week before finals is not so groovy. So students loosen up at night by flocking to massage workshops—organized by peer health educators (PHEs) in dorm lounges. With a hired professional instructing the hour-long session, pairs of students practice techniques to relieve tension in heads, necks and hands. PHE Kara Guzman recalls that the 45 attendees in Soto House had “euphoric looks on their faces,” at the end of a session last December. “They were like, ‘Oh, that was good.’ ”

< Audience-Participation Film Series

FLiCKS, the Stanford movie tradition that started in 1937, is “the way to end the weekend,” says Sabrina Williams, ’04. The film of the week—usually a theatrical release about to hit video—is shown twice Sunday nights at Memorial Auditorium. (Admission is a bargain at $20 for a pass to 10 movies.) The first screening, at 7 p.m., is business as usual. But the 10 o’clock show includes paper-wad fights and hoots from the audience. A memorable example: in a scene from The American President, fictional chief executive Andrew Shepherd angrily denounces a commentator who has incorrectly stated that he attended Harvard. “I went to Stanford, you blowhole,” Shepherd says. And the crowd goes wild.

Happiness, and a Hot Dog >

On warm afternoons this spring, baseball fans and lovers of grass will scramble to get their lawn chairs and blankets on the triangles of green just beyond first and third bases at Sunken Diamond to watch the Cardinal and eat junk food with equal conviction. Kids get close-ups of the players near the dugouts, the area is prime foul ball territory (finders keepers, thanks to local sponsors) and the sun angling across the infield looks positively golden.

< Enterprising Research, Lucrative Upside

While his fellow students were talking about their research on the identification of genes expressed sex-specifically in worm larvae, junior Dan Siroker had a different kind of project in mind. He created a computer program that pores through newspaper articles, gauges how well a company is doing based on the amount of positive or negative language used to describe it, and invests accordingly. So far, so good, he says. The program has simulated results for every year since 1996, and has outperformed the S&P 500 by at least a factor of three. The next step: trying it out for real. Any volunteers?

Secret Campus Restaurant Known by All >

If it’s ambience you’re looking for, the Thai Café is not for you. But it hits the trifecta for lunchtime endorsement: fast, cheap, tasty. Located in the basement of the psychology building, this “café” is actually nothing more than a small table and a cash register in the hallway, fronting an unseen kitchen where entrees like the popular Thai chicken noodle salad are served in Styrofoam containers in two to three minutes. Not really a secret these days, the café often has a line snaking out the door and around the corner by 12:05. One thing: know what you want when you arrive at the order station—the cashier is notoriously impatient.

< Clothing-Optional Bonding Ritual

After a special dinner each year, the residents in Chi Theta Chi hop in the shower. Together. Naked. And then, someone takes photos of the group event to hang in the coed co-op’s entrance. It’s a quirky tradition, says Tony DeLisi, ’05, the social manager. When he moved in two years ago, “I thought it was a little weird.” But, he rationalizes, “If you did sports growing up, you were in the shower with a bunch of guys—which is a whole lot less pleasant.”

Highly Desirable Diaper Duty >

John Bierens’s real job is tending bar, but it can’t compete with his regular Monday night gig—holding babies at Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital. Bierens is one of the hospital’s 80 Cuddlers, a volunteer group that augments care in the neonatal and intermediate intensive care units by cradling, feeding and diapering infants who are struggling for health or even life. “Human touch helps the healing process,” and parents aren’t always available, says Monica Sandrini, who organizes the program. The Cuddlers, like Jicky Child (right), range in age from the mid-20s to the mid-80s. They work in three-hour shifts, around the clock, seven days a week. And there isn’t much turnover—the group has a one-year waiting list.

< Homes For Those Who Love the Dead

There’s a reason 90-plus percent of undergraduates live on campus: As Silicon Valley’s dot-com bubble slowly reinflates, rents are headed back up in the neighborhoods surrounding Stanford. (A studio apartment runs about 900 bucks.) But if you know the right people, Rob Levitsky will hook you up in one of his “Dead Houses” (each named after a Grateful Dead song) which he rents out to Stanford students for $550 to $600 per room.

Popular Networking Tool >

The Freshman Facebook, which includes about 1,600 mug shots of the entering first-year class, was conceived as an orientation handout to help freshmen identify their classmates. But it may actually be more coveted by upperclassmen, hoping to check out the new “talent” on campus. Each year, some of the books are snatched from dorms before the freshmen arrive. “People like to see who’s coming,” says Will O’Neill, ’05, an Orientation organizer who put this year’s Facebook together. And perhaps locate a date? Well, yes. O’Neill cites a friend who received an e-mail invitation to a dance based only on her photo. “She said yes, actually.”

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