Emily Curley hops from one foot to the other in the entrance to King Hall. “I don’t wanna do this, I don’t wanna do this,” she chants as she does her little dance. Curley is not a fan of being scared, which makes her attendance Oct. 24 in the Resident Assistant (RA) retreat to McCall’s Pumpkin Patch a personal challenge. The event is a bonding exercise. Curley says her second semester as an RA is “different overall. It’s stricter within the RA leadership. I don’t know the RAs as well.” The returning RAs did not have to take part in as much training as the new RAs, so some feel a lack of cohesion within the group. “At the same time,” she says, “there’s not one person I can’t go up to and say, ‘I need help.’” There have been many new additions to the RA team this year, including this reporter. I sometimes find it hard to blend in with a group of people 10 years younger than me. As the oldest, and one of the shyest RAs, I am happy to hide behind my reporter’s notebook. My fellow RA and Creative Writing major Maria Salazar brings along a copy of Clarice Lispector’s The Passion According to G.H. She hopes to get some homework done on the trip. Neither she, nor Curley, plan on going into the Haunted Cornfield at McCall’s. “I just want to hear people scream like little girls,” Salazar says, “and then judge them.” McCall’s Pumpkin Patch is part of the McCall Land & Cattle Company farm, owned by Kevin and Kirsten McCall. McCall’s Haunted Farm website tells the tale of farmer McCall, who butchered his family and any tourists who happened by his farm. Officials were never able to find Mr. McCall, but “some claim to see him tending the fields at night, carrying on his gruesome work.” Every October, the farm attracts families and thrill-seekers alike, who flock to the site for portraits of children amid the gluttony of gourds and shrieks and horrors within the Haunted Cornfield and Barn. As part of our RA retreat, we’ll be treading the paths of the Haunted Cornfield, which, somewhere in the planning process, we all decided was a maze. A party bus waits outside King Hall to take us on our excursion. It looks like it was decorated by Dr. Teeth and the Electric Mayhem. Rainbow paint splatters the walls and floor. Three dance poles line the center walkway, and a DJ spins in the back atop a gale force speaker. Green lasers dissect the interior of the mobile disco and yellow and blue lights strobe at both ends. The RAs file in and take their seats in the front half of the vehicle. Student Life Operations Manager Terrance Sanders hands out Halloween-sized sacks of candy. Darnell Thomas, gray flat hat atop his head, makes his way to the back to dance to Missy Elliott’s “Work It.” This is Thomas’ third year serving as an RA. “New people come in and apply to be RAs,” he says. “As far as change, it’s different leaders and different groups of people.” He leaps onto one of the dance poles. It immediately gives way under the weight of his thin frame, and he falls to the floor. The bus erupts with laughter as we disembark for Moriarty, NM. Curtains line the windows, so the action inside is hidden from passersby. Salazar takes a break from her book to dance on one of the still-standing poles. Brendan Boyle and DeAndre Montoya join Darnell Thomas on the dance floor. At the front of the bus, we gyrate in our seats, shooting bolts of electric dance moves from one to the other, taking turns showing off our moves (of which this reporter has very few). Jasmine Man slides upside down around a dance pole while Marshall Leming and Shawn Khounphithack free-style rap to...

The newest buzz on campus is the upcoming EP Horizon from music producer Josiah Noray and director La’Charles Trask, featuring a variety of musicians.