As all people at the fine institution of McGall know, a person’s intellect based on entirely arbitrary measures – often measured in “grades” – is the most important thing about their existence. Students, most heavily subjected to “the painful inanity of it all,” have for centuries attempted to circumvent the self-assigned doom of giving a shit, but most invariably fail. Special Twice-a-Weekly insider information on a new paper by McGall researchers in Futile Pursuits suggests an interesting solution to your pathetic GPA and the consequent self-doubt and angst that plagues you nightly: water.
The study investigates potential links between cognitive ability (“brain thinkin’”), and the giver of both life and death, champion of all that is holy and all that is destructive (“water”). Present in “pretty much everything,” as McGall professor of Futile Pursuits and lead investigator of the study Albert O’Saurus explained by email, water has been implicated in many functions of life. “Breathing, reading, moving your arms around, pooping, self-hatred, you name it, water helps you do it better.”
O’Saurus makes a good point – hydration and the capacity to hate oneself enough to inflict higher education upon them are inextricably linked. The correlation may be strong, but caution should be exercised before taking a straw to the Atlantic Ocean in the name of your perpetual self-loathing.
Many other studies have shown a strong positive correlation between levels of water-in-body-ness and being alive enough to perform actions. However, they should all likely be taken with a grain of salt. Tara Dactile, associate professor in McGall’s faculty of Sad Number Crunching, points out that people who are alive enough to put water into their bodies are likely already full of water, creating a selection bias that goes unaddressed in most studies.
The figures used in the McGall study are also experimentally problematic, as they draw on data from only two sources: the Canada Food Guide, and the unanimous, hollow fear of never reaching self-actualization.
It seems that while lying with your mouth open under the faucet of your bathtub before an exam will do nothing more than make you vomit pure water, it might, in the end, be preferable to the current options of insufferable ennui or stewing anxiety after years spent toiling ceaselessly for little more than a number rounded to the nearest tenth.