Rubber Bands Just because something earned a place in the junk drawer doesn’t mean it’s useless. There’s a reason collections of random items avoid the trash and end up nestled in between pizza menus and car keys. The arbitrary items we forget about tend to be useful. Raid your house and fill a box with odds and ends. Your mom’s catastrophe kit isn’t coming to college. Here are 25 things you won’t miss until you don’t have them.
1. Key Chain
Don’t lose your keys when you ditch that freshman lanyard. That souvenir keychain from Miami Beach serves no purpose lying in box at home. Hook it to your belt loop and save yourself from $75 key replacement fees.
2. Scissors
You will have to cut something eventually, whether it’s a reluctant chip bag or a last minute Halloween costume. Your pocketknife does NOT do the same thing.
3. Safety Pins
The lazy cure to rips and tears. New clothes are expensive and can wait. Beer is expensive and can’t.
4. Band-Aids
You don’t need to go to Health Services for every paper cut. Having a set of Band-Aids on hand saves you from conducting seek-and-destroy missions every time you get a blister. Don’t be the one to knock on your RA’s door for something trivial.
5. Rubber Bands
You never know when you’re going to need one. Keep your favorite pens or the set of notecards your Spanish grade relies on from slipping into the vortex beneath your bed. Also, hall wars are very real. Be prepared with an easy weapon.
6. Cough Drops
In college, it’s always cold season. A little menthol keeps you from sounding like Fran Drescher during recitation.
7. Light Bulb
That $11 Wal-Mart desk lamp won’t survive your fourth all-nighter. A replacement might not help you pass your Calculus test, but it will help you see your homework.
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Label anything and everything. If your roommate isn’t big on sharing, mark your territory in the mini fridge. Just make sure you hide them on nights you go out. Don’t wake up with a mustache you don’t remember having.
9. Extra Lead
If you plan on taking Calculus this fall, a pen just won’t do. Unless you enjoy scratching out mistakes, keep an arsenal of extra erasers with your lead.
10. Combination Lock
You gotta be ready for the gym, bro! But really, you will have to lock something at some point in your college career. If you want to taste those cookies your mom sent before your roommate eats them, I suggest the Fort Knox treatment.
11. Multi-tool
You’re going to break something. A Swiss Army knife could save you from waiting two weeks for maintenance. The $25 rip off model from Walmart will do the trick. Find a great selection here.
12. Ruler
It might not earn you your own show on HGTV, but being able to make a straight line is always helpful. You needed one in the first-grade and you need one now. Your Geometry professor won’t pass them out on the first day of class.
13. Thumbtacks
Something has to hold up posters and the mandatory 14,000 photos of friends and family. If your dorm fails to provide a bulletin board, sticky wall hangers and poster putty are great ways to avoid putting holes in the wall.
14. Stapler
Don’t be that guy banging on his neighbor’s door every time you have to turn in a hard copy of an English paper. Even worse, never turn in papers with the corners folded in place of staples. It’ll be your fault when the TA loses the concluding page you spent four hours on.
15. Stress Ball
Though it speaks for itself. You won’t realize you need one until you have a nine-page paper due the next day. Take a break, squeeze and try not to pretend it’s your professor’s head.
16.Flashlight
If you thought communal bathrooms scared you already, just wait for that first power outage. Nothing screams terror like a shower in the dark. Also, shadow puppets never get old.
A needle and thread can save an out of commission pair of Levis. Now you just need to find someone who knows how to sew. Find a great kit here.
18. Batteries
Don’t say I didn’t warn you when you have to get up to change the channel.
Clean your glasses and all those fancy devices that you spent the family fortune on. Nothing screams misery like a smudged MacBook screen.
20. Extension cords
You obviously need to have your alarm clock, fan, TV, PS3 and Wii all plugged in at the same time.
21. Chap Stick
Just wait until you have to cross campus in twenty-degree temperatures. Make sure to bring back up. You’re guaranteed to lose at least six.
22. Bottle Opener
Don’t limit yourself to aluminum cans and twist-offs. Having an opener handy also keeps you from getting crafty with a door hinge.
23. Tape
If Duct tape can’t fix it, it isn’t worth saving. From keeping fire hazard Christmas lights off the floor to reattaching the poster your drunk roommate ripped off the wall; tape is your religion and your savior.
24. Deck of Cards
You need something to do when you’re stuck at home on frat row formal night. The proper pregame requires a set of 52. From Kings to Ride the Bus, consider it your drinking game bible.
25. Loose Change
You’ll need something to feed the laundry machine when you run out of underwear once a month. When you’re not dropping your life savings on a clean shirt, choose food. Who doesn’t love vending machine Kit Kats at 3 a.m.?
