Benches

Benches are wooden benches made of wood which are placed in front of each dorm. Each year, they are painted by Duke students. The benches get burned during the school year by Duke students after basketball wins against UNC which is why the decoration and sometimes the entire bench is different from year to year. They normally have some picture and a witty slogan painted on them, such as "BP: Bassett pride, Its where we get our Busch" or "Wilson: Y'all Ain't Got Balls Like These," and, my favorite, "Aycock: Is it in you?" While sometimes infested with bees, mud daubers, ants, spiders, and other insects, they are really quite comfy. The most famous is the G-Spot, not only for its name but also because... well, it's called the G-Spot for god's sake. And it has a foot rest, which is nice. Be nice to the benches. They sometimes like to break, and then you cannot sit there anymore, even if it is funny.

As a general rule, the Pegram benches tend to be the most artistic, often paying homage to great painters such as Vincent van Gogh or Salvador Dali. Giles is generally the most boring of the benches, often simply saying "Giles" with no aesthetically-pleasing elements. Alspaugh's bench seems to generally include alcohol references. Lastly, Aycock's bench is almost invariably decorated with a witty double entendre involving an inTIPpropriate use of the dorm's name.

The G-Spot disappeared mysteriously during term II 05, due to termites in the bench.

During Term I 2006, The staff decided to move The Brown bench in front of Giles in the middle of the middle of the night, and were caught by the police for it (After showing proof of being allow to do it, the police left them be.

Just as a general warning, it's not considered a smart idea to stick your scan card into the slots between the boards if you have your shoelace attached to any part of you or your clothing. An unfortunate, somewhat accident-prone TIPster did this during Term II 2003 and, after jumping up to attempt to retrieve a frisbee, forgetting the fact that her shoelace was attached at one end to her belt loop and at the other end to the bench, involuntarily bungee-jumped off of the Giles bench. Ripped pants and an enormous bruise on a forehead ensued. Just don't do it.

In 2007, Aycock's bench had silhouettes of people with the words "Aycock Hanging Out" on the footrest. The obvious innuendo of this made many a TIPster laugh. By 2008, Aycock had been painted over to just say Hanging Out, but not well enough, so one could still see the outline of the word Aycock.

During Term I in 2008, a TiPster named Scott Andrus was accused of breaking the Bassett bench, when really he had done no such thing, as it was actually the fault of a bunch of second-year girls.

At the beginning of Term 1 2009, there was no bench in front of Bassett, only a desk chair with a piece of paper saying "Bassett Bench" on it. This chair disappeared after the first day, leaving only a bench-sized void in the heart of TIPsters. After two weeks, on the Sunday after Quadfest, TIPsters awoke to find that the Pegram bench had been inexplicably moved in front of Bassett by a combination of night-roaming leprechauns, fairies, and angels, or, perhaps, RCs.

Bench Design by Year

• 2004
  • Giles: G-Spot, involving the red 7-up dot man
  • Brown:
  • Pergam: Starry Starry Night
  • Alspaugh:
  • Basset: "GO TO HELL, CAROLINA"

• 2005
  • Giles: G-Spot (Version 2)
  • Brown: Charlie Brown ("Full of substance since 1927")
  • Pegram: solid wooden bench
  • Alspaugh: Alspaugh - King of Peers
  • Basset: BP - Basset Pride - It's Where We Get Our Busch

• 2006
  • Giles: Benchless, until the Brown Bench was moved in front of it
  • Brown: Charlie Brown
  • Pegram: Pirate Themed
  • Alspaugh: King of Peers (the word Alspaugh had been painted out)
  • Bassett: "We're with Sober"
  • Wilson: Weilson (pronounced wheel-son)

• 2007
  • Alspaugh: Red with Absolut Alspaugh written on it
  • Bassett: Bassett written separated with We Play Dirty In between
  • Pegram: Looks like it's on drugs
  • Giles: Just a brown bench
  • Brown: Painted by Allison's RAG during Term II as a prize from Carnivale. They decorated it with 2 OSCs, a tree, their handprints, the llama, and their names and inside jokes on the back. Prior to the arrival of TIPsters, the bench had been painted plainly by staff because it was not considered TIPropriate.

• 2008
  • Alspaugh: Same as 2007
  • Bassett: Black with "Bassett Beast" written in green
  • Pegram: Painted with Van Gogh's Starry Night
  • Giles: Multi-colored paint with GILES in large letters EDIT: Grafitie was applied to the bench, so it ACTUALLY reads "GILFS"
  • Brown: City skyline (inside the Construction Zone, so completely inaccessible to TiPsters)

• 2009
  • Alspaugh: Red with Alspaugh and "Full of Substance" on it, decorated with beer bottle caps and pictures of 'substance'
  • Bassett: Missing!
  • Pegram: Salvador Dali's "The Persistence of Memory" (became Bassett bench on 2nd Sunday of Term 1)
  • Giles: Purple with "Giles" painted in yellow. This was the makeout bench of choice.
  • Brown: Read "Brown-e" like Wall-e, a great movie. It had brownies on it, too.

--Duke West--

• • Brownstone: Brown with the green word "Brownstone" along the back.
  • Kilgo Quad: White with black greek letters spelling "Sigma Nu"

• 2010
  • Alspaugh: Black with glow-in-the-dark graffiti art "Alspaugh," along with the devil mascot. Sadly, the glow-in-the-dark paint couldn't be seen at night because the lamps were too close to it.
  • Bassett: Blue with a basketball court and stands, "Our House Bassett" in white letters
  • Pegram: Cream, red, and white with Andy Warhol-style soup cans emblazoned with "Pegram"
  • Brown: Blue with Snoopy and Charlie Brown on it. Charlie's t-shirt reads "Go to hell, Carolina!"

--Duke West--

• • Brownstone: Brown with the green word "Brownstone" along the back.
  • Kilgo Quad: White and painted to look like a piano
  • Class Quad: Orange with the white and Black numbers, 01, painted on

• 2011
  • Alspaugh: Same as 2010
  • Bassett: Same as 2010
  • Pegram: Random rainbow paint splattering
  • Brown: Two round yellow 'smiley faces'--a sad one and a happy one with brownie stuff around the mouth. The caption says 'Frownie Brownie'
  • Giles: Starry Starry Night with 'Giles' written on it
  • Wilson: fairly boring black paint that peels REALLY EASILY and says Wilson: Game Over

--Duke West--

• • Brownstone Bench and the Kilgo Quad Bench were mysteriously absent.
  • Class Quad: Orange with the white and Black numbers, 01, painted on

• 2012
  • Alspaugh: None
  • Bassett: Same as 2010
  • Pegram: None
  • Brown: None
  • Giles: 'Giles' with the Gatorade symbol for the G
  • Wilson: Blue writing that says 'Wilson' and, underneath, 'Chill, son.' as well as having penguins around it.
  • Jarvis: An anchor formed the 'J' and the caption read "Jarrrvis"

• 2013
  • Bassett: Duke blue with "Bassett" written in white ink.
  • Brown: Black-and-white "Brownies: fresh batch"