For reasons that are lost in the mists of time (three hours ago), this afternoon I've been wallowing in the bizarre rituals of American tertiary institutions as represented on Wikipedia.

This started out as a bit of a peek at Skull and Bones, everyone's favourite crazycakes secret society. I was under the (as it turned out, laughably inaccurate) impression that it was Yale's secret society. Fuck no! I discovered as I read through the little blurb on Skull & Bones that there were numerous other options for the mysteriously-minded Yale gent hell-bent on a bit of cloak-wearing. In fact, on the list of Collegiate Secret Societies in America, Yale comes rampaging to a stunning victory, having a grand ten of the buggers.

TEN! Who needs that much crazy?

And the names! Good grief. Scroll and Key, Mace and Chain, Sage and Chalice... even Book and Snake which just... I mean, guys, you couldn't find a thesaurus? Tome and Serpent! If you're going to wank, why not really wank? I do follow that the X & Y names are traditional. There's a secret society at Cornell called "Quill and Dagger", apparently. (No, that isn't the historical crime writer's association.) Can I found one called "Gin and Tonic"?

I then wondered why on earth some other big names, like Harvard and Princeton, weren't on the list. I soon found out it's because they do things differently there, donchaknow? Harvard don't have secret societies, they have "final clubs", which are basically secret socities with less florid but no less stupid names. (Would you want to belong to something called "Spee"?) Interestingly, they're all still single-gender (male, though there are three recently-founded female clubs), while the Cash & Flash Yale options are (I gather) mostly co-ed.

Meanwhile, Princeton! I actually remembered Princeton as an afterthought, while distracted on a tangent by reading about the Official Preppy Handbook. But yes, what about Princeton? Well, it has a chapter of the slightly ubiquitous (but not nearly as much as Theta Nu Epsilon) St Anthony Hall, but that didn't seem nearly enough to sustain almost-grown men and women in their (obviously extensive) requirements for extra-educational wankery. A little bit of poking found the Princeton substitute: eating clubs.

What? It brings to mind Vikings sitting around a long table and competing over who can eat more half-charred bear leg. (Or at the very least, a tableful of students singing, "Here's to Gazza, he's true blue..." which may not be so very far from the truth.) But actually, the Princeton Eating Clubs seem reasonably dignified. By this stage, I had reached something of a saturation point on flabberghasting, and not even the fact that the selection process for the elitist eating clubs is called the "Bicker" could do more than raise a half-interested eyebrow.

Conclusion? I didn't take university nearly seriously enough, clearly.