CAMBRIDGE, MA - Ignoring advice from his PAF and academic adviser, Kendrick Murphy ’20 reportedly enrolled in five friendships when completing his study card on Friday.
“Shopping week was crazy. I had to leave an 11 am lunch date fifteen minutes in to make it to a lifting sesh with Chad Brockington,” remarked Murphy. “It was hard for me to narrow my list down to just five after shopping fifteen people.”
According to Murphy, his five friends were chosen based on a consideration of Harvard’s commitment to diversity and the liberal arts. His five friends include a member of the rugby team, a Linguistics concentrator, a student at the Graduate School of Design, and a premed. Murphy even cross-registered for a friend at MIT, making the inconvenient commute to play squash every Thursday afternoon with his newfound companion.
“My four friends last semester were all right, but I wanted to expand my horizons and make the most out of my time at Harvard. This semester, I made sure to pick people with Q-scores of at least 4.0,” noted Murphy. “Even then, some of the people I shopped were terrible. Jeff had a weird odor and I didn’t like his conversational style.”
Many advisers discourage having more than four friends, as Harvard students are known to juggle too many responsibilities. In a 2015 poll, upperclassmen who maintained five friendships in their freshman spring almost universally regretted their decision to have more than four friends.
“Kenny's a great guy! I'm kind of jealous of how well he can balance his academic, extracurricular, and social lives,” opined Jackson Tellman ’20. "I really hope he doesn't drop me..."
Reports indicate Murphy plans to audit a romantic relationship this semester as well.