If you’ve been following your college’s “Memes” page on Facebook, you’re probably familiar with UNH student Griffin Kiritsy, whose fresh-faced, pathetically earnest smile is the butt of the popular College Freshman meme joke. To put it into non-internet nerd language: college students use his photo as a template to share brief, humorous anecdotes about things naive freshmen do, such as buying all their class textbooks or telling their friends how cool their professor is for using the word “fuck” in lecture.
UNH’s independent student newspaper The New Hampshire recently caught up with Kiritsy, now a senior, to reflect on his status as a reluctant internet sensation. “I’m all grown up now,” Kiritsy said. “I’m not that dumb freshman who raises his hand in the middle of a 400-person lecture and asks to go to the bathroom.”
“Instead, I make sure to go before class so I don’t interrupt or miss anything important.”
Kiritsy also reminisced about how his alcohol drinking habits have changed. He was particularly proud of expanding his palate for various new beers. “Three years ago, if you asked me what the best beer was, I’d have said Keystone Lite,” he declared. “How stupid I was! Clearly, it’s Bud Lite. Or Coors. I guess that kind of wisdom just comes with age.”
“Oh, and when my friends and I finish a handle of alcohol, we don’t display it on our bookshelf to as a dorm decoration. Such a freshman move,” Kiritsy continued. “Instead, I do the right thing and bring it to the campus recycling center.”
“Everyone there has their orientation lanyards just like me!”
Kiritsy, a philosophy major, is now planning on applying medical school as a result of not being able to find employment.
