9 Definitive Times You Can Still Get Away With Acting Like A College Kid In Your 20s

1. During whatever sporting event your school is known for.

If you’re mixing bro-like pinnies and tequila before 10 AM, you get a free pass. However, if you went to a D1 school and you still live in your college city (in a UCLA kind of situation) you don’t get a free pass every weekend for football games. You get one pinny and tequila pass per year — twice if you’re school comes up from behind and miraculously makes it into the final four.

2. Your birthday.

On your birthday, you get to turn whatever age you want. If you want to celebrate the seventh anniversary of your 21st birthday, no one should stop you. Unfortunately, before you plunge head first into a gin bucket, it’s important to remember that your hangover tolerance levels have aged seven years since your 21st birthday.

3. The days following a breakup.

I still associate sitting in the same sweatpants I slept in with college. I also think of binging on nutella, and watching Legally Blonde and Miss Congeniality back-to-back (the most noble feat) as s collegiate activity. But these are also text book breakup activities, so if you need to channel your inner slob when you’re going through a tough time emotionally, there’s no reason you should resist the need to melt chocolate on anything in sight, and break out your extra worn sweats.

4. Weirdly specific theme parties.

If you’re going to attend an Anything But Clothes party after college, you can’t pair that moment with a spicy pinot noir or a dirty martini. In other words, if you’re going to capitalize on that jungle juice craving you have when you get nostalgic and/or drowsy on liquid benadryl, you need to do it at an overly specific theme party. Think: Lifeguard Bros And Surfer Hoes, or something equally obscene, ignorant, and borderline offensive.

5. The night before Thanksgiving.

Shockingly enough, the night before Thanksgiving is one of the biggest party nights of the year, presumably because everyone is in their hometown, and shares the belief that the best reunions have strong drinks. As long as you’re being safe, there’s no reason not to kick back and sink back into your college tendencies of casually eye-stalking the kid you almost hooked up with three years ago. And, hey, you don’t have work the next day. (Though you do have to eat a very large meal before 4 PM, so keep it together at least a little.)

6. When your song comes on, and it’s after 2:30 AM.

If your bars close at 2 AM, you’re shit out of luck.

7. The first day of your period (if applicable).

Same concept as the days following a breakup situation. The first day of your period is the one day out of each month that deadlines follow your pants’ lead and become a little bit looser. Your procrastination levels are allowed to surpass even your worst college procrastination sessions. If you’re really going to rival your college self, you’ll need a full Netflix queue, a heating pad (for obvious reasons), a curling iron (because now seems like a good time to see whether ringlets frame your face), a coloring book, and a will to create seven new Spotify playlists.

8. Halloween.

There is no rule that says when, where or how you’re supposed to dress for Halloween. If you need to unleash your midriff in your late 20s (or 30s or 40s), you absolutely should.

9. When you run into someone you used to hook up with in college in real post-college life.

There’s a common phenomenon in pop culture (okay, in vintage “How I Met Your Mother”) called “revertigo,” where you revert back to your past self when you’re around someone you used to spend time with. So, if you catch the eye of your ex-college hook up years later while at a bar with colleagues (because you’ve become a legitimate person with a job, who now knows their drinking limits) you’re allowed to revert back to your old self briefly. And if that means you instinctively hike your top down, then so be it.