Gabrielle Paciorek, Assistant Art Director

After the keg full of Heineken has been tapped, after the last cigarette or joint has been smoked, after the last blurry-eyed and stumbling freshman has tumbled out of his house, Derek Anderson surveys the damage.

Bottles sprawled across the living room. Butts piled all over the place, belonging to both Marlboro and girls named Megan and Tiffany. Red plastic cups with dried alcohol lining the edges of the beer pong table.

The smell is pretty much as expected – a combination of alcohol, day-old trash and a drunk guy named Steve who probably hasn’t showered in three days. The floor isn’t like glue just yet, but sandals will surely be sticking to it in the morning.

Anderson and his roommates look for change on their desks or under their beds or in their passed-out friends’ pockets, and they take off for some late-night replenishment.

“I am Mr. Panchos at four in the morning,” the fourth-year San Diego State political science major said. “If I’m wasted, I get Panchos every single time.

“It’s disgusting, I know. Get some change, three rolled tacos and call it a night.”

The walk isn’t too far for Anderson and his roommates. They live on College Avenue, fewer than three minutes away from campus. While many of their friends have moved on to bigger but not necessarily better things, they’ve stayed close.

Everyone defines the “college” experience differently – there are the partiers and the studiers. Many view life from ages 18 to 22 as preparation for the real world, others see it as an escape from the real world.

The decision is completely arbitrary – to each his own.

Anderson’s decision was easy.

Pacific Beach? Too far. Mission Valley? Too expensive. Clairemont Mesa? Too boring.

“I don’t understand it,” Anderson said. “My whole reason for coming to college is getting my degree, but getting a degree while getting the college experience.

“I came here to live that experience – join a frat, get drunk, have fun.”

Like so many other of his classmates, Anderson fits the stereotype of a college student. He lives with his buddies in an average, run-of-the-mill house, and he drinks. A lot. Theirs is not what some would call a “party house” – a barely standing headquarters for parties Thursday, Friday and twice on Saturday – but they are willing to admit that, on any give night, the crack of an opening beer can will be heard.

“When we have nights free, there is someone drinking,” said Anderson’s roommate, finance senior Brian Wilder. “Anyone we know is welcome.”

Sometimes, even people they don’t know.

“We’ve had two parties this year that we haven’t planned on,” Wilder said. “We’ve had parties with about 300 people. It’s a normal party – alcohol, music. Nothing gets too crazy. The house gets really trashed, though.”

Trashed isn’t the appropriate word. Trashed would imply that the house had some beer spilled on the carpet or 10 empty bags of Jack in the Box lying on the floor. Trashed makes it seem like a quick run-through with a garbage bag and a vacuum cleaner would take care of it.

Annihilated works a bit better.

“We’ve had fence boards kicked out because people were trying to get in,” Wilder said. “We didn’t let people in, and they were throwing bottles. We’ve woken up with holes in doors, broken chairs, fences broken. A window was broken once.

“We aren’t too worried about our landlord.”

Their neighbors seem to be a bit worried about them. The house was CAPPed last semester after a noise violation brought police. No more late-night ragers. No more parties with 10 bottles of alcohol and a revolving keg. No more huge gatherings with lines out the door and people scrambling to get in.

“It’s bulls**t,” Anderson said. “You can’t have your noise that loud? It was one of the nights when they had the full house – the cops, the trucks, the drunk tanks.

“They told (his roommates) to turn the music off, and they said, ‘F**k off.’ So the cops come in and found a keg or two or five.”

Their parties are mainly relegated to the daytime now, which Wilder calls their fort