KINGSTON, ON—Having already suffered through three interminable minutes of her new boyfriend's dorm room acoustic set, first year university student Stacy Schiff, 19, began weighing her options as to where she should affix her gaze next.

The impromptu musical set began in earnest when Schiff noticed her boyfriend of two weeks, Steve Sanders, 20, had a Yamaha FG700S tucked behind the headboard of the twin bed in his dorm room. When she asked if he would be willing to play her a song or two, Sanders, who had only started playing the six-stringed instrument in his final year of high school because he needed to pad out his extracurriculars, was more than happy to oblige.

It only took four strums of the guitar strings before Schiff began to worry that the situation could have serious repercussions on their burgeoning romance.

"I went to an arts high school in Toronto. The halls were always full of kids playing all kinds of instruments," said the clearly flustered first-year English major who couldn't understand how the man she'd met in line outside of Stages nightclub last month was somehow unable to sense how uncomfortable and trapped she felt watching him play an excruciatingly drawn-out version of the Lumineers' 2012 folk rock anthem Hey Ho.

"I guess I thought I knew what I was getting myself into, but clearly I underestimated how long Steve would actually play," she explained.

For the first 15 seconds Schiff had opted to look directly into Sanders' eyes, but quickly regretted her decision when he began engaging her with suggestive eyebrow raises that mostly aligned with the 4/4 time signature of the song.

"I knew I had a real opportunity to switch things up the second he started getting really into it near the chorus and closed his eyes. That's when I made the decision to focus on the black smudge on the wall beside his MC Escher poster."

Unfortunately, Schiff's decision to stare past the man she had actually considered introducing to her parents next weekend did not have the desired effect – seconds later, Sanders was imploring her to clap along and she was once again forced into extended eye contact.

"Look, at this point I feel like I'm in so deep I'm just going to lie back, close my eyes, and hope to god they're serving chicken fingers at the caf tonight," Schiff sighed.

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