The Quincy House Committee is tightening the house's lunchtime interhouse restrictions, which now rival those of Adams and Lowell in their stringency.

But Quad dwellers, who now face meals at the Union or a long walk home, are not pleased at the growing strictness of the river houses' lunch policies.

"One day I went to Quincy with two friends and you can only have one guest," said a sophomore Currier resident who then had to dine at the Union, an experience she described curtly: "yuck."

The response from the river is something like, "each house to its own."

"It got so crowded that the line went down the stairs and to the door," said Jill Wheeler, Chair of the Quincy House Committee. "We just wanted to make sure that Quincy people got lunch at a reasonable time."

The new policy, which took effect on October 4, prohibits all non-Quincy residents from entering the dining hall between 11:45-12:15 and 1:00 and 1:15.

The volume of lunch at Quincy averages about 500 meals daily, a hundred of which are interhouse guests, according to Quincy Assistant Dining Manager Den Evens.

During the times when guests are allowed, Quincy residents are limited to one guest per lunch.

Interhouse restrictions are left entirely to the discretion of masters and house committees.

Like Quincy, Lowell and Adams have a one guest policy. "Lowellians may being I, one, uno, ein, (2-1) guest," says a sign posted outside of Lowell dining hall.

"The restrictions are not an attempt to keep people out...But each house has to take care primarily of its own," said Quincy House Master Michael Shinagel.

In a brief telephone interview, Adams House Master Robert Kiely had a philosophical answer to Quad dwellers' concerns.

Kant's categorical imperative, which would seem to favor "each house taking care of its own" to the exclusion of other students, doesn't apply to lunch, Kiely said.

"I don't believe in universal principles. I'm an existentialist. We deal with situations as they arise," he said.

"What we always tell students and checkers at Adams House is that if the dining hall isn't too crowded, use your common sense," Kiely said.

But few students find many empty seats in the Adams dining hall.

"Once I had to go to three different houses," said Currier resident Sarah G. Montross '97