The Head of the Charles should be a weekend of good sportsmanship, exciting races and good old fashioned fun. Unfortunately, by imposing strict rules on parties, and forcing us to register our guests, the administration is intent on making the Head of the Charles just another in a long string of unexciting weekends in the undergraduate experience.

This weekend Harvard students should have the unique opportunity to show off our fair campus to our visiting friends and opponents. Instead, we'll most likely be sitting silently in our rooms even earlier than usual, victims of the administration's unwarranted paranoia. It's unlikely that students, if left to their own devices, would let parties get out of hand given the fact that we're in the middle of midterms. And our friends from other schools aren't any more likely to come this weekend than any other. Frankly, Head of the Charles simply isn't the enormous event that Harvard fears. Most undergraduates see it as just another weekend, albeit with boats.

If only the administration could see its way to loosening up the regular restrictions on partying this weekend we might be able to shake off some of our midterm blues, if only for a night or two.