The expanding brain meme in two frames, with the first reading "Playing football on the lawns," and the second saying "Playing football on the tarps."

Next step: playing football in Butler?

Time is running out before Columbia’s lawns fall victim to commencement. Before that happens, let us celebrate via power rankings the best and worst sports and activities to play on Columbia’s lawns.

1.Sunbathing – While you can do this on the thin strips of lawn along College Walk, it’s best done on the wide expanses of the South Lawns. You can best enjoy the open lawns by doing literally nothing while outside.

2. Eating – Grass, also known to experts as “nature’s dining room,” is the perfect place to sit and chow down, whether you’re enjoying Surf and Turf or indulging in Sweetgreen. While you might suffer a stain, it’s worth it to feel that plush grass under your fingers.

3. Spikeball/KanJam – Let’s face it – these are basically the same game, played by the same people. While you should inherently distrust anyone playing these games, it’s hard to deny that their unorthodox playstyles and small space requirements make them fun to watch while walking by and ideal for a college lawn.

4. Kicking around a soccer ball, but knowing nothing about soccer – “Hey, let’s pretend that the lawn gate is a goal!” This never works. Seeing people attempt to make it work, but tripping over the ball, is a quintessential lawn experience.

5. Peoplewatching – Plenty of interesting people find their ways onto the lawn. In fact, a lot of Upper West Siders treat Columbia as an NYC public park, bringing their children along for the stroll. See how many different colors of pastel shorts you can find! Honorable mention: dogspotting.

6. Throwing a non-branded flying disc – Hey, the sport is called “ultimate,” not Frisbee. While this seems like a good idea, there are two main problems. First, this takes up way too much space, especially just for two people. Second, flying discs are possessed by hellhounds and will never go where you want them to go.

7. Playing loud music – With the gradual decline of the college guitar player, portable speakers have taken up the mantle of providing music for lazy college evenings. But does everybody really want to hear the indie-glitch group you found on Soundcloud? Treat your speaker as a public broadcast, and play something popular. Anyway, here’s Wonderwall.

8. Reading for class – While Columbia wants to valorize this practice, it’s really unfortunate to have to spend such a beautiful day reading. While it’s better than being holed up in a library, you should still do something more fun on the lawns.

9. Playing an actual, organized team sport – Ew. Gross.

10. Working on a laptop – Come on, we know that all the sunlight does is increase glare and show how much dust is on your screen. Even when you crank your brightness to the max, it’s still way too hard to read anything. Go get an e-reader or something.