There can only be one U of A

Following an entire academic year void of reading and writing literature for fun (Gone with the Wind was the only novel I read, two thirds of which was frantically accomplished during spring break), I'm almost afraid that I don't know how to write anymore.

It took me fifteen minutes to write the sentence you just read. It's a pandemic. 

Well, I suppose once I start it up again, I will become so fantastically amazing that I will be able to write stellar blog entries whilst wasted off Jagermeister at a random frat party on a Tuesday night (this is college, after all).

Side note: Licorice-flavoured alcohol does not impress me. I'd like to see some mashed-potato-flavoured whisky. Then we'll talk.

Side side note: I know this is scientifically possible. I took organic chemsitry.

But, until such skills are developed, I suppose I will start by discussing a topic that has bothered me for quite some days now, and that is American colleges and the fact that they all have identical names.

I mean, not completely identical, of course. That would just be anarchy. "Oh, you went to Princeton, I see?" Meanwhile, it was a community college specializing in Narwhal Whispering run by Russian asylum escapees with a campus comprised of an undersized igloo on Baffin Island. But they'll never know.

Off that extreme digression, I come to you with a couple of troubling and real examples. I recently learned that Arizona State University is, shockingly (and not in a sarcastic way), not the same thing as the University of Arizona. And according to randoms on CollegeConfidential.com, the two schools differ quite significantly in prestige, so you can't just use them interchangeably. My question is, why?

I'm sorry, but that's like having the University of Alberta (U of A's unite!) and changing the University of Calgary's name to Alberta Provincial University (Canadians get me). Seems stupid now, right? Hopefully it does.

The only thing more confusing than this is the existence of California University in Pennsylvania. I understand that it is located in the city of California, Pennsylvania, but that just further directs me to the fact that someone named a city California. Sure, it probably came before the state (Western expansion and all that, I'm too lazy to actually research it), but still. Seems like unnecessary laziness to me. 

I suppose my main point is, perhaps the US should have fewer universities. Or perhaps they should start using a thesaurus. Was University of Phoenix really out of the question, ASU? Oh, wait, that's already a school as well.