By Chris Cosci

College students are the undisputed masters of inventing bizarre activities. Even the most sensible college students can be found sledding down snow-covered hills on cafeteria trays or sliding around in giant mud puddles in the pouring rain. For some of the crazier students, no activity is complete until somebody is either writhing in pain or running around with no clothes on. It's no surprise that some parents worry about their children at college.

However, parents of some students at Northern Arizona University can rest a little easier knowing that their children have discovered a new way of relieving stress and having some fun. These students have found a unique recreational facility - a place that offers them the freedom and the space to challenge their minds, open their eyes and let out some latent energy. Inside this recreation Mecca, students find thousands of objects to work with and have already invented many new and incredible activities. It's a magical wonderland called Wal-Mart... Yes, that Wal-Mart.

In Northern Arizona, many places shut down by 9 or 10 p.m. Wal-Mart, on the other hand, is one of the only places in the area that's open 24 hours a day. For college students, who typically recognize going to bed at midnight as early, it's vital to have a place open that late that can fulfill their need to act like a bunch of lunatics.

So, after a long day of classes and an evening of intense studying, students gather together and head out to their local mega-store for some stress release. There, they engage in a number of interesting games, some of which require a little bit of athletic ability. There's the relay race limbo, which requires players to limbo under the shopping-cart stand. And then there's aisle football, a variation on tag football that can occasionally be interrupted by random people doing something else - like shopping, perhaps.

Other games require a keen eye and a little skill. One such game is called "10 in 10." In this game, students are divided into two teams. Two team captains spend ten minutes going through the store, finding ten items for the other team to locate. After placing these ten items in a cart, the captains bring the carts to the opposing team, and each team races to be the first to correctly return the ten items to their appropriate location. A similar game is called A-Z, in which each team has to race through the store to find one item for each letter of the alphabet.

The popularity of these games is booming, and Wal-Mart contests are starting to take place across the country - typically in rural areas. Some colleges have their own home rules or their own games, but the students all share the excitement of running through the empty aisles at one o'clock in the morning. I'm not sure what is more unsettling: the fact that Wal-Mart is the best place these students can find to goof off, or the fact that I really wish I was back in college now so that I could play these games myself.

So what do Wal-Mart employees think of these student games? Eugene Orr, the manager of the Flagstaff, Arizona store doesn't mind them. As long as the students return all of the items back to the shelves, everything's okay. And who knows - they might actually buy something. It's a win-win situation, unless you happen to be the random shopper who gets beaned in the head during a heated game of aisle football.

Mona Williams, a corporate spokesperson for Wal-Mart, offers another perspective on these unusual events. After hearing some of the details, Williams suggested that some of these games might even be helpful to train stock clerks. You mean in addition to being fun, these games can actually be educational? Just don't tell the students.