I would not eat it on a plane

I have to admit that I have been rather lax in the field of making note of my rambling, quasi coherent thoughts for the past couple of weeks. It could be because of the newfound academia that college is presenting to me. But it’s probably because I’m on campus eating all of the time.

Let me tell you about college, my brethren: there is food everywhere. I’m not talking about a dining hall here and a fast food joint there; there is literally some way to get food at every point on campus. Yesterday, I almost got in line for free Krishna Lunch outside of Library West. But then I smelled it. And looked at it. No thanks.

Dear Dave Thomas…

So, in my great many experiences eating hamburgers, I have not allowed for much tomfoolery in their preparation. Plain. Cheese, bread, and meat. Maybe ketchup, mustard, or mayonnaise will make a guest appearance. But other than that, I generally don’t do veggies.

But every now and then, I will see a burger all dolled up for its eventual demise in gastrointestinal juices and enzymes and I wonder: what’s with those raw onions?

The nature of a raw onion is to exist in a ring shape. Hence, we have such fried wonders as onion rings. But wouldn’t it make more sense to, you know, chop up the raw onion prior to its placement on my delicious slab of ground chuck? That way, it doesn’t just garnish the perimeter of my dinner.

Just a thought.

Chance taken

If you talk to anyone who has known me for more than four minutes, they’ll all tell you the same thing: out of general principle, I am diametrically opposed to most (if not all) forms of affectionate interaction. I say this just to give a general idea of how far I actually went out on a limb this morning.

Every morning, I go to the local Krispy Kreme and order a medium bold coffee (with whole milk and three sugars) before I pick up my carpool (which, by the way, is very funny when Angus tries to get into my super-cramped backseat). I’ve gone every weekday since the start of school and have become quite the regular – most of the time, the lady who serves me every day only charges me 50 cents instead of the usual 99.

But for some reason, today I was driven to change my scheme. Instead of pulling up to the speaker box in the always empty drive thru lane and saying the usual line (“Just a medium bold coffee with whole milk and three sugars, please”), I decided to call her by the name that I had noticed on her name tag two days prior.

“Good morning, Debbie – I’ll just have my medium coffee with who-”

She cut me off and said, “Okay, pull up, sweetie pie.”

My friends, it seems that such a personal remark worked in my favor. Instead of a cup of coffee and the newspaper that comes with it, Debbie treated me to a doughnut in addition to my usual order. It was hot and delicious. Probably even more delicious because it was free.

Either way, this could be a lesson: once you’re comfortable with a person, once you’ve gotten to know them, once you’re no longer threatened by their strangeness, feel free to take that extra step and refer to your fellow human by name.

It might get you a free doughnut.

Cheesed off

When I was a little kid, I was always wary of eating salad. If it was green and was not covered with melted cheddar cheese, there was never usually a good chance that such an item would come within a foot of my mouth.

In my old age, though, I’ve matured a little bit. If I am eating at a restaurant and my dinner comes with a salad, I can manage to swallow it while washing it down with a nice vinaigrette.

However, I cannot bring myself to eat garden salads. My ideal salad is basically a bowl of lettuce with croûtons and a sufficiently fattening dressing. I have nothing against garden salads in regards to their content except for one item.

When the chef takes those little strips of carrots and showers my salad with them, my basic instinct (or wishful thinking, whichever you prefer) says, “Oooh! Cheese!”

Oh no, my friends. It’s just carrot. Yuck.

Cut it out

This past week as I was making myself a turkey sandwich, I thought to myself, “Gee, self: you should write a blog entry concerning the merits of the diagonal sandwich cut as opposed to the horizontal.”

Days have since passed, and I have not yet mustered (no pun intended) up the energy to preach from my digital soapbox against the sins of boring sandwich cutting. There’s what summer will do to a kid.

Step on it

I think it’s cute when microwavable products have an extra step on the tail end of their preparation directions that reads, “Enjoy.”

And here I was planning to painfully stomach the ravioli that I voluntarily made for my own satisfaction in a manner that resembles a whiny baby mouthing unhappily the pink medicine that is being forced upon him by his mother. Shucks.

Sinning never felt this good

I know, I know. It’s been a while.

I’m getting fat again. Well, let me rephrase. I’m eating like a genetically mutated cow that fills its four stomachs with whole pepperoni and mushroom pizzas rather than Bermuda Grass. Why? I’m guessing it’s a product of my new line of work and the metabolism that arises from a day on the job.

Either way, this week, I’ve eaten about 3 pizzas, which isn’t all that bad. But when you add in all of the other crap I’ve eaten, my eating habits look atrocious.

Normally, I would feel badly about my newfound diet habits. I really would. But I’ve managed to maintain my weight at a steady 140. Therefore, I’ve decided that as long as I eat when I’m hungry and what I eat is greasy and delicious, I will have no problems in the short run.

And the long run? Who cares?

Billy likes to drink soda

So, I had originally planned on giving up soda pop for Lent. And yeah, I’m going over three weeks strong.

Soda’s bad effects on weight, dental hygiene, and “all that jazz”:http://www.agd.org/media/2004/june/drinks.html have officially persuaded me. Therefore, I think I’ve decided to give it up for good. For nearly a month, I’ve been solely dependent on water and milk, and to be frank, I really don’t miss soda (or pop, if you’re one of my comrades from the Midwest) all that much.

Call me crazy.

Breaking Fast

In the past few weeks, my mother has, much to the urging of my brother, brought back from Publix the various cereals of our childhood.

First, it was Golden Grahams. A cereal that is easily manageable, the flakes had just the proper amount of golden and not too much graham, making for a sustained box lifetime of approximately 23 hours.

Then, she brought home Life. This variation, however, was new: Honey Graham Life. While it sounded appetizing, it came off a bit strong at first taste. I think that this could have been an honest mistake on the part of the honey adder on the production line, I can still assure you that no, Mikey doesn’t like this one.

Last week was my favorite because Mom brought home Smacks. I’ve always been a fan of Honey Smacks. Not just for their sweet taste, but the added perk of flavored residual milk at the bottom of the bowl. Something about that little frog’s cereal is inexplicably wonderful. Plus, it comes in a giant box, allowing many indulgences.

This week, Mom brought us Kix. You know: “Kid Tested, Mother Approved.” I’ve been testing them for a while now and while they certainly are not in contention for the award of best cereal, they hold their own in the whole grain division, barely nudging out Cheerios from the race. They are essentially carbon copies of Cheerios, but Kix have a slight manageability advantage in that due to their largely spherical shape, they float in the milk and one does not have to go fishing for his cereal after a given time of submersion.

That’s been the cereal roster for the last few weeks. This week, I think I’ll lobby for Honeycomb. Or Cookie Crisp. Or Cocoa Puffs. Or Cinnamon Toast Crunch. Or Cap’n Crunch.

Oh God, I can’t decide. It’s times like this I wish I had more than one stomach, like a cow.

I'm the fastest kid at recess

So, things are now on an upswing in my life thanks to the emergence of one of my new best friends in the world: Healthy Cow Chocolate Milk.

Apparently, the cafeteria gave up on the antiquated ways of subservience to Velda Farms. Now, the good folks at Healthy Cow Milk are making the world a little brighter, one half pint at a time.

Not only does this stuff taste way better; the boxes are a billion times more interesting. Back in the day when we had to read some corny joke and turn the carton entirely around to see the punch line, everyone had a pain in their arms from all the turning and a pain in the brain from the horrible, horrible joke. It was like watching television on an old black and white set while having a hand standing contest underwater – just silly and exhausting.

Now, however, we have clever quips at a horizontal level right there at our fingertips. Among the myriad of silly sentences, my personal favorite is, “It takes 100 cartons of Healthy Cow Milk to be as fast as the slowest Healthy Cow.”