Mitt Romney Tries to Eat Rick Perry

The Elegance of Collegiate Dinning

They say that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result.  So by that definition I must be the most insane person in the world when it comes to dinner time. 

What will happen is around 9:30 (yes I eat dinner at 9:30 or later.  College: Where your lifetime of obesity begins) my body will notify me that it is hungry.  I will head to the pantry and notice that the only thing I have is a jar of peanut butter and an empty bag of “Apple Dapples.”  I will then open the fridge only to find several empty bottles of my roommate’s fruit juice.  After failing there I will go to the cupboards and see that I have several jars of Ragu tomato sauce and boxes of spaghetti sticks.  I will think “I guess I could make spaghetti.”  But then I will remember that I don’t have any pots to cook the spaghetti in.  Disappointed I will head back to my room.

But then about 15 minutes later my body will be like “Hello! You still didn’t eat anything!”  And I will be like “But body, there wasn’t any food, I checked!”  And body will be like “Yea, but that was 15 minutes ago, just imagine how much food could be there now!”  And me, thinking with the same rational mind-set of a second grade boy who is trying to get a girl to like him by throwing rocks at her, head back to the kitchen to see what I can find. 

After repeating this cycle for about an hour I eventually find myself dipping uncooked spaghetti sticks into Ragu sauce.

It’s no secret that college students skip a lot of meals and when they do eat it’s mainly crap.  But there has always been something that has bugged me.  Occasionally there will be a nice established adult who will be concerned about the health and nutrition of a college student they know.  They will decide that they want to help us out by buying us some food.  But what do they buy every single time? RAMEN! RAMEN FREAKIN’ NOODLES!  “Wow, why thank you Mrs. Jenkins for giving me the one type of food I can actually afford.  That was so nice of you.  And an entire box full of it too, wow.  What is that like three dollars’ worth of food?  How graciously generous of you to supply me with enough sodium to inflict me and my posterity with Type 2 Diabetes.”

I honestly don’t know what they’re thinking when they get that for us.  “Oh look here at the bottom of the shelf! It’s Ramen Noodles, Isaac loves Ramen Noodles!  He eats them all the time!”  I EAT THEM BECAUSE I HAVE TO NOT BECAUSE I WANT TO!

Luckily for me this year there are some girls who live down the hall who enjoy cooking.  I kept an eye on them for the first several days until I kind of got a feel for their schedule.  That way I can “happen to be walking by” about the time they are starting to eat.  “Wow!  I just happened to be passing by and I noticed that something smelled absolutely delicious in here!  What is that?  Tortellini no way!  And it looks almost as good as the girls who made it!” (Followed by a huge sincere smile)  Two minutes later I walk into my room eating a plateful of tortellini.  “Where in the world do you keep getting all of this food?”  My roommate asks.  In full maturity I respond “Your mom” and then ignore him.

But I think I am kind of starting to like one of the girls of whom I get dinner from.  I’m not exactly sure how to get her to like me back.  Maybe I’ll just throw some rocks at her.

The Greatest Victory of Isaac's Life

I was reading the school newspaper and I saw a little notice that said the newspaper was having a 90’s trivia contest that day in its office.  Considering myself an expert on all things 90’s I made my way up to the newspaper’s office to enter.  I entered and walked up to the 30 something year old secretary who was pre-occupied with a copy of ’17 Magazine’.  After waiting for a moment I said “Excuse me, I’m here to enter the trivia contest.”  “You’re here for what?”  The secretary responded.  “The trivia contest. I read in your paper that you were having one.”  “Nancy!”  She screams to somebody hiding in a back office.  “You know anything about a trivia contest?”  “No!”  Nancy yells back.  “Ask Tom!”  The secretary turns to a boy about 8 feet away who was staring at a computer screen with a look on his face like he wanted nothing more than to die.  The conversation that ensued was so golden I have to put it in script format in order to catch it in its full glory.

Secretary:  (Yelling at the same volume she yelled at Nancy) Tom!  (She pauses and for some unknown reason waits for a response)  Tom!  (She yells again as if he didn’t hear her the first time.)

Tom: What? (He mumbles without even glancing away from the computer.) 

Secretary:  Know anything about a trivia contest?

Tom:  I hung it on the wall behind your desk.

Secretary:  What do you mean? 

Tom:  The question for the trivia contest is written on the paper that is hanging on the wall behind your desk.

Secretary:  So what do I do with it? 

Tom:  You ask him the question.

Secretary:  Which one? 

Tom:  The one that’s written on the paper. 

Secretary:  Which paper?

Tom:  The one hanging on the wall behind your desk.

If I was Tom I would never glance away from the computer either.

To make a long story short, the question was “What year did the Soviet Union fall?”  I know a ton about the 90’s but I didn’t know this one.  So I took an educated guess and said 1991, which turned out to be correct.  There are a lot of other things I could tell you a lot about 1991.  It was the year that Nirvana’s “Nevermind” came out and ended the reign of Michael Jackson and the rest of 80’s pop from the top of the music charts.  It was the year Bill Clinton launched his presidential campaign.  And it was also the year my crap-in-pants ratio started to decline (although I must note it did not stop completely until Clinton’s re-election.)

But the best part of all of this is for my lucky guess I ended up winning a free iPod touch!  I know right?  I was expecting some Laffy Taffy or something.  Those suckers gave me a freakin’ iPod touch!  The new kind too!  It was amazing.  When I tell people I won the iPod I feel as if I sound like those wall comments that you get on facebook when your friend’s profiles have been hacked.

“Hey bud! How’vya been!  Just wanted to let you know I just received a brand new iPod touch absolutely free!  I saw the offer and I thought ‘what could it hurt?’ But it actually worked!  I think they’re only giving out a limited amount so you better hurry and get yours! Just click here http://thisisobviouslynotyourfiendfromthirdgradeimeanseriouslywhotalkstotheirfriendslikethishowstupiddotheythinkweare?//

Due to my parents being a weird cross-breed between Mormon and Amish I was never exposed to the latest technological advances growing up. So holding this iPod for the first time was a revelatory experience.  When I held it in my hands I said to myself the same two things a new father says the first time he holds his child.  “This is a miracle.”  And  “What am I supposed to do with this?”

 My roommates told me that the first few days I had it I sounded exactly like a senior citizen would if they were using it. They said they overheard me saying things like “Well I’ll be! This son of gun has internet access.” “Golly!  Whad’ya know? You can download an entire book onto this thing!”

After I had had the iPod a few days I was telling my friend about it and he asked if he could see it.  I handed it to him and he scrolled through it for a few seconds and then looked up at me and said “You don’t have any songs on here.”  I responded “Does it do that?”