A great influx of requests for another blog post? I really should be comparing Eden to Canaan right now, but I just spent a good solid two hours on music theory (how on earth did Mozart write symphonies as a six year old??), and a nice break from the stress of schoolwork will be appreciated. For now, at least. When I wake up tomorrow and realize that I have a whole paper to write by Friday, perhaps the feeling will morph into utter despair. However, I've experienced utter despair enough times in the past few weeks that it has decreased into a dull ache that reappears whenever I listen to sappy music (are we human or are we fucking dancer?).
But if you want to know about my personal life, ask me personally. I'm here today to give you advice on how to survive eating out of a college cafeteria. If you are not already a college student, you will be soon enough, and really, you must eat to live (epic discovery, I'm sure, by our bacterium ancestors).
1) Don't be vegetarian. You're signing away your own life. I'm limited to the salad bar (gah iceberg spinach arugula blah), the "vegetarian station" (oftentimes a little over iced smoothie thing...this is a full course? not all vegetarians are anorexic...), or the perpetual supply of lukewarm yogurt, honeydew melon, and cheese or veggie pizza. Tofu? Only served in chunks, like spongey gelatin. Beans? NEVER drained, and usually under spiced and overcooked. Raw veggies? Nonexistent. Often, after an unsatisfying dinner, I'll run back to my little room and pull out my pop tarts. Definitely not home-cooking.
2) Love pizza. Always available, either by the slice or by the personal pan (spinach, mushroom, and olive has become my ultimate favorite). Moderately healthful, as long as you avoid the meat lovers or triple cheese. Really, pizza accounts for at least one meal a day for me. It's only the second month, and I'm running out of food variety already....
3) Eat breakfast. Truly the only satisfying meal. Made to order omelets, waffles, and a perpetual supply of slightly burnt hash browns and slightly runny scrambled eggs, not to mention pineapple juice, crappy coffee (decaf or caffeinated? the lack of distinction has led to many caffeine withdrawal headaches and crashes in the middle of psych class. Crazed looking octopi covering my notes? Yes, I'm delirious). However, I actually wake up for breakfast maybe twice a week. My alarm is set early enough, but my brain cannot handle waking up 30 minutes early just for food.
4) Get used to not eating when you want to. I want to eat breakfast at 11 in the morning, lunch at 2:30, and dinner at 7:30 or later (I mean, I'll be up till 1, so a late dinner is much preferred). In reality, breakfast ends at 10, lunch at 2, and dinner at 8 (in reality of that reality, the cafeteria workers start shutting down at 7:30, and all the good stuff is gone by then anyways). So today, one meal in the middle of the day sufficed, since the food places were all closed by the time I felt hungry again. Oh, irregularity...
5) Lukewarm. Hope you like it.
6) Wait...that sushi has been sitting there un-iced from the lunch hours to the dinner hours. Food poisoning? Not yet, but it looms around the corner...
7) Oh, the celebrations. Whenever a big influx of pro studs is on campus, or when some distinguished personality is present on campus, the Rat (our affectionate and actually official name for the main cafeteria) throws a little 'party'. For the "Oktoberfest", we were served very purple cabbage (but flavored with honey instead of vinegar?), German chocolate cake (baked goods...ALWAYS mediocre and disappointing), and some mush called German potato salad. So so sad for a little German girl like me...
8) Fro-yo is life. It is the main course (with granola or fresh fruit), the side dish (to wash down the salty soups) and of course, the dessert, piled high in a plastic cup and taken out to comfort students while they nurse their disappointed stomachs.
9) Stock up on ramen, easy mac, instant meals, peanut butter, crackers, anything with a bit of substance. Snickers bars. The ultimate power snack.
10) Work out. Even if you hate the cafeteria's food, it's still a buffet. You will gain weight unless you play a sport or live on a campus significantly larger than mine and must walk more than a minute to get to class. Treadmill, elliptical, weights, track. Whatever works for you. Like, seriously. If the gym wasn't closed already, I'd probably be there now, working off this midterm stress (which I really shouldn't have, considering I have no midterms...)
That being said, I plan on storing up for the winter when I go home this weekend. Stuffing my face with as much home cooking as possible and filling my suitcase with fresh-baked cookies and, if I weren't flying, containers upon containers of real food. If you really, really like food or are really, really picky, I would advise living slightly closer to home, just to survive.
It might work in your favor, though. Asking your parents for food instead of money will awake that instinct in them to feed their young, so they will give you more money to buy food. Eventually, though, you will find yourself actually spending it on food....
