Finals and Shit

I know this is behind the times, or as some would say, "2008? More like 2000 and late." In fact, this is occurring in 2011.

Finals period eating behavior among college students is similar to that of bears about to go into hibernation. Both bears and students must survive through a period essential to their continued survival, so they eat and eat and swim upstream to spawn.

I am gonna start by making a list of some of the things I ate during finals period last semester and it is not pretty. I'm just starting finals now so it's about to get real bad again. The winners of "WORST foods I Ate Last Semester" contest are:

First prize: Raw ramen noodles seasoned with salt packet I found in my dress pants (who the fuck has time to boil water?)

Second Prize: Ivy room falafel with 3 falafel balls "on the side"

Bronze: mozzarella stick I found in the ADPhi lounge at 4AM

runner-up: 2 candy canes I stole from a christmas tree at a local business

Of course I eat other real food that I buy at a store, like oreos and diet coke. There is something about finals that brings out the worst of our eating habits. Also you totally have to realize how first world problem-y finals stress eating is. Not only do I not have to toil in the fields to satisfy the demands of my feudal lord, I'm all like "ahhh I'm consuming extra caloriessss."

If my mom found out what I eat during these times, she would flip a shit. Normally, she would send me a care package right about now but she dropped the ball this year because she was too busy stressing out about my sister's statewide examinations. I usually go through those care packages fast though, so I still end up eating awful food I find in the library.

Those care packages are fucking great. It's like an explosion of the best and worst parts of advanced industrial societies, namely plastic packaging and obesity (both AWESOME). There are lots of weird Asian snacks, lots of even weirder American snacks and the occasional unlabeled chinese herb mixture designed to enhance brain function.

Aside from the weird herbs, which I keep in a container along with the self-tanner I accidentally won at Sephora, there is candied ginger, packets of powerful antibiotics, no. 2 pencils (to the scan machine can read my bubbles), face masks to rejuvenate my tired face, and Korean stickers of academic encouragement.

Those stickers are great - I stick them in my notebooks. They're like the equivalent of the "great job!" and "You're the best!" things you got in grade school but instead they loosely translate to "conquest!" "the climb to excellence!" and "[untranslatable anti-colonial protest chant!]"

And of course, there is the food. Now I don't know if any of you have any experience with the bizarre yet infinitely delightful snacks dreamt up by the Korean peoples, but this shit is awesome. Screw macroeconomic indicators, international recognition, and a consolidated state apparatus -- if you can produce over five different varieties of chocolate-filled panda cookies, you ARE a developed country.

Here are a few of my favorite things:
1. Yam-Yam, which is a cone-like thing that has one side of trans-fatty cream goodness (in strawberry or chocolate) and another side of breadsticks. Amaaaazing!
2. Choco-pie-Marshmallow wrapped in cake wrapped in chocolate. They drop this shit into North Korea to teach them about the triumphs of capitalism. Pretty convincing to me!
3. I don't know what they're called, but they're just popped rice lightly seasoned with sugar. They're like, 10 calories each and go great with butter.

And then my mom always packs the classics:
1. Goldfish - because that advertising campaign that had the jingle that said "and my mom says they're okay!" really worked on my mom! Thank you, Pepperidge Farm corporation!!
2. Wheat thins - they're a health food. Especially when you eat the whole box in one sitting.
3. Nilla wafers
4. Beef jerky - these come in varieties. One variety comes in "sesame chicken" flavor. WTF?

And there we go. A brief overview of my finals eating habits. I hope all of you are feeding your bodies well during this stressful time. Just relax, take a bite out of that sandwich you found under your bed, and remember that the feudal lords don't have card access to the Rock.