What College Has Taught Me Pt. 1

You know, I told myself I’d operate life in this condo much as if I were an adult with a house. Nevertheless, I have fallen prey to the college diet/lifestyle. And along the way, I’ve become privy to the idiosyncrasies of the malnourished student. Here are just a few tips I’ve learned along the way.

1) Patience is a virtue. But so is half-patience.
It’s getting chilly outside, but drinking water without ice never felt right to me. Plus, my water filter doesn’t seem to be absorbing any of the frostiness from the outside, so my water is always on the lukewarm side. With that in mind, I always have ice cubes in trays ready in the freezer. But one day, I forgot (…I was lazy) to fill a few of the trays ahead of time, so I suffered with lukewarm water for a good hour or so, waiting for the ice to freeze over. Needless to say, I got impatient, and I opened the freezer to see that it was only halfway frozen. That was good enough for me. I cracked them loose, and began to lift cubes, with clear holes of immaturity, into my cup. I proceeded to pour the water that hadn’t frozen into my cup as well.

Let me tell you. Water that is at the brink of freezing is the most refreshing water there is. I’m sure if I waited another 30 minutes, the ice cubes would’ve been fully functional…but I’d have to wait another 30 minutes.

2) Have something edible around you. Please.
Many a night I come home hungry to a place with no pre-made meals. Which usually means a lot of time must be spent chopping and slicing, and cooking rice, and stirring, and sometimes that’s all just too much. So sometimes I just lock myself in my room and knock out. But that doesn’t solve the problem. I’m still hungry. Sometimes, I get lazy to the point where I’ll look at what’s around me, and put two and two together. One night during Fall semester, I was sprawled out on my couch, feeling weak and deprived. I looked up and saw a bundle of grapes and a bottle of Sriracha. And that was dinner.

Don’t feel too bad for me though. The next day I had all you can eat sushi. The night following that, I made myself a 3 course dinner. But the point is, leave random snacks, or fruit, and other forms of edibles around the house. In the living room, obviously in the kitchen, in the bedroom, and even in the bathroom. You really never know when you’ll be too lazy to get up. And it’s a problem that often strikes at completely unforeseeable moments.

3) The orange juice carton says “Shake Well.” Don’t.
Those who are familiar with my outlandish habits know that I consume an obscene amount of orange juice. I can take out 2 gallons (equivalent of the 4-pack of Tropicana cartons sold at Costco) in 3-4 days. Well, that was when I lived with my parents. Now, I don’t have such luxuries, but recently, I’ve discovered that I might not need that much anyway. …Although that fact should be fairly obvious. I’m also sure my stomach is thanking me. Joke’s on it. It’s still going to get ulcers in the near future.

I have a gallon of orange juice that I purchased a week and a half ago. There is still maybe a quarter of a cup left. Under normal circumstances, that quarter of a cup would’ve been gone at least 4 days ago. But I’ve learned the ways of conservation, again, thanks to my bloating laziness. When I first opened the bottle, instinct told me to shake it, so I did. But as the nectar began to deplete, I got lazy. I stopped shaking. And I realized the more and more I drank, the thicker and thicker it got. To the point where at about 4/5 of the way down, the juice inside was as thick as syrup. And that is liquid gold, my friends.

Simply pour a small amount of this OJ syrup, dilute it with some water, and add ice. I think I started tearing up when I came to this discovery. There is nothing like learning how to stretch the ability of my favorite beverage to its absolute maximum.

4) There is no shame of taking advantage of good deals.
Nor is there shame in heeding advice from an old mentor.
I originally wanted to create an entirely separate post for this, but I figured it would fit better in the scheme of this one. Pizza Hut, along with Papa John’s have really stuck gold with their new promotion. By allowing their customers to order any pizza for $10, they not only make their clientele extremely happy, but they shove their collective boots up Domino’s rear-end. Seriously. Domino’s “revolution” was endearing for the first week, but when we all realized the fallacies of their ploy, in addition to their weak promotion, their luster, once again, began to diminish.

Pizza Hut, acting as the gold standard in chain pizza restaurants should, created a beautiful promotion. Truly stunning. Any pizza. $10. Wasn’t long until Papa John’s offered an identical promo. Yes, I’d rather have a pizza from an actual pizzeria, but funds aren’t always going to be around. And nor is this promotion. So I ordered 2 large pizzas a few days ago from Pizza Hut. I initially was going to act the hero and finish both pizzas, but a quarter of the way through, I felt disgusting and halted my ambition. It’s lasted me until just a few hours ago. 25 bucks stretched for 3 days. And the pizza was just as good as when it was delivered.

My 6th grade English/History teacher, Mr. Michel, imparted words of wisdom that I will never forget. He told us that as a college student, he was poor and didn’t own a microwave. He had leftover pizza, but he didn’t know how to reheat it. But he thought again. He had a stove. He had a pan. He had a way. So, on low heat, he began to reheat the pizza. The cheese, slowly but surely, began to reconfigure itself into the oozy opaque plasmodium that once dominated the pizza’s landscape. However, it wasn’t what remained the same that made this new method so breathtaking; it was what changed. The crust, instead of just being heated through with the power of radio waves and steam, altered its dynamic as a result of the concentrated heat of the pan and stove. Instead of having a flaccid slice, the foundation was stiff, wafer-like in crunch. Yes, crunch! That weekend, after he told the story, I tried out his method, and never went back to the microwave, or the oven.

His story transcends pizza, though. It’s the concept of what we have. What we have may never seem like much. But what we have can surprise us. A quote Mr. Michel often recited was a firm belief of his. That “necessity is the mother of all invention.” College may be a shift in what we’ve considered “normal” for the greater portion of our lives, but with enough desperation, and enough adroitness, we can rewrite our own “how-to”  manual of life.