That is the question uttered wearily by every student during this point at the semester. Go on, ask one. They’ll turn to you with bleary eyes and caffeinated jitters, and repeat that same question.

Mid-terms has just past, like a great typhoon of late-night studying and flurry of readings and scribblings. The tide has drawn, but you never know when it’ll flood back with a storm of new papers and exams.

Boy, college is tough. But I’m not here to bitch. I’m here to share a few of my secrets on how to stay sane in the midst of all the stress and craziness.

Unfortunately, I still have 43 meals left to choke down in my school dining hall. Damn it. It’s already past half the semester, and I’ve only dined there for a total of 7 meals. And I’m already so, so, so sick of all the food there.

I have, however, found the dining cafeteria a good place to study:
They have internet access and power cords for my laptop, so I just hitch my Macbook up and take advantage of the unlimited drinks and snacks.

Like say, granola in a bit of milk, with chunks of chocolate:
Warmed up in the microwave, the chocolate melts into the mixture, and the granola gets sort of chewy…
Not bad, but it was too sweet. The first bowl was good. But after my second bowl, I thought I was going to puke.

So another time, I decided to do brunch, since how can anyone mess up brunch food, right?

Wrong.

Check this out:
 Salad, fruit, turkey sausage, frittata, and omelet. With diet coke.

Salad is fine. Fruit is okay. Turkey sausage is blah. Frittata is blah. Omelet is waaaaay under-seasoned.
How the hell does one mess up an omelet? Is this some crazy low-sodium rule that the school has? And where is the cheese I ordered? No cheese makes Sophia a very, very unhappy grouch.

Disappointed, I just filled up on frittata:
…And more frittata:
And more frittata, with another sausage patty:
 And yet more frittata, with yet another patty:
I used the same plate for the omelet, so it’s still there, cold and rejected.

It’s something about the fact that this lackluster meal cost me $11 that makes me stuff myself to the brim with lackluster food. Does this make sense? That in order to get my money’s worth, I feel the need to fill myself up to the gills!

Poor Mimi. During our weekly Thursday meet-ups, I sometimes have to drag her to dine at the cafeteria. And they’ve been consistently bad. But we managed to find a few items that were actually edible.

Vegetarian Shepherd’s pie that was all potatoes and no filling:
Some kind of Indian-spiced vegetable medley that was actually pretty good minus all the grease:
 Mango-Chutney Chicken salad with tzatziki sauce:
Some kind of beef curry that was tough, stringy, and spat out:
Boring egg salad and tuna salad: 
These totally needed hot sauce. And lots of it.

On the brighter hand, I found out that Fridays was Asian-themed. Despite my ambivalence, the food wasn’t too bad:
 Asian sweet-and-sour rice noodle salad, cheese pizza, tzatziki sauce.

And second plate:
 Pepperoni & Sausage pizza, lemongrass mashed potatoes, green curry with shrimp and white rice

There was not a hint of lemongrass in that mashed potatoes, so I suspect they just threw that in there to sound fancy and go along with the Asian-theme. The green curry was pretty good, though.

So far, a lot of misses and a few acceptables. And I have 43 more rounds to go. God. Damn. It. I tried to swipe my friend in for a free meal, but they wouldn’t let me because I only have a partial meal plan.

Huh?! I’ve never heard such complete bullshit in my life!

To think my brother goes to Virginia-Tech, the school with one of the best on-campus dining, complete with lobsters and wood-grilled pizzas. Next time he complains about the food, I shall smack him and make him eat ours.

Wow. How did this post turn out to be so negative? Sorry, I promised not to bitch, but as I said, bad food makes me grouchy!

I’ll be back to my more chipper self by the next post. I promise!

Question of the Day: Remember my 7 pm rule? What about you? Are you a late-worker? A procrastinator?
And any tips for me to enjoy school dining food more?