posted 2007/09/09 at 16:26
As I mentioned in my last post, on Friday I started a new game of Final Fantasy VII in celebration of the ten-year anniversary of its stateside release. Yesterday I played the game for much of the afternoon, and since I don't stick to my diet on Saturdays, I was also drinking red creme soda while I was playing. I can remember drinking a lot of Barq's Red Creme Soda when I was first playing through Final Fantasy VII, which was kind of notable because I hadn't drunk that much of it since I drank it regularly at Antioch. Apart from Fruitopia, Barq's Red Creme Soda was my favourite drink to get from the vending machines in the Student Union there (although when the cafeteria was open they had Mr. Pibb in the fountain drinks, which I probably liked more than the Barq's), and I went through an awful lot of it while I was down in Yellow Springs. Even today I get a strange feeling of comfort from drinking red creme soda, although I can't find Barq's brand of it anywhere so I'm stuck drinking Kroger store brand red creme soda these days.
Yesterday afternoon my Mom was baking pumpkin pies, which is kind of an odd thing for her to be doing at this time of year. Right away when the smell hit my nose, I couldn't help but feel like autumn had hit, given that she normally waits until at least late October to start making pumpkin pies. I did feel a bit cold then, but that was because of the air conditioning; it was still fairly summer-like outside. Still, as I sit looking out my window here, it's hard not to notice that some of the leaves on a couple of our trees have started to yellow and brown, and the other trees have turned a fairly dull green. Today being the first Sunday of the NFL season and all, it does feel like we're accelerating towards autumn fairly quickly here. Strangely, though, the smell of Mom's pumpkin pies was the strongest indicator of autumn I think I've experienced so far.
I'd like to drive over to Cleveland sometime in the next couple of weeks to visit my friend Lara now that she has her own apartment there. (I know, since when have I actually wanted to go to Cleveland? Well, for a good friend I make exceptions to my usual rules.) If there's anything I'm looking forward to more than meeting up with Lara for the first time since this past winter, though, it's the fact that I can get Sbarro pizza at the service plazas on my way to and from Cleveland on the Ohio Turnpike. I already have an inexplicable love of bad road food as it is, but there's something about Sbarro pizza that hooks me for some reason. A mall by my old private school used to have a Sbarro, and for a while there was even a Sbarro at UT's Student Union, but both of those locations have long since vanished, and the only place I can go locally to get Sbarro is the movie theatre in the big mall in town, and not only am I not a movie person and not a mall person, but trying to navigate things there on a Saturday just feels like too much trouble to me. I think going all the way to Cleveland and back just to hit up the Sbarro locations on the way there may actually be more convenient for me, strangely enough.
When I do visit Lara, though, I'll have to be sure to bake brownies for her ahead of time, and I'm already doing a lot of baking for my students. The teacher I had in my undergraduate career who turned me on to teaching often brought cookies to class, and openly admitted that she did so to pump us full of sugar (and thus make us more talkative) as much as to show some appreciation for us. I've kind of brought that to the classes I've taught so far as well, and although it kind of stinks that I have to wait to consume their leftovers on Saturdays when I go off-diet, I'd like to think that my students appreciate the effort I put into making cookies for all of them. The fact that the cookies also serve as a "bribe" to get them to come to class ... well, that's just another positive side effect of the whole thing. Still, I'm trying to figure out how I'd have the time to bake for all of my classes when I start to teach full-time. I guess I should hold off on worrying about that until I actually get a full-time teaching position, though.
"Still, I'm trying to figure out how I'd have the time to bake for all of my classes when I start to teach full-time."
Isn't that what TAs are for?
copyright © 2008 Sean Shannon