I’m a strong believer in the prevalence of tide-like semesters, and I feel as though I’m (once again) experiencing its effects. It begins with my workload like a sliver of sea far on the horizon, only just visible through the syllabi, which comes rushing toward my unwilling feet in a pre-spring-break surge. It then ebbs briefly before permanently settling back around my knees for the final month of the term. Because my workload, somehow, shares an inverse relationship with my ability to concentrate, I spend much of April either in reflection regarding how I could have avoided this or waiting for emails about various applications of which I’ve already done all the work for.
In tough times like these, I’ve willingly thrown myself into any opportunity of non-academic solace, and mystically, a super-cool new soda machine has presented itself in Frary:
Come try the new Coke freestyle machine in Frary Dining Hall. 140 different flavor options. twitter.com/pomonadining/s…
— PomonaCollegeDining (@pomonadining) April 9, 2013
I neither know anything about soda machines nor do I really drink soda, but I heard a buzz about it on Monday, and (desperately?) adopted it as my newest thing of the week. That said, the line has been so long up to this evening that I’ve only eyed it from the salad bar, so perhaps this entire account is just one giant overstatement gaining speed and whirling out of control. That said, this machine is objectively cool, because it has a nifty touch screen that allows you to combine a zillion different soda flavors together into some cool drink of your choice. Today, at a late dinner, I finally tasted it for myself (a fruit punch-lemonade!) and it was so delicious I’ve been gushing about it ever since.
Before this year, Frary was my least favorite dining hall, and it has quickly become my very favorite thanks to its falafels and bread bowls and curly fries and salads and cupcakes and ice-cream sandwiches. I fully realized this today when, on a tour, I unexpectedly found myself spurting Frary-love to a group of prospective students, something I always deemphasized before (mentioning the super-large variety of food the consortium as a whole offers.) That said, I’m finally won over. I just got a red-velvet cupcake from Snack.
It’s wonderful.