Daily Loaf

Each Fall an army of eighteen-year-old “adults” floods USF, expecting to finally set foot in the long prophesized “real world.” They soon discover that college, and the real world, are whatever these freshmen make of them.  In constructing their identities, most are required to take a basic writing course. Creative Loafing has chosen four of those students to blog for the Daily Loaf...

I sat there looking out of the window at the lake in my back yard. How many fish are in there? What would happen if I swam in it? Would I get a rash? Could I out swim the alligator that lives in there? No progress. More staring. That damn little cursor (to whom I gave the non-gender-specific name Pat) on the blank Word document kept flashing as if to say, “Let’s get a move on, Alamo. What are you waiting for? Type something, loser. I spit on you. You’re pathetic.”

Then I started thinking, “Christ, Pat’s right. Why can’t I write this? I am a loser… All I can think about is alligators and being verbally abused by an inanimate object.”

Before I could finish berating myself, I heard five words coming from the television buzzing in the background: New Office tonight on NBC. “Mother of pearl**, today’s Thursday!” I thought. “There’s bound to be something on there I can talk about.”

I valiantly flipped off the cursor and said to him/her, “I’ll be back, you condescending little shit.”

Keeping in mind the promise I made to Pat, I watched The Office with trepidation, fearing I would, once again, be subject to Pat’s harassment. Luckily, The Office pulled through for me, as it always does. But what to write about? Kelly’s tapeworm diet? Maybe. Dwight and Angela’s steamy warehouse romps? Could get racy. Michael destroying Holly’s (the new HR lady) Counting Crows tickets. Eh. The fact that the Counting Crows are still playing concerts? Might piss fans off, or even my teacher who recently went to a Counting Crows concert and yet claims to be “with it”. Jim proposing to Pam? Bingo. How could I not write about this? Everyone’s favorite fictional couple is finally getting hitched. If you aren’t cheering this relationship on, you are an emotionless, cold-hearted android. Jim’s gas station proposal has increased my, and probably many girls’, standards.

Gentlemen, the bar has been raised — that is, the bar that makes you datable. I should mention, though, that I have no business raising this bar. Because, even when the bar was down at “he must have teeth and must not smell like the inside of a homeless man’s shoe,” I couldn’t bag anyone. And that was the only smell restricted. Maybe it is because all I do is watch TV and then write blogs about watching TV. Yea, that’s probably it. But, I continue to be in denial, hence the title of this blog. Anyway. Every now and then, some hottie on television or film does something that raises the standards. It can be the most unrealistic, cheese ball act you’ve ever seen, but, nonetheless, it gets factored in.

Before, it was Noah from the Notebook. If you weren’t a carpenter from the twenties, your chances with me were slim. If you made it past that stage, the next step was to build me a house on a lake with a painting room. I don’t even paint, but you bet your ass it had to be included. Now, it is Jim’s proposal. Forget the lavish engagements in front of hundreds of people. I want a gas station engagement now. It’s simple: call me to a gas station on a rainy day, wear a button-down shirt and a tie, and kneel on the gas and spit covered ground without hesitation. And if you can somehow work in a camera and give me a little sideways Jim smirk, that would be great. There you have it guys: the formula is out. That’s all it takes. Now come and find me. Please…No? Ok, that’s fine. This just in: the bar has officially been lowered. Great, now Pat is going to give me crap about my dating life, or lack thereof. At least I have a relationship, right? Even if it is a love-hate relationship with a cursor named Pat, I’ll still count it.

**Extremely lame exclamation (stolen from Spongebob Squarepants) that I still use.

Andrea Alamo is a Mass Communications major on the Telecommunications track. Interested in television, film and radio.

“One of my main goals is to improve my writing because, in the future, I would love to write television scripts and/or film screenplays and, possibly, create a series of my own. I love everything music and am involved with the student radio.”

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