Cook out

Yesterday I worked in the office for a few hours. It was nice to be in the office with Sue and Tracy and it is really starting to feel like things are winding down a bit.

Then I went outside. It was beautiful! I was walking across campus with noting in my hands, with nothing on my schedule for the rest of the day and the students were actually out of the buildings! They were out on the lawn throwing frisbees, and sitting in the grass studying, I was so excited. It was so warm outside, I was actually hot for a minute! Can you believe it? I was HOT!Anyway.

I passed one of my residents Danny Swan who asked if he could grill outside on the second floor. I told him that he couldn't grill on the patio because it was a fire hazard. (Never in my life have I ever worried so much about Fire Hazards.) But, I told him, he was welcome to grill out in front of the building. And I told him to use my grill.

That's Danny Swan... with the headband on.

Then I realized. Beautiful day + Grill + Meat = FUN! So, I promptly went to the store and purchased 80 hot dogs, 30 hamburgers, 14 sausages, buns, mustard, charcoal, napkins and lighter fluid. (I realize now that the only thing I brought to eat was meat... I'm such a guy.)

We must have had around a hundred people come by.
Either that, or fifty people ate like a hundred.


There was nothing but meat to eat. Meat, meat, and more meat.

I then put the grill together and cooked out in front of the building from 4:30 to 6:15. In that time, we ate every piece of meat I had purchased, and Danny brought down 10 hot dogs and ten hamburgers which we promptly threw on the grill and ate as well.

Danny showed me a little trick where you cut the ends of the hot dogs

to make them "bloom" as he said.

When it was all over, I looked around me and realized something that struck me as very funny. Take a look at this picture. This was just before I brought the "left-overs" inside. (Which were plates, ketchup, mustard, and napkins. The can of soda is empty.)

The cooking table after everything was said and done.

Notice the lack of meat, and the abundance of napkins left over. It was like something out of a Visa commercial.

90 hot dogs
14 sausages
40 hamburgers
3 napkins.

Priceless.

Guys coming in and out...

It was a blast to have the residents hanging out in front of the building, and to have the smell of a big ol' cookout going across campus. Now that it's all over, I'm thinking. This was an unplanned, completely non-advertised event, and we probably had 100 people stop by. This merely leads me to think: next year... it could be BIGGER... (Who knows, we might even have potato salad.)