Bookcovers

Back to school time in the fall is hilarious.

I don’t even laugh at the kids anymore, I laugh at the parents. All the crap you have to go get them to go back to school. Spending about $500 on all those clothes they’ll wear for a week or so. By the end of the 2nd week, they’re wearing ripped up t-shirts and the same crappy jeans they were wearing at the end of last year. I always wondered one thing, how is the stuff they were wearing in June, already out of date or not fitting come August? Its a mystery!

Then there are all the other accessories...the scientific calculator. I swear teachers have a kickback on those things these days and the kids hardly use them. The backpack thing, with each weighing about 25 lbs full of books, kids don’t need gym class, they get a workout just going to school. Its also been documented that kids have more spinal problems than every before, which many trace directly as a result of backpacks. Now as a public service, each backpack comes with the business card of an orthopedic surgeon inside.

Then there is the ungodly amount of money spent on the endless school supplies...pens, pencils, notebooks and all that other crap that most of which will be lost, unused or traded for weed by the first week of October.

Of course all schools require your kid cover his/her books. Years ago, a paper bag did the trick or the Daily News, but now that too is no longer good enough for your kid. There are now bookcovers you just buy, bring them home and they jump out of the bag and cover your kid’s books automatically.

They now have them stretchable, self ahering and what not, which gets you out of spending 10 minutes with your kid teaching them how to cover a book, doing the folds and maybe creating a moment of creative bonding between you and your child. Hence your school year is now off to another banner start.

I can recall some schools used to give us book covers, but we didn’t use them for the usual purpose. In the margins there were coupons for a variety of things...10% off a pair of jeans....$5 off a haircut some place.

1981....

My first year of college, I was dealing with it all rather non chalantly. It was the day you go down to select your classes in the middle of the summer. I figured there was enough classes to go around and when I get there, I get there. I’m sitting around watching TV and my brother Mike gets up and sees me sitting there.

"Aren’t you going down to pick your classes?” he asked.

“Yeah” I said casually, “I’ll go down later.”

He looked and me and said kind of pissed off, "Dave, you have to almost sleepout down there to get classes. By the time you get there, you’ll be lucky to be able to get Basketweaving 101.”

I looked at him and figured he didn’t know what the hell he was talking about. But I got there around 3 pm and found most of the classes I needed to get started were picked clean. Still, with a little effort, I managed to put together some kind of a schedule.

Off to the side was a few handouts and a stack of bookcovers that didn’t look like too many people wanted. In college you buy your own books, so most people didn’t think about covering books. However in the margin of the book covers were coupons for buy one get one free Big Macs.

Now most college kids would enjoy a free Big Mac, but the "Buy one” part of the deal is often a problem for most college kids who seldom have any money. However, I lived off campus and had a job, so buying one wasn’t usually an issue for me. Because the coupon said nothing about 'not good combined with other offers’, if the McDonalds happened to have 99 cent Mac’s specials that day, then you could basically net yourself two of them for a dollar!

I took a stack of the book covers and took them in another room to rip the coupons off. I discovered I had about 28 in all and threw the book covers out. I put the coupons in my wallet and even picked up a couple Mac’s to chow down on the way home!

When I got to college, I thought it would be an extension of my obnoxious high school life. There was a kid named Phil who sat behind me in English composition who was my personal patsy.

A fat little kid who loved the Mets, I knew he had his weekly $10 allowance his father gave him, so I used to bet him stuff to give him a chance to make more money for himself or lose. However his choice of bets were often bad, usually Mets games as they were even more awful then than they usually.

But by the time baseball season was over, we were betting on anything from who got a better quiz score to the temperature of the room to how many times the teacher said “obzuurd” during the class.

I was generally sick of this kid by December so I decided to bet the kid something that once and for all might make him go away.

“Hey, why don’t we have a Big Mac eating contest?! $50.”

No sooner did I say it, I got a look at his Buddah-esque tummy and knew this kid had ingested more than one Mac at a sitting once before. But he seldom had anywhere near $50 on him and so I thought he’d hesitate a little.

“No problem!” he said gleefully. I told him give me $9 and I put up the same and went to McD’s on 99 cent day (add the tax) and brought 15 coupons, to buy 30 Macs! The help was less than thrilled to see me and the manager was less than thrilled he was giving out 30 Big Mac’s for less than $20.

We went into the cafeteria and laid them out on the table and commenced slamming. People were watching us not realizing it was a gluttony contest, but just seeing a crap load of Big Macs laid out on a table were going to gain a little attention.

The first few went down pretty easy, but after awhile the special sauce begins to take on a life of its own. The burgers, lettuce and bread go down ok, but the sauce that makes you want one to begin with, makes you not want one 5 or 6 later.

By the time we were both at around a dozen or so, we were both turning colors and getting good and sick. We looked at the clock and realized it was time for our class. However there was a problem, as we were both gonna wretch. We left the rest of the Mac’s behind and we hurried off to the bathroom and both of us commenced puking incessantly.

In the classrooom the professor lady asked the class, “Where’s Dave and Phil?”

“Last I saw them, they look like they had just bought a McDonald’s." a kid replied.

“Lunch?” she replied with a question.

"Nah, the whole restaurant.” He tells her we were chowing a pile of Big Mac’s.

"Those two must be gambling again." she sighed, “Don’t they know that’s against the law?”

Meanwhile in the Men’s room...

“*BARF*, how many did you have?” I asked Phil.

"*BARF* I don’t...*BARF* remember. You?"

“*BARF*...I’m not sure."

“Who *BARF* wins?”

"*BARF*...Call it a draw? *BARF*”

“*BARF* I don’t care.”

It was awhile before I could eat a Big Mac again!

The next month it was time to pick our classes for the next semester. I followed my brother’s advice, went early in the morning and got better classes. Then when I went to the final station, the lady there said to me, “We have some freebies over here...a few pens and some BOOK COVERS with McDonald’s coupons."

“No thanks” I replied, "I’ll use paper bags!”

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