Lunchables

Today, I had an awesome lunch. No, it wasn't a 18 oz. steak, a seafood/sushi buffet, or even Wendy's 99-cent Menu Salad and Chili. As you may have guessed from the title, I had Lunchables. Two, to be exact, one big box and one small.

Laugh at me if you want, but it was a pretty damn satisfying meal so I don't care (surprisingly filling, too). I know that I'm 23, almost 24 years old, but does that mean I can't enjoy some crackers, cheese, little round pieces of ham, and makeshift pepperoni pizzas once in a while? It even came with a chocolate frosting and M&M's to make a "dessert pizza", you can't say no to that! Tomorrow, I can't wait to enjoy the other boxes I bought, tacos and lean turkey with a mini-Butterfingers bar. OH BABY....

So I'm sure it must seem random, that I suddenly decided to go out and buy some Lunchables for myself, but wasn't completely out of the blue. Yesterday when I went to get my lunch from the fridge at work (it was just a plain sandwich with chips and OJ), I saw that someone else had brought a box of Lunchables. And that brought back a lot of memories of Lunchables, which eventually made me crave them to the point where I really had to get some.

Actually, I never really had these things when I was in elementary school, when most kids (ages 22 and under) get them. My mom decided that they were too expensive to get for me and my sister (which they are), so we got her homemade sandwiches and fruit instead. I guess I always envied the other kids who got Lunchables because they seemed so cool. All putting together the little pieces of food that came in a neat little package, while I struggled to finish my mushy banana, and had to fold up my paper lunch bag to bring home when I was done, so it could be reused for lunch the next day.

Well nowadays, I make my own lunch, and the funny thing is, I still end up bringing sandwiches and fruit every day, except now it's by choice. And I also find myself voluntarily saving and reusing my lunch bags, exactly like I hated so much to do back in those days. Funny how things work sometimes.

But anwyays, when I talk about "bringing back memories", a big part of it was that feeling of envying other people's Lunchables, and not so much about memories of how I got to enjoy them myself. Well, at least not as far as those elementary school days were concerned.

The time did come when I got to eat Lunchables and satisfy years of longing, and this time was college. (Again, I know this makes me sound like a major weirdo or a loser, but I'm assuming if you've managed to read this far in a blog about Lunchables, that means you're willing to look beyond these things). People who got to live with me or hang around with me a lot in college know that I was pretty dependent on packaged, ready to eat meals. Especially after getting sick of dorm food or all the specialty stuff like NRG, Rover, and Chomp-Ass. Throughout my 4 years living at school, I went through a wide variety of these ready-made foods, among them, Hot Pockets, Lean Cuisine, Bob Evans' frozen biscuits, and many kinds of Ramen. Looking back, I guess it was only a matter of time before Lunchables took its turn, and sure enough, one day as I was browsing the food section at Meijer, I saw them and thought, why not?

So for a while in my college days, Lunchables were a regular part of my life. They were even better when you could microwave it so the cheese on the pizza or taco was melted. I would've used the microwave here at work today, but I didn't want all my coworkers to know that I was a 23-year old Lunchables eating freak. Although, there must be at least one other Lunchables eater that uses the fridge here. But oh well, even when cold, they are still good.

Wow, I can't believe I wrote all that stuff about Lunchables in my blog. One day I'm writing this huge long thing on Starcraft strategy, and the next day it's these detailed thoughts and memories on Lunchables. I definitely need a vacation soon.