Ice cream social studies

Today the library is throwing an ice cream social for anybody on campus who feels like showing up. Watching the plans for this event unfold over the last two days has been a lesson in different personality types. I don't know if you ever really understand somebody until you've seen them throw a party. See, I cannot stand event planning, so if I invite people over to my house, I'm just happy if I remember to offer them a drink and order a pizza that we eat on paper plates. And there are some people who seem to have a real knack for party planning and can throw together an impressive shindig in the blink of an eye. But I think the rest of the world falls somewhere in between...where they throw nice parties but they drive everyone around them completely insane in the process.

And don't even get me started on Martha Stewart. Ugh. That woman. You remember back in the day when you could just show up to a potluck with a fruit and jello salad? Ever since ol' Martha arrived on the scene, now the stakes are so high that if you didn't spend 3 hours in the kitchen shaping pate into dolphins, you're considered a failure. Freakin' Martha Stewart.

Really, I think the bottom line here is that if you're giving away free food, don't worry about presentation. If you're charging $50 admission, then, by all means, get everybody drunk so they won't remember if the tablecloths matched. Otherwise, people just need to relax.