"WHAT I DID ON MY SUMMER VACATION" 3 ways

My least favorite cooking competition trope for my least favorite school assignment

I dreaded the post-summer-vacation assignment every year in elementary school. It seemed laughable to distill 3 months of existential crisis¹ and intense introspection² into something that could fit into the outline of a sun, ice cream cone, or flip flop.

Hostile.

And then you had to like... read it aloud? Or at the very least, pass it past 5 other kids to the end of your row, and then your teacher would read it later and write little comments? Absolutely not!

Luckily, I am extremely chill now,³ so I’m attempting to reckon with this prompt from hell, to see it in God’s image just like the complex flavors of the Sonic banana shake.

Grad school icebreaker version

The old go-around-the-room approach. The goal here is to make yourself sound worldly and intelligent, but also very approachable and laissez faire. And to express disdain for the injustices of academia while also licking its boot.

Haha um, OK, hi everyone! I’m Jenna. This is my second year in the program. Uh, I feel like every time I do one of these, I get zooted back to elementary school—like, I can smell the Ziploc baggies of Goldfish, very Proustian, haha right? I see you back there! Love a fellow Prousthead. Rep-re-sent!!!

Anyway, uh, not a ton to report this summer, I was really deep into my research, which we can get into more later—find me after class! Follow the grape vape! Haha. But I’m also equally into praxis. Really into praxis, organizing, dismantling.

Let’s see. This summer I did praxis, ate the best arepa of my life, got told I’m the voice of a generation or whatever... and I wrote a pantoum and have been slowly building up my library. Oh, right, and my hobbies are roller skating and critical thinking. Peace!

The arepa part is true.

Myspace bulletin version

The point of these was to make you appear mysterious and just the right amount of seductive as a child.

WHICH IS BETTER:

1. Vampires or pirates? arrggghh matey (▰∀◕)ﾉ pirates!!

2. Strong or weak? Weak :3

3. Keroppi donut from the Hello Kitty Cafe or trash can nachos from Guy Fieri’s Vegas Kitchen? Trash can nachos from Guy Fieri’s Vegas Kitchen

4. Shorter or taller: Same size!!!!

5. Breakfast or lunch: Lunch, esp when the lunch is eggroll, esp when the eggroll lunch is concurrent with my first viewing of Under the Tuscan Sun

6. Roman or Kendall: Roman for the fanfic, Kendall for the fancams

7. 110° or 111°:
   111! Threepeat!

8. Applying to jobs that use Workday or being drawn & quartered:
   Being drawn & quartered <3

ANSWER TRUTHFULLY:

1. Last beverage (of the summer):
   Really bad green tea

2. Last time you cried:
   When the tea was so bad. Last straw kind of thing. I had to pull over.

3. Best book you read this summer?
   The Dispossessed again! Sorry!

4. Who was your favorite dancer in the burlesque show?

   The one with the Substack (but last updated 2021 -_-)

5. What are you craving RIGHT NOW?
   Trash can nachos from Guy Fieri’s Vegas Kitchen

6. Shoe’s you wore today:
   Haven’t worn shoes today

7. What’s your preferred AMC location?
   Barton Creek—it’s got the Claire’s next door, there are no invasive tray tables like Tech Ridge, and it’s not haunted like Lakeline

THIS SUMMER, DID YOU…

1. Kiss anyone on your friends list? Yes :)))

2. Stay up until sunrise? No

3. Watch someone die? i don’t wanna talk abt it…

4. Play the Wii? No :/

5. Hold hands with someone? Yes :]

6. Like someone who didn’t like you back? no can’t relate

7. Dance like crazy? Yaaaas! Slay!

8. Wear contacts? Yes

9. Eat the trash can nachos at Guy Fieri’s Vegas Kitchen? Yes, but only once

10. Change clothes in a car? NO I’m not a SKANK

11. Buy a mini elliptical to replace your long afternoon walks, finally giving into the decreasing livability of our climate? Yaaaas! Slay!

12. Kill someone? I’ll never tell!

13. Walk outside in your PJs? omg no!

14. Get a tattoo? No but became increasingly insufferable about the next one!

15. Watch the news? No :)

Repost with your own answers!!! :p

Jeopardy! banter version with host Ken Jennings

I’ve been really, really into Jeopardy! lately.

KEN: And Jenna, our 3-day champion—It says here you engaged in some light art crime this summer?

JENNA: I sure did, Ken.

KEN: Tell us more about that.

JENNA: So I was getting some art moved and installed a few months ago. A few pretty large pieces, not the easiest things to move. One in particular is this painting of a dog driving a convertible with a giant shiny blue himbo waving from the back. The art movers I hired wrapped it, and moved it, and positioned it just how I wanted it. And the main guy steps back after, looks at it on the wall, and says, “Nice. It’s like… happy pride.” And I was like, is this a read?

KEN: It might have been.

JENNA: Maybe, Ken. And then they left, and I never got charged the $350, and I never reached out to the company about it.

KEN: Fascinating. Do you think you’re scot-free?

JENNA: I sure hope so, Ken. Maybe they literally meant happy pride and didn’t charge me because it was pride month, and everyone in the room was viscerally and clockably queer.

KEN: You can’t say queer on TV.

JENNA: Or maybe I just seemed really poor, and they felt bad charging. Maybe they have a little pro bono pool they can dip into with discretion. Which is hot. But now that I’m telling this story on national television, I might be getting a delayed invoice.

KEN: Your winnings are only $2, so let’s see if you can eke out a little more to offer them as we continue this round. Let’s get back to it.

1. In no way helped by 1,400 Things for Kids to Be Happy About

2. Typically manifesting in a glittery periwinkle notebook labeled “IDEAS”

3. On account of I write questionable things and then put them on the internet