Wannabe Party Pooper

Today marks my last graduation party of 2006! If there are more to come, I don't think I can bear another betoothpicked cocktail weiner or cheese cube or party nuts. Since I'm a person of profound reflection, I've realized several ironies during the graduation season. Firstly, the amount of food cooked and consumed is absolutely incomprehensible. Why are there so many kebobs and baked goods when we're all trying to evade the Freshman Fifteen like the plague? Truth: It's more impressive to have a party with tables of grilled items and the like than a sign with "Fight the Freshman Fifteen" to explain the emptiness. Who can have a party without food? Secondly, graduation is a time for relatives and conventional semi-misers to shower you with trees of greens to compensate for the fact that they don't really care about you and have absolutely no idea what you really want. For other occasions, I am staunchly opposed to money giving because it only reflects on the lazyiness of the gift-giver. For graduation, it's different. Essentially, you would rather spend that money for something you want or can buy as you are now legal instead of a porcelain cat lamp for "the dorm" from Aunt Millie. Yet, the money that you do get ends up being re-gifted to another graduate... It seems that all those years of unnoticed re-gifting is here to bite you in the butt.