It’s all about the know-how
all just a matter of taste,
Stop telling the way I gotta play now,
Too much food on my plate.
-Jason Mraz’s “Too Much Food”

Let’s talk about food.

Food is important to college kids!  As incoming freshmen, the vast majority of you will be on the Meal Plan.  Just in case you’re not entirely familiar with the meal plans, check out the housing website’s thoughts on Meal Plans(http://housing.osu.edu/current_dining.asp).  There you can read up on the meal plans and even get it changed during the first 3 weeks of each Quarter.

In my experience, most freshmen get too many swipes, especially first Quarter.  This is important for a number of reasons:
if your meal plan is too low or is limited, you can almost always scam off friends’ meal swipes.
if you DO have too many Fall Quarter, you can adjust your plan during the first 3 weeks of the Quarter
if you still have too many, you can change your plans between Quarters at no cost

I started Fall Quarter of freshmen year with 125 swipes.  This ended up being too many for me (I eat breakfast in the dorm and sometimes combine lunch and dinner), but for most students this seemed to be about right.

At the end of each quarter, many students find they have a few swipes extra to burn.  They don’t carry over from Quarter-to-Quarter, so whatever you don’t use goes to waste.  This means that each Quarter ends with students going to places like Marketplace (south campus), Morrill C-Store (west campus), and North Commons (north, in the basement) to buy groceries.  You get 10% of your swipes that can be used on groceries at these locations.

Funny story: As you may recall, I said before that I had too many swipes my first quarter…  Suffice to say, about 30 boxes of frosted flakes took over my room at the end of Fall Quarter and lasted through all of Winter Quarter.  It was awesome.

Finally, my favorite places to eat:

• West Campus - Fresh Express Morrill – the most variety and the highest quantity of non-buffet-style food
• South Campus - Marketplace – delicious food, including Italian, Asian, deli, salads, and more!
• North – North Commons – All-you-can eat, and the food is usually decent

Take care,
Rob