Foreword:

After glancing over the past two submissions, I noticed that it may seem like I have an obsession with green bean casserole. Nothing could be further from the truth, as I have a severe hatred of green beans. If anything, I suffer from an acute case of Chlorositiolachanophobia, or the fear of eating green vegetables. It's very rare. In fact, I am the only known case in the entire world. I was forced to self-diagnose myself through the Internet and combining three fears together* because no doctor was able to do so and the OWU medical insurance would not cover further study.

In reality, I find the combination of the words "Green" + "Bean" + "Casserole" very funny. I will try not to use a reference to green bean casserole in this blog again for a long while.

On to more important things...

I think doughnuts are one of God's most perfect foods. You can't help but feel happy when you eat one. Try to be sad when you are eating a doughnut- you can't.

I grew up in Amish Country, Ohio; otherwise known as Holmes County**; the home of the original Baby Swiss cheese and the World's Largest Cuckoo clock.

This will all come together right... now:

In between shooting my friends with BB guns and attempting to run over lumps of road apples (horse dung for the lay person) in the middle of the road on my bike while growing up, I would take the 25-minute trek to my Dad's house in Wooster. We would grocery shop at Buehler's Grocery Store. There he would buy cream sticks from the bakery. I would plop down in front of the TV and watch the Smurfs (until I was banned from watching them because my mom heard they were Satanic- but that is neither here nor there), eating a cream stick.

Fast forward to yesterday- March 27, 2006- and lo and behold, in my boss's office, there sat Donald and Shirley Buehler '55. They own Buehler's, hence the name. I've got to be honest; I was a little star struck. Seriously- I love these people's doughnuts that much***. Up until yesterday, the name "Buehler's" was always just a name of a store, like Charles Schwab or Kenneth Cole. I forget that these "brands" were/are also real people. And these particular people are responsible for unbelievable doughnuts as well as providing all of my nutritional needs at my father's house growing up.

OWU has great alumni- this is just one example of how, since I began working at Wesleyan, that I have seen how graduates from this school have influenced my life. Bob DiBiasio '77, the Vice President of Public Relations for the Cleveland Indians, is the reason I chose public relations as my major while at Otterbein (please refrain from asking me whether my diploma is real or not- I work at a college, I've heard it all). Yet another is Norman Vincent Peale '20, whose many books have given my mom something to say to me about staying positive even when I don't want to hear anything like that.

In short, thanks to everyone from OWU who has helped me in my life, from learning the joy of sugar to my future career.

That was a weak ending...

footnotes:
* Lachanophobia- fear of vegetables; Sitophobia or Sitiophobia- fear of eating or food; Chlorophobia- fear of the color green.

** This is one way of knowing someone is from a truly rural area- when they state where they are from they say a county instead of a town or city.

*** The reason that I feel that Buehler's cream sticks are by far superior to that of other places is simple: cream-filled pastries from other doughnut vendors use either too much sugar or not enough sugar. An instance of either of these scenarios creates an inferior product; whereas Buehler's has created a more perfect union of both sweet and bitter. It is an art form on par with that of Van Gogh, Beethoven, and Dickens.