P: Pepperoni

Urbana, Illinois, 2003

I didn't want to see the movie Old School.

Amy and I and our husbands and a bunch of their running group buddies went to the movies. When we got there, the men all wanted to see Old School. I didn't. Amy didn't care. So I ended up going to see Old School instead of something I thought would be more redeeming.

The University of Illinois is home to one of the largest greek systems in the entire country. And when we walked into the theatre, every single fraternity brother from the university was there, filling all of the rows except for the very first one. That's where we sat.

I was terrified. I remembered years ago at a CU football game how there were fraternity brothers throwing pepperoni at people. I never knew why. But they thought it was really funny.

So there at Old School, I worried and waited for the pepperoni slices to start flying. How long until there would be one landing on my forehead or in my hair or on my shoulder or slapping me on the cheek?

There were no pepperoni slices in the theatre. Those fraternity brothers never even threw popcorn at us. But they certainly howled with laughter at all of the funny moments in the movie.

Except for the one where Will Farrell says that he's too busy to party because of the big day at Home Depot the next day. WE (the old people in the front row) laughed at that line. That was our world at the time.