Kip Haggis on higher education

Gentlemen!  Let's broaden our minds!  Lawrence?

Ha!  That's from Batman.  Great movie.  Anyway, I want to tell you about me and Nichols trying to stop a friend from making a HUGE mistake: staying in college.  To study anthropology.  Yeah, you heard me.  Anthropology.  

I mean, come on!  That doesn't make any money.  So I put on a jacket and my White Sox hat (season's started, baby!) and went down to the street to meet Nichols.  He was late of course.  Grumbling the whole way about having to get up on a Saturday and I'm telling him, "HEY!  This is for Rich!"  Oh yeah, Rich.  That's our friend. The one that's about to throw his life away on a WORTHLESS college degree.  There's nothing more important in life than friends.  I cued "Eye of the Tiger" up on my iPod and did a few fist jabs in the air, pumping myself up to get this job DONE!  Nichols just shuffled along with his hands in his pockets, looking like that kid in third grade who was sick at school but his parents wouldn't come pick him up.

We got to Rich's apartment and I gotta tell ya, I was sproutin' 'bout half a stalk!  No, not because of Rich!  Because I could smell what he was making...BACON!  That Rich...he's alright, I tell ya.  The bacon was okay.  Not up to the standards of someone like me who is "in the field" of the culinary arts, but then again bacon's like sex: even when it's bad, it's good.

I slapped a handful of limp bacon slabs in between toast and started mawing on it.  Nichols kept making small talk with Rich.  Me?  I needed dude food!  Man fuel!  Then I could take on the task at hand.  Namely, how to keep Rich from throwing his life away on books.  Gotta stay away from that crap, man.  Keeps you from doing what God sent all of us here to do: make a LIVING.  I mean, who cares if you know who wrote what or who painted what or who the Vice President is?  How are you supposed to get PAID for that?

"Well as you can imagine," Nichols started out, pussy-footin' around.  "Kip and I..."

"Me n' Kip," I corrected.

"Right...we're here because we have...concerns that although the field of anthropology is deeply fascinating and academically relevant, it's not exactly...lucrative."

"Yeah.  Just look at Nichols.  All them 50 cent words and no money.

"I actually, I wanted Kip here for an interview," Rich said.

Me?  An interview?

"It's for a class paper.  I want to do my thesis on Kip."

"You're kidding, right?" Nichols asked.
"That's why I made bacon," Rich explained.

"Yeah!" I said.  "Because this is a guy who knows HOW to bring home the bacon!  Unlike you!  Nichols doesn't know what he's talking about.  Still in school, Rich and let's have that interview."

Nichols rolled his eyes like a snob and just sat in a funk.  Rich got out a notebook and a camcorder.  I told him to get my good side, natch.

"Anything else you need before we get started?" Rich asked.

"How 'bout a hot cuppa Joe?"

Rich got the coffee and we were on our way.  It went somethin' like this:

RICH: So Kip, you obviously like bacon.  What else do you eat?

KIP: Aw man, food is my life!  Steak, hot dogs, Italian beef, pizza, anything with cheese...

RICH: Do you eat vegetables?

(pause)

KIP: Does popcorn count?

RICH: Right...as an anthropologist, I'm taking note of your physical build and...

KIP: But not in a gay way, right?

(pause)

RICH: No, not in a gay way, Kip.  You're squat, stocky, and rather hirsute.

KIP: Huh?

RICH: You know, the way we always joke about you being a hobbit?  Hairy?  Thick hair on your chest, your back, tops of your feet...your knuckles...

KIP: So?

RICH: Just making a record for the study.  And where do you work?

KIP: Roy's Smoked BBQ Shack. 

RICH: And what do you do there?

KIP: Prep cook.  Use a lot of knives, hacking through slabs of beef, lighting fires, you know.  Kitchen work.

RICH: I see.   What books have you read?

KIP: Uhhhh...To Kill A Mockingbird, Huckleberry Finn, A Tale of Two Cities...

NICHOLS: You only read those first two in high school.  And the only reason you read Tale of Two Cities was because Spock gave it to Kirk in Star Trek II.

KIP: Look, do you mind?  You're adding irrelevant information.  I'm sorry, Rich.  As I was saying before being rudely interrupted...

NICHOLS: Sigh...

KIP: I mostly read comic books.  Got a HUGE collection.  They keep me riveted, captivated, all that crap.  But not ones with too many words.  They take too much time to read and the dialogue blocks the pictures.  What are you doing with that needle?

RICH: Blood sample.  Kip...I'd like to introduce you into the wild.  Study how a...primal man such as yourself survives.

KIP: Cool.

Yeah, it's like Ferris Bueller says, "Life moves pretty fast.  If you don't slow down, you might just miss it." 

Well I'm not one to miss an opportunity.  Cashing in on Rich's study may just help me launch my pizza empire!

Stay tuned!

Follow me on Twitter: @Jntweets