By Iris Pennington-Smith and Hugh Jass
DEERFIELD, IL–Every day, the janitors come up from Custodia to stack every chair in the lunch room on top of the tables. But this stacking time is becoming earlier and earlier—so much so that Flipside reporters decided to investigate the problem. Recent studies show that the average time at which a first stacking occurs is at 12:17 p.m., almost an hour before the final lunch period ends.
“I haven’t even opened my bag of Gardetto’s by the time they start putting the chairs on the tables,” said sophomore Sami Willicker. “I’m considering moving to the CCRC because I just feel so pressured to finish my lunch every day.”
But The Flipside has discovered that this premature chair-stacking is much more than the acts of an overachieving custodial staff. It is in fact part of a conspiracy that can be traced all the way to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, Washington D.C. Deerfield’s “janitors” are actually agents of Michelle Obama’s campaign to end childhood obesity in America.
“I’m just doing what I was told,” said a nervous James Hatcher, the DHS’ head custodian. “They told me that the faster we stack the chairs, the less the students will want to eat.”
However, the plan seems to backfiring at DHS. Students are being forced to shovel down their lunches as fast as they can, causing their metabolisms to slow down. And the drive-by caf is certainly not helping the cause. Since the new area opened last week, students are leaving the cafeteria in record time (cookie sales have also soared 137%, but that’s a different story). They are no longer taking the time to enjoy the ketchup ceiling stains from the Great Food Fight of ’09, the beautiful views of the staff parking lot, or find the disappearing Legend of Zelda branded trays.
What’s more, the library has noticed a boom of students coming to study once the chair-stacking starts. This leads us to believe that it is linked to something even bigger than Michelle Obama: China. It is now believed that President Barak Obama’s approval of the First Lady’s health initiatives is rooted in his plan to catch American students up to the level of our Chinese counterparts.
The conspiracy is, however, benefitting the janitors. Our investigators discovered that once the last student leaves the lunchroom, the janitors crank up a boombox, clear out the tables, and make the cafeteria into a dance floor. For them, faster chair stacking means better dance parties.
But for the students, the chair-stacking problem at DHS has no end in sight. If you are interested in ending this torture to the student body here and to students at schools all across the nation, PLEASE, sign the online petition at: www.ilikethefeelingofbeingoutofbreathafteriwalkupaflightofstairs.org.
