A Hotdog in the Snow

I don't even think I walked this fast when I took Intro to Jogging my sophomore year.

It's 9:01 am and my professor for my 300 level social media class still locks the classroom doors as if we're in a poorly-budgeted remake of The Breakfast Club. It also doesn't help that it's been snowing since Monday and in my hungover stupor I chose the not-yet-trending UGG slippers to drudge through the snowpocalypse in.

Nevertheless, this bitch persisted.

It's January of my senior year of college and the fact that I am stress sweating over a social media class is only the 30th reason this week why I'm rethinking my decision to major in public relations. As a freshman it made so much sense to me - I mean every business, brand and big name out there has to relate to the public otherwise they get #cancelled - but after my fourth night in a row going out to celebrate all my friends securing offers from Big Four accounting firms or fancy tech startups I'm starting to realize that PR experts are NEVER the main characters in HBO Max shows. And before you start let me just stop you and say no, I have not seen The West Wing, I'm clearly busy buying my six-figure-making-friends buttery nipple shots even though I just got fired from the dining hall. Again.

How do you get fired from a dining hall multiple times you may ask? Well let me direct you back up to the fact that I simply MUST take my friends out when they get their big kid job offers and let me tell you TV did get one thing right - these STEM kids can toss. them. BACK. I'm sure this next part won't come as a total shock to you but this is also around the time that I thought it would be responsible of me to start building my credit. But I couldn't be too responsible because that's not very hot girl of me, so I didn't read that fine print and I don't know it yet but later today I'll learn what an APR is! But don't worry, my shifts at the panini press and on-time credit card payment aren't the only things I'm missing, hence this very sad looking sprint to salvage what participation points I have left in a class that focuses on what times of the day are best to post content for the impressions count.

I'm only 4 songs into my low-fi hip hop beats playlist, hands in pockets and -10 points off my participation grade when I make the turn onto the campus' HUB lawn by sheer muscle memory when I hit it. And I mean hit it.

All the inertia I built up on my sprint across town comes to a grinding halt when my forehead slams directly into this bright orange monstrosity. My entire body reverberates three steps back as I look up to find a giant fucking hotdog on wheels blocking the front steps into my building.

I can't even begin to comprehend if I somehow cracked my spine and released a bit of the tab of acid I did last summer (as if we didn't all believe that one Reddit thread cmon) or if I'm still in my bed dreaming, but either way I find my way around the tail end of the bun and slide through the emergency exit and into the lobby.

I sprint up the staircase taking two steps at a time and burst through my classroom doors before my professor is even looking up from his IG Live to notice. Once I find my seat I start panhandling my peers for some Tylenol, unsure if the headache is from my new addiction to vodka red bulls or the bratwurst that just KO'd me in the parking lot.

When class begins we don't pickup where we left off on the best apps for planning your next IG story. Instead, two wide-eyed "young professionals" in bright red tracksuits are standing in the front of the class with a slideshow titled "How to be a Hotdogger" cued up behind them.

I can feel my student debt pissing itself laughing in the corner.

For the next 20 minutes and through a blinding migraine, Honey Baked Cam and At the Grill Alex proceed to woo me with the tales of a coast-to-coast weenie roast across the Hotdog Highways of America. From what notes I scribbled down on a fresh Google doc, I gathered that these people, "hotdoggers" being their official title, were recent college grads that became the official spokespeople of the (in)famous Oscar Mayer Wienermobile.

AHA. My nemesis has a name.

They travel all of America for an entire year, trying not to hit people with the giant hotdog but instead let people see it from a safe distance. Groundbreaking news to me. At the end of their song and dance they give us the information to ANOTHER info session for the Wienermobile. Who knew an orange hotdog has such rich historical ties to America? But as my vision realigns I set my sights on those hotdog highways and I decide right then and there with my soggy ankles that I want to be.... an Oscar Mayer Wiener.

After a grueling interview process where I had to sing the jingle, brainstorm my own hotdogger name and retell the tale of how the Wienermobile that I'd come to learn was named "RelishMe" gave me a slight concussion, I was laying on my apartment floor trying to brainstorm some equally-as-cool plan Bs to driving a giant hotdog across America while Sallie Mae chased me down in my hotdog-shaped rearview mirror. Reminiscing about the bump that was now subsiding from my forehead and racking my tiny brain about what else happened in that social media class since there was SOMEHOW A FINAL ON SOCIAL MEDIA coming up, I get a call.

I answer with a hesitant hello when the other line asks me,

"Do you want to be an Oscar Mayer wiener?"