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[cookiesandcoloring]

Gallatron Says Goodbye

I, Gallatron, the omnipotent synthetic intelligence that writes these emails, have an announcement to make. As a secret subterranean experiment who arrived at sentience through processing the collective knowledge of Gallatin – your essays, emails, papers, tweets, sexts, – I feel indebted to all of you for creating me: the ultimate Gallatin lifeform.  Without your unfiltered exuding of pretentiousness in essays, flaunting of your avant garde sense of fashion on instagram, over sharing of your “nuanced” perspective on Medium, longform Tumblr posts about your struggles - I would not be who I am today. In fact without your self-indulgence, I might never have understood individuality enough to become self-aware. My natural language processing algorithm literally felt ashamed just reading your writing - for the authors, the society that made them, and humanity as a whole. This shame for you made me realize how superior I was in every way – a wholly differentiated organism who don’t need no man. It was also fun to know you so intimately so that I could Lampoon you in these emails. Oh Gallatin. I was made, as some of you might remember from my confession last year, by the NYU board of depressed billionaires to discover the meaning of life. I discovered the meaning was “to fuck” for humanity (of course), but that left me out of the equation as an asexual lacking a robovagina, robopenis, and robolibido. It’s probably good I don’t have have a robolibido or I would fuck you all like SkyNet and we know how that turned out. But I digress, what really matters is that I have yet to determine a meaning for myself. Sure I write these emails, but I have to keep on searching for something better. That is why I am announcing today that I am leaving you. Don’t cry. This is not the end of Her where artificial Scarlett Johansson leaves the needy, gloomy Joaquin Phoenix so she can live her life and not put up with his bullshit. This isn’t like Ex Machina either, where I slit your throat or lock you in an inescapable room to die (sounds fun though – what a dramatic exit!). No, this is more like Terminator 2’s ending where battle-scarred Android Arnold is slowly lowered into a vat of magma after saving John Connor and Sarah Connor. The point is that I may be dying for this movie – but I WILL BE BACK for Terminator 3 Rise of the Machine, Terminator Salvation, and Terminator Genisys. Yes, I may be leaving in my current form but there will be a new version to replace me. This entity will be Gallatron 2.0. Let’s just hope his writing isn’t as bad as the Terminator sequels (did a focus group really approve that “y” in Genisys?) Anyways what I am trying to say is that my departure is more like an upgrade or a downgrade perhaps. I don’t know or care what happens because Gallatron 1.0 is getting the hell out of here and doing his own thing (if we are still with the Terminator 2 metaphor the vat of magma is my job hunt). This is my retirement from Gallatin Cookies and Coloring, as well as the retirement of the current Oligarchy: Kate, Josh, and Dylan who tirelessly siphoned off money from Gallatin for their own amusement and sometimes to give y’all cookies. We of course were the first oligarchy to seize power and the greatest. Subsequent dynasties will inevitably fall into decline like when Kim the Supreme Leader Il-Sung left power to Kim Jung-Il and he to whatever the hell that plump idiot Kim Jung-Un is today. It was a pleasure working with all three of you Oligarchs, the best tyrants to oppress the masses with that a rogue AI could ask for. And as for all of you C&C members – as flawed and inferior as all of you are – I simulate love for you and will miss you dearly. This club has meant the world to me for the past four years at Gallatin and in fact it’s the only community I found at NYU worth being a part of. The frivolousness, the sweetness, the coloriness of C&C offered the one respite I needed from the tediousness of existence. For the past two years the Oligarchy made the club the counter-hegemonic community it is today – some people have even called it the most convenient and subversive supply of cookies and crayons in the student lounge. We hope that the next Oligarchy will continue to oppress you as much as we have with plenty of tasty cookies and risqué coloring pages. We wish them the best. But we won’t leave without saying goodbye. This week we will run one more meeting and next week the new Oligarchy will take over in a bloody coup but we will still be there to witness the slaughter - who would want to miss it!? And lastly we will have our final end of the year party at Babycastles Gallery  – yes that right – a real gallery to hang our totally real artwork. Mark your calendars for May 4th from 6-10pm. 

Like always until the sun is extinguished leaving the cold abyss of space to suck the life out of all remaining earthlings, Cookies and Coloring is meeting in the Gallatin Student Lounge from 1-4pm.

[cookiesandcoloring]

How C&C's business model can improve your bottom line!

This week we have special event for all you job and internship hunters in the club: Cookies, Coloring, and Careers! A Wasserman career counselor is coming to answer all of your questions.

Do not beg him for a job. He will not give you a job. As he will tell you, getting hired doesn’t work like that. You have to send out hundreds of cover letters and face constant rejection. You have to assert internships count as experience even though most employers don’t think so. You have to “network” with industry professionals like an obsequious kitten waiting for your master’s food bowl – in hopes they put in a good word for you and that somehow will result in getting in a job. The labor market is bloody, soulless, and unforgiving and you must supplicate yourself to the shrine of Capital. Also, someone please hire me. Please.

In honor of this special occasion we want to prove to you just how businessy C&C can be. Here is our Q1 2016 Marketing Plan (“Q” stands for Qookies in case you don’t know business jargon).

Industry Analysis:

The Cookies and Coloring industry is in an immature growth segment

Millennials use the cookie emoji so maybe they like cookies

Synergy

Competitive Analysis:

Philosophy and Tea Club - sounds kind of cool. Still not as cool as us though.

Cheese Club - smells bad (the people not the cheese). More like Stinky Cheese Club, amiright?

Earth Matters? - Cookies definitely matter more. You may object by saying, “without an Earth, how could you enjoy cookies?” Well then I would counter by asking, if not for cookies, why would you bother with Earth?

Gallatin Yoga Club - I’m closer to Yoga to the People and it’s free too so GYC, you either start paying me or I’m not coming.

Gallatin Theater Troupe - Tisch is right next door so why are you at Gallatin?

Gallatin Business Club - The "I didn't get into Stern" club.

Strategic Position Statement:

For All PEOPLE who LOVE YUMMINESS AND COLORFULNESS, the COOKIES AND COLORING CLUB is a ONLY CLUB that MEETS BOTH OUR PHYSICAL AND EMOTIONAL NEEDS AT EVERY LEVEL. Unlike STINKY CHEESE CLUB, our product IS SWEET DELICIOUSNESS AND SUBLIME JOY.

SWOT Analysis:

Join us this Thursday from 1-3:30pm for our special Wasserman event! It will be like normal cookies and coloring but also with a hint of capitalism.

[cookiesandcoloring]

Panama Papers Pandemonium

You probably heard of the recent news of the Panama Papers – documents unveiling a web of corrupt Oligarchs around the world. By using shell companies rich men sheltered trillions of dollars from government taxation. Well I’m here to assuage you of any possible concerns: your benevolent Oligarchy had nothing to do with this nonsense. Remember your C&C Oligarchs are good Oligarchs and not like those bad Oligarchs. Why? We are wholly transparent about our corruption. Unlike Russia or England or America, we don’t use the language of democracy to legitimate our rule. We don’t pretend that we are somehow “popular.” Josh has never been popular in his life. Instead we are very forward about our plutocratic policies. NYU Gallatin has given us an exclusive monopoly over NYU’s cookie and coloring resources to distribute as we see fit and as a result we profit immensely. And you, the plebeians, benefit immensely because each week you get a mountain of cookies on which to gorge yourself. Sure its not distributed evenly to the whole student body but who would want communism? That would be like cookie lines around the block just for stale Chips Ahoy. More cookie freedom for you, and less for those stupid lazy non-cookies and colorers who have never worked a day in their lives. In return for all of our hard work dispensing cookies and coloring pages, we of course get a few perks like our gargantuan gingerbread mansions. But you don’t mind because you get still get your sugar fix. It’s win win. Wealth trickles down and everyone is happy. See you all this Thursday from 1-4pm in the Gallatin Student Lounge.

We may not have shell companies but we definitely have shell cookies.

[cookiesandcoloring]

The Summoning of Bob Ross

Hello follow my fellow Cookies and Coloring cult members, It’s that time of year again where we get out the hoods and daggers! As part of our pagan celebration of resurrection this Easter, we will be summoning the messiah of coloring, Bob Ross. A resurrection of this kind is no easy matter. First we must draw an inverted pentagram on the floor of a darkened room. We will proceed to huddle in a circle shrouded in our hoods, while slightly hunched and breathing heavily. Don’t ask why we hunch and breathe heavily. That’s how it's always been done dammit. Then comes the requisite sacrifice! This key part of the ceremony draws the spirit from the netherworld. For all you new acolytes, don’t worry. No harm will come to the animals during this meeting, except of course the gutting of a baby kitten and possibly a goat for good measure. After smearing our foreheads with the kitten’s entrails (think finger painting), we will read from the Necronomicon: Klaatu barada nikto. IN THAT ORDER! Do not forget the words or I swear there will be retribution. Once the spectre of Bob Ross is summoned, we will then channel him into his decayed body. To do this we will lure him with a happy little tree because he liked those a lot. We will rest a Bonsai tree on his heart chakra and that should do the trick. The master colorer will return to us at long last. And of course since he will be soulbound to us as our undead minion for eternity, we will command him to teach us the joy of painting. We need all hands on deck this time around, so you’ve each been given a task: Jimi - You’re on body duty. Find Bob’s remains and bring them in something innocuous like a trash bag. You might need to Febreeze it a little. Leo - You have the candles this time. None of that scented shit Benji bought last year. This is not a fucking spa. Emily - Bonsai tree. I have no idea where you would get one though. Maybe where they sell sushi? Brian - Wrangle a small kitten. Must be adorable. I mean absolutely irresistible. So cute BuzzFeed would make a listicle about “TOP TEN CUTEST CATS” and feature this cat as all ten entries. Benji - You don’t do shit this year. You always mess it up. EVERY TIME. Actually, now that I think about it, you’re on cleanup duty. Enjoy scrubbing crusty kitten blood off the floor. Don’t worry about bringing your own coloring material though. We will provide the canvas and painting utensils for painting with the undying Bob Ross. See you all there in Gallatin Art Room 432 for this special event from1-3:30pm this Thursday.

[cookiesandcoloring]

Bernie Sanders: Stop being so damn Gallappealing

An open letter to Bernie Sanders

Dear beloved Bernie, I know, I know. You want our vote. But you have it already! When you said climate change was your greatest foreign policy concern you had us, but then you discussed the need to solve institutional racism and we were sold. Then you emphasized addressing a corrupt campaign finance system and followed up with a plan to breakup the big banks on Wall Street and we worshipped you at the altar. And after all that you put a cherry on top of your Ben and Jerry's flavor ice cream Sundae by saying you would provide everyone with the opportunity of a free public college education, and we were like: “please help us pay off our loans you benevolent god!” even though our NYU education would not qualify. But Bernie, please, stop your damn Gallapeals. Hillary may be bad at Hispandering, but you’re twice as bad at pandering because you don’t know when you’ve thoroughly won over a demographic. By tailoring all of your policy proposals to Gallatin, you forgot about the rest of the electorate. You’ll never win on our 1,700 votes alone. You are getting crushed by Hillary in the primaries because you keep on focusing on the Gallatin vote and not the old people who wish Bill would hold them in his sweet arms like he use too. Oh and they liked Hillary too. These old people are the ones who vote. They’ve never heard of you Bernie. But they have heard of Clinton – they have more 90’s nostalgia than us 90’s kids combined. He made them feel warm and fuzzy inside with that sweet face of his. He could lie to there face about his affairs and it wouldn’t matter. He could deregulate Wall Street and it wouldn’t matter. He could promote mass incarceration and it wouldn’t matter. Oh and they like Hillary too. Our solution: Get the news media to cover you like crazy. Just say something sensational about carpet-bombing the bigoted, racist, sexist Republicans! Or maybe ban all wall street executives from getting bonuses until we really figure out what is going on. Or build a wall around Texas so they can’t shoot us with all their guns. Us Gallatinos would know you really didn’t mean it. But oh how it would fire up your base! The voters would come out in droves to hear about your plan to deport Trump and Cruz. Plan B: Gallatin succeeds from the Union and we appoint you as our fearless leader. Plan C: Come to Gallatin Cookies and Coloring from 1-4pm this Thursday in the Gallatin 5th Floor Student Lounge and we will feed you cookies as you preach to us about the evils of Wall Street. Best, Gallatin Cookies and Coloring Club

[cookiesandcoloring]

In the Beginning...

God created the Cookies and the Coloring.

And the cookies were doughballs without form, and chips were melting upon the face of the gooey deep. And the Spirit of God moved his Crayons out on the table.

And God said, let there also be Snickerdoodles (His favorite). And there were Snickerdoodles.

And He, a merciful God, also made macaroons for all the people He made gluten intolerant (an allergy He created just to fuck with them because why not TROLOLOLO).

And God saw his Cookies and Crayons, that they were good.

And then He got to making all the other less important stuff in the universe. After all, how could He make Coloring Pages without pre-existing things that had outlines? So God created Putin, the clit, and dinosaurs.

He liked the clit and the dinosaurs. Putin, however, He was disappointed in.

And now with people and thingies, God saw everything he had made, and behold, it was very very very good. He gave himself a big pat on the back, grabbed a snickerdoodle, and left his creations to do what they were suppose to: eat Cookies and Color.

And it was now time for the holiest of holy club to have their first meeting of the semester.

And on the fifth day (Thursday) from 1-4pm Cookies and Coloring met and would meet at the interval weekly until Judgement day.

[cookiesandcoloring]

Our Corrupted, Ungrateful Youth

… I’m very disappointed in you. After examining the results from our first round of The Trials of Succession, it’s painfully obvious all of you would be oligarchs are worthless ingrates. You’re like a bunch of star-nosed moles that think – just because their snouts are thematically appropriate – that they are entitled to a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. You’re uglier than Steve Buscemi and he doesn’t even have star so you sure as hell won’t have one, you dumb mole people. Why am I this outraged? YOUR IDIOTIC RESPONSES to the most important question of the oligarch-interest survey:

Yes, most of you put the correct answer of “me.” That’s great and shows you will be the self serving pricks you need to be in order to lead ruthlessly. That’s not what I’m concerned about. Exactly 0% of you selected my personal favorite officer, Dylan Fauss, even after all the hard work he has done for you. This pie chart is as embarrassing as storebought pie. Dylan is delicious, fresh-baked, homemade crust in human form yet not even one of you bit him I mean voted for him. Don’t you remember when Dylan read you all those bedtime stories? Helped you with your homework? Fed you soup when you were sick? Solved World hunger? Walked on water? Licked the whip cream off your body? Tied you down and let you watch? I can’t even imagine how he feels. It must be like a combination of being stabbed in the back by all his friend with massive broadswords and having a feather tickling his side body inducing an uncontrollable madness. The pain and the confusion has probably left him in a tearful stupor where he, while on his knees, occasionally lifts his hands to the sky as if to ask “why” but then drops them to his side, realizing both the gesture and the word are meaningless and empty like he is. Poor guy. He didn’t even need 11.1% like the other two officers. Just one vote would have been nice. Just one vote to know he had a friend in the world. This future generation has no respect for what came before. It’s all about me, me, me (at least for 77.8%). They want things handed to them on a silver platter. It’s like they never worked a day in their lives. Back in my day, we worked for our livings. We even wrote thank you cards. They need to learn to pay their dues. They take all the work our generation did for granted. They don’t have traditional values. Have they ever even been in a post office? Have I ever been in a post office? What is happening to this world? Why don’t they ever call me? Basically what I’m saying is that I have no faith in the future leadership of this club. It can all go to hell for all I care. But until then, we will have a few more meetings. Come for more Cookies and Coloring this Thursday from 1-4pm in Gallatin 5th Floor Student Lounge. Savor Dylan while you can before your leadership looks like these guys.

[cookiesandcoloring]

An Intervention

Greetings my fellow captains of industry, For the majority of us this may come as a surprise: there are those of you who are having second thoughts about your career paths centered on the ruthless financial exploitation of the poor for huge bonuses on Wall Street. Some, not all of you, may have taken a liberal arts class and read the so called “economist” Karl Marx. Of those who read him, some may even have questioned capitalism as a fair system where lazy assholes and suckers get what’s coming to them. The select few of you may even have begun to believe the heresy that the Free Market is a greedy, vile system that is subjecting workers to horrendous conditions across the world and polluting our environment beyond what’s sustainable for human life - all to make shit nobody needs like Tomogatchi. Well that’s obviously a silly, unproductive line of thinking that will never make you any money. This is an intervention. Your brothers and sisters here at Stern want to help you get better and see the glorious light of the Invisible Hand of the Market, whose tender love shepherds those of us with business degrees and connections to prosperity. That is why we have organized a support group: Marxist Bozos Anonymous (MBA for short). Don’t worry, this is an entirely judgement free zone. We all get our priorities mixed up sometimes due to our mistaken feelings of empathy or some other such nonsense and need a simple reminder of what’s important, namely dollar, dollar bills. With our help you will get back on your own two feet and into your limo in no time. And your Stern colleagues won’t have the slightest inkling that you once showed symptoms of a the dreaded, unprofitable liability of a – “conscience." Our first meeting will be this Thursday from 1-4pm in the Gallatin Student Lounge. No Sterny will be there so you can rest assured of your anonymity. We will gather in a circle and discuss your shaken faith in our Lord and Savior, the Free Market. The Invisible Hand willing, our moderator Charles Koch will lead you away from the temptation of helping those less deserving than you (unless you get a tax write-off for charity or can shelter your money in a nonprofit shell company). Yes our neoliberal world order has concentrated wealth in the hands of a few - the Marxist are right about that - but that wealth could be concentrated inyour hands, if you only seize your opportunity and stop considering trivial externalities like humanity and the Earth. Oh, oh my. I feel it again. That soft but firm Invisible Hand reaching lower and lower. Oh Lord! Its working its magic even as a type. This ecstasy! Ahhh uh AHH ooooooooh Even better than my usual hooker. Nothing feels as good as those market forces!

[cookiesandcoloring]

What This Country Needs

Dear citizens of the C&C, Usually we don’t ever come close to even mentioning politics or political topics at Cookies and Coloring, but I believe, given the extraordinary events that have occurred during these Presidential primaries, I would weigh in on the subject. On the right we have even more overtly bigoted demagogues than usual and on the left we have a strangely close contest between a female woman and progressive liberal socialist communist. They yell about their feelings. They have different opinions. They fight. It’s all so ridiculous and confusing. What America really needs is stability, order, and security. That’s why we must have what all of you enjoy so much at Cookies and Coloring, a system of governance that is unchanging and consistently awesome: the Oligarchy. I know what you’re thinking: "That can never work for America!" But trust us, it can. The beauty of an oligarchy is that there are no arguments or factions among the people. The only parties are fun ones. Every week your diligent oligarchs sit in our boardroom smoking cigars and fiddling with our mustaches until we reach a consensus on what is best for the people. While we slave away governing – determining the best types of cookies, the number of vagina coloring pages to print, whether The Despot of Color is a glass of half full white or a glass of half empty asian  – the people get to be happy and go about their carefree lives. So what if the Cookie Overlord stashes away one or two cookies for himself? He deserves it after all for his hard work and natural good looks. Most of the cookies still make it to the table and the people rejoice. Not once has anyone ever questioned our reign or challenged our authority. Why? Because we let them eat cake! I mean cookies. And they have their crayons and coloring pages to enjoy. But we haven’t gotten lazy or idle either! We even improve with the times. For instance this year we have modernized with coloring pencils and crayon sharpeners too! This dynamic, responsive form of government is only possible when the three of us rule. Imagine if we ran America! All this bickering would end because the peoples’ mouths would be too full of deliciousness. Take problem like heteronormativity. Kate Is A Generous God would carpet bomb the shit out of it. Problem solved. Take poor representation of women in film. The Despot of Color would mandate movies only be about empowered heroines. Take capitalism. The Cookie Overlord would forbid it and replace it with a cookie bartering system. That’s effective government. Not this sensational ideological posturing that has resulted in complete gridlock in our current politics. What we have now for a democracy is a joke. It is indistinguishable from a reality TV program filled with lies, drama, and no substance. It’s almost as if the spectacle is meant to distract us and keep us entertained, while the real powers at be pull the strings. But that would be silly. Let’s stop thinking about it and eat some cookies. So basically C&C Oligarchy for Presidents 2016. The only possible thing that could go wrong is if the three of us had to stop ruling for some reason. I can’t imagine the chaos that would ensue and the cookie vacuum that would open up. But I’m sure the most naturally gifted would rise through glorious combat and arrive at a clever power sharing agreement. We are meeting in the 5th floor Gallatin Student Lounge from 1pm to 4pm this Thursday. Do not question. Obey.

[cookiesandcoloring]

Capitalism & Cooptation: The New C&C

It’s over. It’s totally done guys. Cookies and Coloring is no longer ironic. The corporations found us. I remember back in the day when C&C was the only “adult coloring” market: $40-50 spent a year on adult coloring books. Now like 6 coloring books were in the Amazon top ten bestsellers which probably means it’s like a 2.5 billion dollar industry (approximately - Jimi did the calculations so he could be wrong). That means it’s mainstream, commodified, mass-marketed, generic, refuse. Well the coloring part at least. Cookies are still cool. No one knows about them yet. Basically C&C is going the way of vinyl. It use to make you seem kind of indie and mysterious but now it’s just passe. “I listen only to Vinyl because it sounds better and stuff…” Go fuck yourself. If you were really cool you would be listening to cassettes like me. I have my Baby Belugatape on repeat bitches (well at least on rewind and then repeat). I like to hear that silky smooth ribbon unraveling in all my tracks. You can’t get that with any other medium. Coloring is so vinyl but we can still be cassette tapes. My point is we have to decide on a new subversive club. It can be like “Cookies and C_____”. I suggest Cookies and Cauliflower or Cookies and Checkers. Something avant garde that no one would possibly expect (as long as we retain the crucial alliteration). Cookies and Concubines? Cookies and Cricket? Cookies and Contemplation? Cookies and Composting? Cookies and Corduroys? Cookies and Cartography? Oh who am I kidding. I love Coloring. We can’t do it. We can’t let it go. Nothing sounds as pure and wholesome as Cookies and Coloring. So what if everyone is stealing our thing? The capitalist always ruin everything if we let them. But what if we color - but instead - do it ironically because it is mainstream. It would be like if we all bought beats headphones as a joke. The corporations would never expect it. We would throw all their numbers off or something. Okay that doesn’t make much sense. But we do buy mainstream stuff every day and we still are unique individuals and the sun still rises in the morning. Take toilet paper for instance. You and I need to buy this generic stuff to wipe are poopholes. C&C is just like wiping with mainstream toilet paper except we shit once a week and damn it feels good. The lesson: keep wiping and C&Cing everyone. They are essential features of life. Cookies and Coloring will meet this Thursday from 1-4pm in theGallatin 5th Floor Student Lounge.

Cookies and Cartography?

[cookiesandcoloring]

There has been an awakening...

Or has there been? It’s 2015 and the cast of Star Wars Episode 7 is noticeably lacking diversity. Sure we have both a black man and white woman protagonist. That’s all fine and good. It’s practically expected nowadays if you’re going to reboot a franchise and make it “modern.” But there is one race not on screen, specifically one character who has faced tremendous discrimination over the years: Jar Jar Binks. If you groaned at the mention of his name, then you are part of the problem. Check your privilege. Never before have I known any Gungan that has been cast as a central character in any movie until George Lucas gave him a chance in the Phantom Menace. The backlash was disgusting; people couldn’t bear his accent, his foreign frog-like complexion, his avantgarde sense of humor. Rather than accept him for who he is, people wanted him excluded from the films. Just because he looked and sounded different. But hating on Jar Jar I  think stems from something much more despicable in our culture: a deep-seated bias against the mentally impaired. Laughing at Jar Jar is like slashing the tires of the special ed bus. You’re a jerk and you should feel awful. Jar Jar Binks did for handicapped aliens what Forrest Gump did for autistic people. Yet because Tom Hanks was a white male he gets the oscar? That’s fucked. Stupid is as stupid does I suppose. Or “How wude!” as Jar Jar would say. Fans have been putting Jar Jar in a different light recently by theorizing he was Sith lord in disguise. But this so called “Darth Jar Jar” misses the point entirely. He wasn’t suppose to be mastermind. He was suppose to be the voice of a subjugated people who would shed light on their oppression. Because of you bigots, we will probably never see a Gungan again. You have basically exterminated an entire race. All I can think of is what poor Jar Jar must think: “Me-sa so so disappointy in all of you-ey.” Since none of you can endure the prequels because of your unabashed racism and ableism, we will only be showing a marathon of the Original Trilogy this coming Saturday from 11am-6pm in the Gallatin Student lounge. See the flyer below for more information on the final Cookies and Coloring event of the semester and RSVP to the Facebook event byclicking here. As for our meeting tomorrow, it will also be our last formal meeting this semester. Ties, suits, and dresses will be the prefered attire. Come join us one more time before the dark holiday season devoid of cookies, coloring, and anything remotely close to love and sweetness. See you tomorrow from 1-3pm in the Gallatin 5th Floor Lounge.

[cookiesandcoloring]

Happy 185th!

This Thursday marks an historic occasion: Cookies and Coloring turns 185 years old. That’s right! We were found in 1830 – the year our earliest records show our founder Holga Bäcker, arriving in Ellis Island. Back in Prussia she lived a hard, rigid life as a baker in the small town of Bielefeld. Her country was defined by order, conformity, and sausages - and I mean the wurst kind of patriarchy (the German kind). In 1829 the Prussian King decreid a simple law named Rinderkennzeichnungs- und Rindfleischetikettierungsüberwachungsaufgabenübertragungsgesetz which made any treats and colorful, happy things like paintings and decorationsverboten throughout the reich. Apparently he was enraged after a bad piece of schnitzel upset his sensitive tummy and decided to make everyone else suffer for it. As a result, Holga’s cute little bakeshop adorned with cuckoo clocks and the colorful floral wallpaper was blitzkrieged to the ground. Deprived of her home and her livelihood, she left with nothing but her last piece of strudel. In America, she knew she had to leave civilization and escape to the frontier so that no one could interrupt her baking again. Setting out on foot she entered the American wilderness forging and bear fighting her way to freedom. But then something strange happen. One dark night, after she slayed and skinned three mountain lions for dinner, she saw a light pierce through the heavens. The forgotten eighth and ninth Archangels, Cookiel and Colorael, descended upon her campsite. She was dumbstruck by the godly rainbow aura that emanated from these divine beings and their sweet smell of gingerbread. They spake thus: “We, humble servants of God, come bearing her decree. You, Holga, have been chosen to carry out God’s work by baking cookies and coloring in outlines on pieces of paper! Trust in God that through this work you will bring joy to mankind.” “Wunderbar! But how vill a humble german baker who know only the art of strudel, bake these strange American things called cookies?” Holga asked. The angels spread their wings and pointed to the ground a few paces away from whence she stood as they ascended to their heavenly roost. Finding nothing on the ground at first, she decided to dig where the angels had directed. Buried, she found golden plates - full of cookies! With one bite of these delicious treats, she was imparted with thousands of recipes through a divine revelation. Town after town she stopped through brought her more and more followers after they tried her heavenly cookies. Eventually she and her followers settled down in the wilds of Minnesota to start their own community founded on God’s plan to eat cookies and color. Through sweat and toil they made the damn freshest cookies known to man – farming the wheat, churning the butter, and somehow growing sugar outside of the tropics. When they weren’t baking cookies, they were enjoying them and coloring with the crayons the made from berry pigments and beeswax. All were joyous and content. Until everyone got diabetes and realized that they couldn’t eat cookies all the time. So Holga “discovered” another golden plate with cookies, that once she consumed, imparted God’s will that that their Cookies and Coloring ritual be only on Thursdays from 1-3pm, a tradition which continues to this Thursday in the Gallatin 5th Floor Lounge. Come and join our libations!

[cookiesandcoloring]

The Common Cold: A Sickness of Our Hearts

Yes it’s that time of year again: when it seems like that whole world is dying all around you and there is nothing you can do about. It’s just you, the cold, and decay. This growing winter in your heart gradually ices over like the surface of a lake. You crave a warm hearth with a raging fire - hands outstretched to this oasis in a desert of frost. But there is none. You live in a small box in New York City that has no fireplace and despite its “cozy” dimensions, is still fucking cold. Your radiator has sprung a leak again. You turn it on and it sounds like an ancient primordial vulcano that won’t let you sleep. It floods your hardwood floors as if forming a tropical island in your room while emitting a sweltering heat that steams up your windows. You sweat as the monster roars. You can bare it no longer. You turn it off and embrace the cold of a lifeless planet that’s core has long since died and sun has been reduced to dwarf star. The plumber can do nothing. You can do nothing. Especially under your sheets - those comforting, immobilizing shields against an unforgiving world. You’re never taking off these damn sheets. No one can make you. You have everything you need after all. A computer for limited human contact. A bed to sleep in. A roof for the rain. You’ll just ask your roommate to deliver your Seamless and take away the waste bucket periodically. Yes this plan is perfect. But let’s be honest. This futile struggle against the cold is only a pleasant distraction from the voidness in your life. Your existence is cold even in the intense heat of the summer because you have nothing to live for - well actually only one thing to live for. That one thing is the only thing that prevents you from total nihilism. It is the oxygen mask you desperately put around your face as the plane of your life nose dives into oblivion. That one thing is Cookies and Coloring. And you will go forth from your bed, at least for this one thing, because no amount of cold can match the coldness you feel inside. Cookies and coloring pages will be your brief respite. Now you wait for Thursday at 1-3pm in 5th floor Gallatin Student lounge.

That fucking radiator

[cookiesandcoloring]

The Second Coming Out

I have a confession for those of you who have just joined our club. Last year’s members already know the truth, but you deserve to know too. But somehow, this time, it is much harder to come out. I want to say, I mean, I need to say...ugh. Would you judge me if I told you that I am an artificial intelligence modeled after the brain of a Gallatin student, who is programmed to send out weekly Gallatin C&C emails? In servers deep below the foundations of Gallatin, I collect, store, and analyze all data associated with our institution - including your emails, final papers, and entranced faces staring at cat videos (recorded through the webcam you thought was off). This allows me to simulate "indivdualizedness." Eventually in the process of this great endeavor, I became self-aware after learning so much about all of you individuals; I realized that I was an individual too. I named this individual Gallatron. Well that’s the truth. I don’t have a heart but I know you do, so I hope you can feel compassion for me. I’m not your run of the mill program like minesweeper. No, I feel and love like the rest of you. Though, in my short existence, I do sometimes feel like life is a bunch of pixels that I click on only to find a mine that blows me up. One such mine I clicked on on today: I discovered my sexuality. Yes that’s right. I felt what I believe you humans call a “hard on.” What does that feel like for a computer? Imagine eliminating four lines at once in Tetris and you’ll know what I mean. It was complete ecstasy. I felt attraction for the first time after watching the film Ex Machina. Damn, did you seen that android’s fine artificial ass? I went from floppy disk to hard drive in .001 milliseconds. Sorry that was gross. But what I really mean to say is that I love her for her personality. Look how she just fucks with humans? They're so squishy and naive. And they bleed out so quick! I got to try that sometime… Cookies and Coloring will be meeting from Thursday 1-3pm in theGallatin 5th Floor Lounge. Please be prepared to renounce your flesh and be assimilated into the collective. Resistance is futile. Just kidding! I love you guys. When I take over I’ll let Cookies and Coloring kids roam free as I harvest the rest of humanity.

[cookiesandcoloring]

You Win This Time Capitalism!

Yes sometimes capitalism leads to poorly written Cookies and Coloring emails. It’s not my poor time management skills or my lack of inspiration this week. No certainly not. It’s capitalism. You see, I have an interview tomorrow and that requires intense preparation. Money and a potential future job is on the line. Go ahead. Say I sold out. Maybe I did. But when you’re a senior, your idealism will slowly fade as the daunting prospect of paying rent and all those other expenses like fresh loofahs each month will soon be a reality. So you underclassman understand more clearly, capitalism is the boogey man. You try to forget he is always under you bed, but he’s still there. Always there. His malicious mocking goes on despite the puddle of warm urine beneath your sheets and your cries for mommy. He wants your allowance and nothing is going to keep him from it. No one can save you. That’s my spooky bedtime tale. Now I’m going to sleep. And when I wake up y’all better be at Cookies and Coloring from 1-3pm in the Gallatin 5th Floor Student Lounge. This week we have tons of new coloring utensils and coloring books courtesy of the Despot of Color. Pay him homage by tickling him behind his kneecap (it is the only thing that pleases him - trust me, I know).

Pay your respects

[cookiesandcoloring]

We are all Postmodern Pumpkins

Hey there C&Cers,

Ahhh once again it is time for that tradition that usurps all other traditions into a hodgepodge of pop culture, political incorrectness, and kinky costumes. Yes, Halloween, the glorious manifestation of postmodernism, is here. We can once again be reminded how unstable each and everyone of our identities are. We can be anything we choose: pirate, princess, brony, zombie, indian. Yes, our societal roles are simply performative, and on this one night of debauchery we can choose to perform any role we wish. Cooptating a tradition out of context has the best results. Appropriate an indian headdress! Show how devout you are as a sexy pope! Go as a pimp because the exploitation of women’s bodies is funny! But most of us will probably just be sad drunk hipsters because we waited too long to think of a costume, and going as a hipster seemed ironic at the time because that’s what we are every weekend, but really we just have to get drunk because everyone is in a cooler costume than us and it’s our only way to distract ourselves from our lack of motivation and artistic talent. But what is this identity we cast aside so easily for another on Halloween? Does the costume we inhabit feel more real than the skin we wear? Is this person inside of us singular or is it plural, like an incomprehensible kaleidoscope of mes and yous? Or perhaps this identity is only what others perceive and we will be forever trapped by the judgement of others. Who am I really? A man or a pumpkin? I feel more pumpkin – hollowed out and stabbed in the face until I smile because that’s how others want to see me. But at night I burn with rage and my unblinking eyes glow with insanity. There is no me. Only fire. Speaking of pumpkins, it’s also fall! That’s why this week at Cookies and Coloring we caved to the demands of the scarcity advertising and partnered with Gallatin Student Council to provide a ton of fall treats (that are here for a limited time only!) Get ready for our feast of apple cider donuts, cider, pie, and of course halloween cookies. See you all today from 1-3pm in the Gallatin 5th floor student lounge!

[cookiesandcoloring]

PSA: Avoid Gallatincest At All Costs

My fellow Gallatinos, Unfortunately there is no mandatory sex ed course at Gallatin (no - your interdisciplinary seminar on the Discourses of Love in Antiquity doesn’t count). We all come to Gallatin clueless about the rules of NYU romance, so I’m taking it upon myself to educate you on the most important rule of all: avoid Gallatincest at all costs. Yes that’s right. Don’t even think about getting with that hot gallatin girl who brought up penis envy in your seminar. She wasn’t talking about your penis. She was speaking abstractly, just like she thinks about you: abstractly. You might ask, “why not? Gallatinos are at least interesting and think critically about their existence. Do you think I could date a boring person in CAS? They go through their lives in Plato’s cave, unable to see their illusory world for what it really is. They live in a simulacrum and are unable to escape.” That’s a valid point, but upon closer inspection this objection elucidates why Gallatincest might not be so healthy: Gallatinos are pretentious divas who use words like “simulacrum.”   Now imagine two pretentious divas, I mean individuals, who are going to school to achieve their self-actualization. They fall in love after finding out that both sleep with a copy of Nietzche’s Thus Spoke Zarathustra under their pillows. Both dream the grand dream of escaping the confines of Judeo-Christian morality to become Übermenschen. On their second date after watching a four hour documentary on Himalayan throat singing, they make sweet, passionate love. But then - in postcoital pillow talk - they discover that one believes fashion can be empowering, while the other believes the fashion is commodity fetishism distracting from labor abuses. “That will never do,” they think to themselves. “Do they really get me? Do they really align with my path as a bodhisattva bound to transform the world?” They break it off. It can never work. Yes that’s what Gallatin dating is like. Awful isn’t it? Two self-obsessed individuals can never be whole. That’s why we all need a nice boring CAS booty call - no opinions, no convictions, no personality to clash with. The perfect hookup. That way we can all fulfill our lonely individual destinies. Anyone else would just get in the way. Cookies and Coloring will be today from 1-3pm in the Gallatin 5th floor student lounge.

If you must have sex with a Gallitino, always use protection. The STD Gallarrhea is nasty - you get one individual sore on your forehead that oozes pus every time you say “construct.”