I am so sick of veggie burgers, chicken and deli sandwiches, three foods I actually really like. But when they’re some of the only items you get to eat, they lose their appeal real fast, and I find myself hungry but not in the mood to go eat.

Some of you on campus may share these feelings. People always comment on how bad dining service-type food is, but I don’t think that’s the problem. I like veggie burgers, deli sandwiches, pizza and pasta, and I love chicken. I once thought I could always be in the mood for chicken. And I have no problem with Eastern’s Dining Service’s cooking and preparation of these foods most of the time.

Dining Services has forever been saying it wants student input, but is it really listening? I don’t think students asked for Pemberton to be closed. They didn’t ask for Lawson’s Mexican cuisine to de discontinued. Dining says it’s making changes to give students more variety. If students have gotten more variety this semester, I’ve missed it.

Students used to be able to eat Chinese food for lunch at Stevenson, and Stevenson’s dinner menu didn’t only used to be hamburgers, chicken and French fries. Lawson used to serve baked potatoes for lunch and Mexican for dinner; now it serves the same meal as Taylor.

Just last week a friend commented he would even pay more to be able to have the same variety we had two years ago. I wouldn’t necessarily go that far; I’m stingy with my money, but I want more variety. This realization came to me one night last week when I called the menu hotline to find out what was for dinner. As I listened to the voice recording, I wondered why I wasted my time calling since every place except one was serving its “usual.” I knew coming back to campus I would have one less dining hall to choose from. I didn’t know I’d really be losing two. The university might as well have closed down Lawson Hall Dining. The only benefit is that lines won’t be as long.

When I first heard Pemberton was closing, I felt bad for the students who lived there or like to eat there a lot. I ate at Pemberton, but not enough that I would be overly disturbed by its closing. Plus, I was moving to a residence hall that had its own dining center, so I figured I’d eat there. But now I do miss that one extra lunch or dinner option that could add a little more variety to life.

I also really miss Pemberton’s Reservation-Only Dining. As a semi-poor college student, I don’t get to go out to eat very often as I’m sure is the case with many college students, and although Reservation-Only wasn’t really a restaurant, it was different and had a restaurant atmosphere.

On a positive note, however, I did have a change the other day at lunch. Andrews had chicken or beef taco salads – now that was a welcome change over the usual. And although I’m used to, and like, late night pizza, I like Dining’s idea of spicing it up a little and trying out late night breakfast. I just hope it doesn’t completely replace the pizza. Dining needs to pay a little more attention to what students really want. They want some consistency where they know if they want a hamburger for lunch, Thomas will have it, but they also want more choices. Don’t serve the same meal on two different sides in the same building and say that’s a way to give students variety. It isn’t, and we end up sick of the foods we love.

Michelle Jones is a junior journalism and English major and a biweekly columnist for The Daily Eastern News. Her e-mail address is [email protected]. Columns are the opinion of the author.