A World of Opportunity

Last Friday I saw one of the most enlightening TV commercials ever aired, and since then I've been waiting and waiting for them to play it again so I can be sure I wasn't hallucinating. But it's starting to seem like that commercial was a once-in-a-lifetime viewing opportunity, so I'll go ahead and impart its wisdom in a message to all of my current, former and future interns, as well as to my little sister Liv:

If you want a fun job where you get to spend time with your friends, travel, work in magazines and be on TV, then hear this: there is NO REASON to go to college. Who needs the stress? Who needs the 30-year student loan repayment plans? The solution to your life's ambitions can be found in one elegantly suggestive two-syllable word: Hooters.

That's right, ladies, the Hooters restaurant chain is on the prowl for reliable new employees. In the recruitment commercial (aired on E! during a rerun of The Girls Next Door), an optimistic college student visits her guidance counselor and describes the qualities she's looking for in a grownup job (fun, magazines, travel, friends, etc.). The counselor gets in just one derisive snort before the co-ed suddenly remembers Hooters and flounces out, ready to begin her new life.

And why not? Hooters has a lot to offer. For one thing, you get unlimited free tube socks. You get a meal plan that includes all the wings you can eat (the resulting cellulite is easily hidden by flesh-toned dance tights), and one voucher per year for a round-trip ticket to Vegas on Hooters Airlines (you do have to serve peanuts during the flight).

It's too late for me to get on the Hooters fast track, since I already went to college and developed a wrinkle on my forehead. Plus, orange isn't really my color. But it's a pretty sweet deal, so all I'm saying to the next generation is: give it some thought.