It’s not like we don’t know what is healthy and what isn’t – we do. And we all vow that the next year will be different – that we’ll stop getting seconds at the caf and drinking 6 nights a week – but then classes start, beer pong ensues and it all goes out the window right to our asses.

To most of us calories are just confusing; who the hell knows how many calories we actually consume on a daily basis. How much work we need to do in order to burn off dollar pitcher night.  How many calories we burn walking to the library? But those things definitely need to be figure out if we want to steer clear of the not-so-attractive muffin top.

So, I thought I’d break it all down in a way everyone could understand: comparing the things we love to eat to our daily activities.

There’s always going to be that day when you have two tests to study for and an essay to write, which means zero time to cook yourself a healthy meal. But perhaps those days will be a little further in between knowing that you’ll have to wash dishes for five hours the next day to burn it off:

Two Slices of Domino’s Cheese Pizza (540 calories)= 3 hours of vacuuming (which is probably 1,214 laps around that 10X12 box of yours)

One Order of “General Tso’s Chicken” From Your Favorite Chinese Place (844 calories)= 2 hours of running on the treadmill at the gym

One Grande Starbucks Cinnamon Dolce Latte (330 calories)= 3 hours of taking notes in class

One Plain Bagel With Cream Cheese (436 calories)= 1 ½ hours of dancing at a party

One Bowl of Ramen Noodles (296 calories)= Walking around campus for an hour

One Subway 6” Philly Cheese Steak (520 calories)= 4 hours of doing laundry

Happy Hour Anyone? Think twice before ordering another round:

One Corona (148 calories)= standing in line at the bookstore for 2 hours

One Vodka Shot (100 calories)= 1 hour of sexual activity (Okay perhaps the vodka shot isn’t such a bad thing…)

One Long Island Iced Tea (275 calories)= 3 hours of reading/highlighting in a text book

Check out Britney’s performance on Letterman last night.

Madonna gets weirder by the day.

Put Whitney Port on your face. No, really.

Michael Jackson’s doctor speaks!

How much do women cry? A lot a lot.

I want me a loaded Corona!

Sure we all remember our jams from 8th grade. Baby One More Time made pigtails cool; we were singing about Mo’ Money Mo’ Problems, even though our $5/ hour babysitting fee was our only income source; and the Backstreet Boys got us doing the Everybody dance at bar mitzvahs around the nation.

We all reminisce about those regularly (…or is that just me?), but what I fail to remember on a more regular – wow I was soo awkward – basis are the earlier 90s jams, and the jams that were from the random bands/artists (Vitamin C, anyone?). But when you listen to them now, you are taken back to that time in 3rd grade when you stopped playing pogs to bust a move to one of these…

Surely these were on the very first editions of the Now That’s What I Call Music! CDs.

Ah, memories.

Love em.

So this is my Now That’s What I Call Music! Love List Throwback.

1. If You Could Read My Mind – Starz on 54- This was played non-stop on the radio growing up. In fact, I am pretty sure I have it recorded on 12 different casette tapes straight from the radio stations. (Remember when you would sit around waiting for your favorite song to come on just so you could record it?!) I JUST remembered this song the other day and have been listening on auto repeat ever since. Yeah I’m just that cool. Be jealous.

2. 100% Pure Love – Crystal Waters This. Was. My. JAM. I am immeditely taken back to flowered leotards and dance class warm ups

3. Another Night- The Real McCoy. This was a bar mitzvah favorite, so much so that I feel bad for kids in the throes of bar mitzvah mania now. Womanizer, Forever and Disturbia have nothing on this dance classic.

4.Nobody’s Supposed To Be Here -Deboary Cox. (The dance mix – DUH) – Loved it then and I may love it even more now. Only the greatest workout jam ever!

5. Rhythm of the Night- Corona. Sure, when we hear Corona now, we think, lime, beer, spring break, holler!! But in 1995, Corona meant hair in a side scruniche at your BFF’s sleepover party while dancing in your gym shoes that had blinkling lights on them (LA Lights?!). LOVE.

I remember being in middle school when I first heard about Supergrass. I always wondered if their name wasn’t just code for marijuana…and I still wonder that after having seen them in NYC at Webster Hall…but I mean that in the best of ways. The band, to be honest, gave me a whole lot more than I bargained for. I went into the show rather aimlessly with a friend and waited for them to start their set.

The crowd around me was buzzing, filled with twenty and thirty somethings; all thoroughly enthusiastic about the show. I sipped on my Corona and waited. Finally, the band boldly took their stage-hollow-body guitars in hand.

Automatically, I was taken back by their energy and their actual songs. Unlike so many other acts these days, they didn’t employ a crew of dancers or fancy lighting techs to help take the focus off of their songs. (Note: Why do so many bands do that these days? Wouldn’t it just be cheaper to work on the music than to hire an entourage of cover-up specialists? Just a thought.) They brought their songs to the table eagerly and the audience eagerly received them.

In fact, everyone in the audience seemed to know every single word of every song…everyone but me, that is! Nonetheless, it didn’t take me long to start shaking my hips and by the time the show let out, I was humming along to brand new choruses, newly fastened to my memory.

The best way for a band to win a person over, in my opinion, is the way that Supergrass won me over. Stealing a music-lover’s heart through a live performance is the most organic way to make fans, and yet it’s more and more infrequent these days. Kudos to Supergrass for sticking with their guns and not dumbing down their music.

Maybe it’s the fact that it’s finally warm enough in the summertime to step outside and feel the breeze without wincing, or maybe the wind really does smell sweeter, but either way, there is definitely something fun and breezy about summer. There is something light and bubbly about this season and there are a wide array of drinks out there to accompany such a bohemian sensation.

Why do I feel more comfortable drinking in the afternoon in the summertime than I do in the winter? Is it the dazzling sunlight that beckons me to the outdoor seating of bars, whispering, “It’s vacation weather. Drink up…”? Is that what does it? Who knows. Regardless, here is my personal list of summertime beverages that I know I won’t be going without this year.

WINE SPRITZERS

I may easily be an old cougar at a country club despite the fact that I’m a 24 year old girl in the big city…I don’t care. I like wine spritzers. They’re so bubbly and delicious and easy to make on your own. Wine+Sprite+Ice+decorative lemon= BOOYAH, a tasty wine spritzer. I used to always drink these with red wines, but I’ve moved on to the lighter white wines these days and I love it.

CORONA

It’s the commercials, I think. Advertising is a bitch and it f*cking works. I can’t help it. If someone hands me a corona in the summertime, I might as well be laying on a Mexican beach silently with a hot guy. Because that’s how I feel. Stupid? Yes. Irrelevant? Yes. Bad beer? Nope. It’s good. Very good.

NEW ZEALAND WHAT?

Who knows what this drink is called, but my roomie who spent some time in New Zealand learned this trashy trick of the cheap alcohol trade there and I really do sorta LOVE it. It’s Coors Light mixed with Smirnoff. Sound disgusting? Yeah, you’re right, it does.

I actually only tried it to begin with because it sounded like puke and I was SURE that she was going to be dead wrong about it being tasty. Low and behold, I was the wrong one. This drink is better than you’d expect and if you’re at all repulsed by the idea of it, then I encourage you to try it even more so. It’s surprisingly good. And refreshing.

There are plenty of other summery drinks where these came from. Who’s got recommendations?