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The campus-wide panic has begun. Students with a slight cough stay in their rooms all day and refuse to leave. Guys at frat parties ask a girl if she's feeling congested before hooking up with her. Students who never leave their rooms continue to play video games and eat Cheetos, unconcerned. However, the panic hit a new apex, as it has finally spread to the very devices planted across campus to aid students- the hand sanitizer dispensers.
"I was pretty confused about what I was doing here," said the dispenser outside MacMillan 117. "It took me a few weeks to make the connection between all those swine flu stories on the local news and my presence. But I finally got it, and now if any more of those little punks even get close to touching me, I swear to god I'll start spewing mustard all over their hands. I'm not even loaded with mustard cartridges, but. I'll find a way."
The machine in Salomon Center seemed equally concerned. "Does it scare me? Yeah, man, it scares me a lot," the dispenser told the Noser. "I mean, I can't be getting sick- I have an interview next week. I'm applying for a dispenser position at the Mayo Clinic, and this is it, man. I'm not PLME. I don't have that safety net."
The panic of the dispensers is disconcerting because they were put on campus to prevent exactly the thing they are now concerned about. Also, they don't have brains and are literally made of plastic.
In response to growing rumors about a possible dispenser mutiny, human Chet Adams '13 told us he was "not freakin' concerned."
"Are you being serious right now?" Adams spat. "If a dispenser won't give me the sanitizer I need, I will physically hurt it. I will punch it repeatedly. And if that doesn't work, I'll call Health Services, 'cause I cannot afford to get sick this week."
The dispensers have banded together in the toughest of times, and continue to look out for one another. Not one dispenser has fallen victim to the illness as of yet, which they would tell you was due to their strong collective will. However, most would say it is due to a lack of immune systems, internal organs, and anything that could actually become infected. Also, they're filled to the brim with hand sanitizer.
"Just keep on truckin', that's our motto," said the dispenser teetering on the first floor of the Sci-Li. "The machine right outside of the Gate suggested we go with 'Yes We Can,' but I'm not really a political guy, so I didn't really get it until somebody explained it to me. I dug the simple truck line. If that's not our official motto, I don't really care. I'm gonna keep saying it anyway."
