My Robot Is Pregnant theme song!

My old high school chum Sean Ahern is serving some time in Pennsylvania and I hired him to write a review of the prison food. The letter arrived yesterday, so with no further ado, take it away Sean:

“One would expect a dull, oleaginous sheen coating the inner workings of the seventy-five year old colossus of confinement that is United States Penitentiary, Lewisburg. A slow walk through the crestfallen bachelor pad of serial killer “Buffalo Bill” in “Silence of the Lambs.” A greasy stroll to the putrescent cavity in the center. The dining hall. Despite the cold harsh semi-realities mirrored in the songs of David Allen Coe, I’m here to tell ya – it’s not all that bad.

Three hots and a cot are not nearly as good as some things that rhyme, but I assure you, you’d be hard pressed to find better biscuits and gravy this side of Cuzzin’ Richies*, my friend.

They say breakfast is the most important part of the day and the day starts at 6:30 am with a variety of cold cereals, pastry and fresh fruit.

But let’s do lunch. Vegetable soup compliments a hot turkey sandwich, sides of mashed or boiled potatoes, green beans, turkey gravy and and apple sauce accompany in mouth watering delight.

Care to kick it up a notch? Bam! Try the soup du jour, pasta rotini with meat sauce, mixed vegetables and garlic bread. Perhaps a tossed salad* is something you take pleasure in. (syrup and jelly are available for you deviants.) Those eating something other than ass, this culinary delight boasts a healthy mix of lettuce, cabbage and carrots. Low calorie dressing is always an option. (for the salad)

For the hypertensive convict “heart healthy” alternatives are offered as well as no pork for Muslim fundamentalist radical jihadi terror suspects.

Did I mention the beverage bar? Take your pick from these palate pleasing options to quench your thirst – coffee, milk, cola, diet cola, root beer, lemon-lime, lemonade and fruit punch. Go ahead and drink your fill. It’s free! Sort of.

What’s not easily washed down with the many fine selections from the beverage bar is the high price of this all inclusive resort. what you won’t be getting is the fuck out here any time soon. The federal system offers no parole, chances of early release are as hollow as the center of a bagel – your choice of margarine pats or grape jelly.

The food truly isn’t bad, but then again Olive Garden has the never ending pasta bowl with free salad and bread sticks. How would you like to live there though? Put a bunk bed in the bathroom, lock the door at 10 pm…

Pasta becomes insignificant after a while and even the most comfortable of comfort foods can’t ease the pain.

The chow hall isn’t just food. Let’s talk about ambiance. The quaint personal touch of racially divided Formica topped tables supply the background for a cultural stew, while the sectioned brown plastic trays and yellow plastic utensils wrapped in napkins add a festive burst of color, appropriate for all occasions.

A cheerful beeping of scanned prison identification cards chirps as each meal is served and a jovial corrections officer announcing the block rotation over the public address system can be heard over the many conversating patrons.

The lines are long and the service is less than perfect. It’s rare to find a server without at a sourpuss as he is forced to work under the watchful eye of The Man. I’ve only experienced worse service once, when I was accosted by a post-op transsexual at an eatery called “the Friendly Toast” in Portsmouth New Hampshire. It was over a harmless sausage joke and I’d rather not talk about it – Bon Appetit!”

*The truck stop in Greenland NH

*tossed salad is prison slang for analingous