This Samurai was made with slightly less than the daily paycheck of a Walmart employee: just three dollars. His skeleton is wire, his flesh is newspaper, his clothes are napkins, his armor is plastic utensils, and his blood is onion juice.
From the moment I heard that the project had to be made by amassing a large amount of cheap materials I knew it was my destiny to steal the school cafeteria's utensils. I hatched an elaborate plan to swipe 100-300 utensils over the span of two weeks. The ultimate result would be roughly twelve dollars worth of eating tool-shaped petroleum byproducts (and napkins) falling into my clutches, and at no cost to me due to my thievery.
One thing stood in my way: in the cafeteria, the cart of utensils stands approximately fifteen feet from where three school administrators sit to observe the entire cafeteria for the length of the period. What's worse is that Mr. Stone, the school resource officer (in other words, the cop who was lucky enough to be stationed in a high school) often stands near them, chatting and making sure nobody is spiking their cheeseburgers with tobacco or something. And as amusing it would probably be to see officer Stone's expression when he realizes that I was not smuggling narcotics, but plastic utensils, "utensil trafficker" is still not something I want even a remote chance of appearing on my record, so I waited until he went off to patrol the courtyard to strike.
I departed from my lunch table and sashayed on over to the utensil cart. I gave a shady glance in either direction, and stuffed a handful of assorted utensils under my jacket. Making sure that the utensil-carrying side was facing away from the administrators, I shuffled back to my table, presented the loot to my peers, and assessed what amount of what type of each utensil I had retrieved. I would do this maneuver 2-4 times per lunch period, and at the end of the period would fill my pockets with utensils and retreat to art class, where I stashed my daily payloads.
This went exceedingly well pretty much every day. Half way through the first week I realized a new feature in the utensil cart: instead of having eight cups for forks, one for spoons, and one for knives (as usual), it had seven cups for forks, one for spoons, and two cups for knives. I was thrilled, because I was not collecting an adequate amount of knives in relation to other utensils; but then it dawned on me that this was entirely in response to my actions. On the preceding days, I had stolen almost all of the knives. I realized that this left the second lunch period with no knives. A godlike power overcame me: I held the supply of utensils to hundreds of students in the palm of my hands (or in my pockets, as the case may be). Naturally, I abused this power to the best of my ability. On one particular day, I remember there being five cups for forks, two for spoons, and three for knives. It was a sad day for fork enthusiasts, but a happy day for me.
The second week was a bit tougher. I noticed that the administrators that sat across from the cart were paying closer attention to people retrieving utensils. I stepped up my game, got sneakier, took more trips of less payload. The major fault in my plan was that my lunch table was one of the closest to the utensil cart. I thought this would be to my advantage, but it meant that I also sat closer to the gaze of the administrators. If they looked closely, they could have seen me assessing my spoils. Early in the week, I noticed them suspiciously glancing at me more often than usual. I pushed on until one of them was practically staring at me at all times. It was at this point that I had to secure my haul through sending my comrades in utensil thievery to plunder the cart.
At the end of the operation, I found myself with several hundred utensils of all shapes and sizes cleverly disguised in an ice cream tub but no idea what to use them for. It was at this point that I questioned why I even engaged in this whole enterprise. I racked my brain for things to make with plastic utensils. "Samurais are cool," is what I though at my moment of greatest inspiration, and thus I begat this Samurai.
Several sticks of hot glue and minor burns to my fingers later, the world laid its eyes on the finest utensil-napkin-newspaper samurai it had ever seen.
From the moment I heard that the project had to be made by amassing a large amount of cheap materials I knew it was my destiny to steal the school cafeteria's utensils. I hatched an elaborate plan to swipe 100-300 utensils over the span of two weeks. The ultimate result would be roughly twelve dollars worth of eating tool-shaped petroleum byproducts (and napkins) falling into my clutches, and at no cost to me due to my thievery.
One thing stood in my way: in the cafeteria, the cart of utensils stands approximately fifteen feet from where three school administrators sit to observe the entire cafeteria for the length of the period. What's worse is that Mr. Stone, the school resource officer (in other words, the cop who was lucky enough to be stationed in a high school) often stands near them, chatting and making sure nobody is spiking their cheeseburgers with tobacco or something. And as amusing it would probably be to see officer Stone's expression when he realizes that I was not smuggling narcotics, but plastic utensils, "utensil trafficker" is still not something I want even a remote chance of appearing on my record, so I waited until he went off to patrol the courtyard to strike.
I departed from my lunch table and sashayed on over to the utensil cart. I gave a shady glance in either direction, and stuffed a handful of assorted utensils under my jacket. Making sure that the utensil-carrying side was facing away from the administrators, I shuffled back to my table, presented the loot to my peers, and assessed what amount of what type of each utensil I had retrieved. I would do this maneuver 2-4 times per lunch period, and at the end of the period would fill my pockets with utensils and retreat to art class, where I stashed my daily payloads.
This went exceedingly well pretty much every day. Half way through the first week I realized a new feature in the utensil cart: instead of having eight cups for forks, one for spoons, and one for knives (as usual), it had seven cups for forks, one for spoons, and two cups for knives. I was thrilled, because I was not collecting an adequate amount of knives in relation to other utensils; but then it dawned on me that this was entirely in response to my actions. On the preceding days, I had stolen almost all of the knives. I realized that this left the second lunch period with no knives. A godlike power overcame me: I held the supply of utensils to hundreds of students in the palm of my hands (or in my pockets, as the case may be). Naturally, I abused this power to the best of my ability. On one particular day, I remember there being five cups for forks, two for spoons, and three for knives. It was a sad day for fork enthusiasts, but a happy day for me.
The second week was a bit tougher. I noticed that the administrators that sat across from the cart were paying closer attention to people retrieving utensils. I stepped up my game, got sneakier, took more trips of less payload. The major fault in my plan was that my lunch table was one of the closest to the utensil cart. I thought this would be to my advantage, but it meant that I also sat closer to the gaze of the administrators. If they looked closely, they could have seen me assessing my spoils. Early in the week, I noticed them suspiciously glancing at me more often than usual. I pushed on until one of them was practically staring at me at all times. It was at this point that I had to secure my haul through sending my comrades in utensil thievery to plunder the cart.
At the end of the operation, I found myself with several hundred utensils of all shapes and sizes cleverly disguised in an ice cream tub but no idea what to use them for. It was at this point that I questioned why I even engaged in this whole enterprise. I racked my brain for things to make with plastic utensils. "Samurais are cool," is what I though at my moment of greatest inspiration, and thus I begat this Samurai.
Several sticks of hot glue and minor burns to my fingers later, the world laid its eyes on the finest utensil-napkin-newspaper samurai it had ever seen.