It’s somewhere around midnight, and the dinner of seven o’clock is long gone, a low rumbling in its place. Glance at the boxes on the shelves of the communal food collection: Easy Mac, Cup Noodles, Grandma’s Cookies...oh, the choices. Open refrigerator, bottles of water. Nothing to eat. A few minutes pass. Open refrigerator, bottles of water. Still nothing. But you do it, too. Hoping that you had somehow missed something the first time. Or that something would just...appear.

Severe hunger leads to delirium, this I know.

Panic sets in.

And then I remember something! Oh, Fahad. Maybe it’s because deep down he’s always twelve hours ahead of us, maybe it’s because he just doesn’t sleep. In any case, he is always trying - usually unsuccessfully - to solicit company to this “Late Night Dining” at Lakeside Dining. While before I had never really paid any mind to the solicitations, I suddenly realized: if it is indeed, what it sounds like, “Late Night Dining” may just offer the right remedy for this midnight dining dilemma.

Unable to track down Fahad, I venture out to the Lakeside Dining Hall with my trusty sidekick-slash-roommate Emily.

There is a big cardboard menu in front. Quite a variety, I must say. Burgers, chicken fingers, hot wings, quesadillas, smoothies, the list goes on.

But I like hot wings, so I order hot wings. The man in charge tells me that someone came in here last night, and having tried the hot wings at every airport she has passed through, called Late Night’s hot wings “the best.”

“We’ll see,” I say. I also order a chicken quesadilla.

I am really, really hungry.

So I get my receipt and write my name on it and hand it over to one of the chefs, who make orders as they come in. Ten or so minutes later I leave with a couple of styrofoam boxes and a promise to offer my take on the famous hot wings.

Back at home, I open up my hot wing box. The room is instantly filled with hot wing smell. I take one. I bite it.

Not good. To be frank. Granted, my tastebuds are a little particular, having already been blessed by some of the greatest wings of my time — Wingnuts’ Lemon Garlic Wings (only available to the privileged few who reside in Orange County, California), BJ’s Original Hot Wings, Pizza Hut Hot Wings - but neither of my roommates fall out of their chairs, either.

Disappointed, I move on to the chicken quesadilla. Maybe there is an orange pool of greasiness at the bottom of my box, but the quesadilla is greasy goodness. A perfect blend of tortilla, cheese, chicken, and a few grilled mystery vegetables.

I am satisfied.

So while Late Night might not have the best wings on earth, they do make some pretty good quesadillas, and pretty good other things, too, I’m sure. The large menu in front contained something around 50 different dishes, plus smoothies and bubble tea, etc. etc.

I’ll get around to the others, I’m sure, next time I am hit with a midnight dining dilemma.