Nature's Goodness in Plastic Wrap

I’ve never considered myself nutritionally deficient.

Until today.

I don’t eat breakfast per se, but rather, I keep a store of breakfast type foods in my bottom drawer at work. The building blocks of my nutritional day usually start with Pop Tarts, and are then supplemented by Nutri Grain bars, Toaster Pastries, or any other individually packaged, easily chewable, yet never-go-stale breakfast type bars.

But this morning, and thus the impetus for my article today, I forgot to bring my Pop Tarts from home, and this has thrown my whole morning breakfasting ritual into a chaotic tumble, the likes of which haven’t been seen since the Palamino tumbled in, through and beyond Disney’s The Black Hole (bonus points if you can name the other ship and it’s mythological significance).

We’re talking a cataclysm of Biblical proportions here.

Fortunately, the vending machine has always been able to supply me with my much needed strawberry or blueberry artificially flavored fix. For a measly buck, a single saw back, uno denero, por favor, I can have my pick of Pop Tarts.

But not this morning.

“Umm, Mister, are you ok?”

Freshman are so cute and innocent.

They don’t understand the cruel pain the world can deal out to you. The heart-breaking, soul cracking, mind-numbing ache that comes with being led on by promises of good fortune and happy tummies.

“Gragggle-fraggle,” I replied, and continued to pound my forehead against the Plexiglas of the vending machine, which gave a little in mockery and then applied Newton’s Third Law against my cranium.

I was forced to purchase some of Grandma’s Homestyle Cookies. I hate these things. Even though they have a picture of what appears to be a kind, elderly-faced, grandma-esque woman, I think she’s actually using her evil and arcane powers to deceive us.

These cookies aren’t like grandma’s, they aren’t even like ma’s.

Stale, lifeless and bored is more apt.

These cookies act like sponges sucking not only the water from your body, but your spirit and your will to live in the bargain. I called the Frito Lay company, who apparently are hiding the Grandma/witch from the public eye.

“Sir, there is no such person here. Please don’t call again.”

“I just want to know what evil spells she places on her cookies to make them the bane of humanity.”

“Sir, there is no “Grandma”. It’s just an advertising gimmick.”

“Back, Spawn of Melkor. Back to the pit from which you came.”

“Sir, we’re calling the police . . .”

Apparently the title “customer service” doesn’t always convey the responsibility of the position.

Thus, this morning, I was reduced like a commoner to my freeze-dried package of Grandma’s-inappropriately-and-misleadingly-named Cookies, and began to munch. The nutritional information was hardly reassuring, as the cookies contain more calories and fat then I generally see in a year.

Well, more than the average person sees in a year.

I tend to view food as a matter of quality and quantity: Quantity is quality and quality is quantity.

Especially when it comes to Mother Nature’s recipe for goodness that was handed down from generation to generation until Dr. John Harvey Kellogg founded his company in that Paradise-on-Earth, Battlecreek, Michigan and the first Pop Tart rolled off the assembly line to a blaze of fan fare.

“Sir, we’re not interested in campaigning to have Dr. Kellogg canonized as a saint. He was a Seventh-Day Adventist. Now please stop calling.”

“Not until every American is aware of the sanctity of the Pop Tart. Not until there is a Pop Tart in every kitchen from sea to shining sea. Not until . . .”

“Sir, we’re calling the police.”