The Donut Incident

In response to the Donut Incident (Item #16) on my 25 Random Things post, Michele says she once ate an entire package of 25 Peeps so she wouldn't have to share them when she got home. She then guessed that, contrary to her, I "probably didn't eat the donuts out of selfishness."

Well...

I was 15 years old at the time. Mom and I were at the grocery store without the rest of the family, which almost never happened.

We had just rounded the corner from the produce aisle, and there they were: mini-donuts!

Not the little packages of five pathetic minis--these were the Super-Ultra-Mega-Bags, the huge bags that you could only find in a "bulk" store (like Sam's Club or Costco) these days: forty or fifty miniature ovals of plastic-chocolate-goodness calling out to me!

I asked Mom if we could buy them. The request was pretty innocuous, probably something like "Mom, can I please have these?"

What she HEARD, however, was more along the lines of, "Mom, can I please have these, so I can take them home and share them with my seven siblings? I know how much everyone likes them, and nothing fills me with more delight than bringing a smile to someone's face. Even if I don't get a crumb myself, I won't mind. It would be enough to know that everyone else did. Please, Mom? Wouldn't you like to help me bring a bright ray of hope into our home today?"

She looked at me, eyes glistening with maternal pride, and said, "Of course, honey."

Unfortunately, what she heard was nothing like what I actually MEANT. There really is no way to put my intentions into words, except to say that my thoughts began with "Mwa ha ha ha ha ha ha...." and, had the Villainous Dance of Villainy been invented at that time, I certainly would have been doing it right there at the end of Aisle 2.

Because, the truth is, my intentions had nothing whatsoever to do with sharing. The moment that "Of course" fell like grace from her lips, I was scheming. I was thinking only of ME. I probably could not have told you, at that moment, whether I had any siblings at all. I think I ate 3 or 4 donuts between the time we paid for them and when they were loaded into the back of the van. I then jumped into my seat and began plotting when/how I would consume the rest of them. That is when the awareness of siblings flooded back into my mind: the piranha that were waiting to get their grubby teeth on MY donuts! I spent the entire drive home devising a fool-proof way to get the donuts up to my room without anyone seeing them.

The brilliant plan: stuff the bag into my shirt and RUN.

It worked beautifully. Moments after our arrival, I had the entire bag (minus a few more tasty morsels) stashed under my bed. Every 20 minutes or so, I would return and furtively cram a few more donuts into my mouth, quickly chew them up in my closet, and sneak out of the room before anyone's suspicion was aroused.

It was heavenly!

One of the best evenings of my entire life!

But not one of the best NIGHTS. No, no, no. By bedtime, I had finished off three-quarters of the bag--probably three or four dozen of the little Discs of Despair.

I spent the next few hours learning what the human body does when its convinced it's been poisoned. I've only been THAT sick one other time: after brain surgery. Significantly, though, THAT shockingly-similar bout of nonstop vomiting was induced by a combination of (1) having been pumped full of general anesthesia and (2) having just had one of my balance nerves severed, so that even slight movement felt like riding ocean swells.

The fact that I duplicated that experience without medication or self-mutilation is rather sobering to me. Don't they test these things on animals before they sell them to humans???

So no, Michele, I'm afraid my motives were no more noble than yours were. And I'm glad to hear that you've consequently warned your children about the dangers of gluttony!

I just wish you had warned ME in time!

MOJ