Embrace the Thin Mint?

Dear Blog Reader;

I hope this finds you doing well. I am fine. The weather broke for a week. I rode 106 miles outside. There were no potholes. The assassin deer mommas have just passed the half-way point in their pregnancy. They have had the ultrasound done and have posted the instagram on Antlerbook. The yearlings are turning bitter that mom doesn’t pay attention to them any more. Their fathers have been distant at best, absent at worst.

These situations all produce the perfect recipe for fostering another generation of ruthless killers. I was reading my biking magazine yesterday. They were providing the results of a reader survey. One of the questions was “what are the animals that you’ve collided (or had near-misses) with on the  roll."  I provide you with the results. I do have a couple of problems with their methodology. Surely dog encounters are very common. Yet, they are not mentioned. Also, should squirrels even be mentioned? You would barely even notice the bump or thump or whatever if you hit a squirrel. They are little better than wooly worms which I will crush with ruthless abandon next October in repayment for the winter they predicted this year. As the graph clearly shows, the assassin deer are tops in frequency and lethality. Those antlers aren’t for show Gertrude.

Yesterday was a momentous day. I finally reached the nexus of $4 in my pocket while in the presence of a Girl Scout in February. I suppose that I shouldn’t try to eat my way to a better outlook on life. But there you go. It has served me well for 51 years. No need to stop now. I do feel comforted with a sleeve of Thin Mints; two sleeves in a box, 16 disks in a sleeve; thirty-two disks of melt in your mouth, minty, chocolaty goodness. Thirty-two disks waiting to be dunked in a glass of milk and savored. The way that they are packaged just perfectly, one can tear the closed end; cup your hand at the end, lift the other end. The Thin Mints will all topple over and pour out straight, like a world record attempt of domino toppling. No plastic grabbing a disk edge, no secondary ripping of the package, they pour gently out into the palm of your hand four at a time; the perfect dipping number.

I wonder if Girl Scout cookies vie for not being in the box to be frozen or even worse forgotten in the freezer. It certainly would never happen to a box of Thin Mints but the Cranberry Citrus Crisps have to be a bit worried. The Thanks-A-Lot screams of youthful angst; “thanks a lot for buying me and then shoving me in the freezer while you eat your favorite Thin Mints. As time goes on and you go looking for another bag of raspberries, tomatoes, or green beans, I keep being shifted back and forth sinking slowly to the bottom of the freezer. Now, I find myself under the ham. That’s right I will slide past my eat by date under the ass of a pig. Thanks-A-Lot.” That never happens to the beloved Thin Mint.

I have often had a hate-hate relationship with youth fund raisers. I have often felt that it was little better than exploitation. What do you do if you have a million rolls of wrapping paper, 10,000,000 light bulbs, a gazillion pounds of pop corn? How will you get rid of them while keeping sales costs low? I know let the children pawn this stuff on their parents, relatives, and parent’s coworkers. Give a little to the organization and overcharge for the actual value of the product. I cringe at the thought of eating $5 popcorn. The thought of wrapping 2 presents with a roll of $5 wrapping paper makes me nearly homicidal. I have found a remedy for this conundrum though. “Do you want to buy some popcorn, Mister?” “No kid, here’s $5 now go find someone else to bully.” This way the organization receives funds to continue their good works and I don’t have to gag on $5 popcorn. If I wanted to spend $5 for cold popcorn, I would go to the movies.

I don’t have these irrational reactions with the Girl Scouts. I gladly seek them out. I look forward to going to the store in February. If the lovely Miss Beverly needs some vanilla for a pie, I gladly volunteer. I go to the drawer where I keep my $4 bills and happily drive 10 miles for the opportunity to buy the minty, chocolaty goodness.

Yesterday, I had the most delightful encounter. The Girl Scout in question had been at this for a while. No Crayola, or sharpie decorated poster board for her. She was a seasoned veteran of the Thin Mint crusades. Her sign was about 4 ft high with l.e.d. lights drawing the panicked buyer’s attention. I say panicked because she wasn’t in the front of the store where I had expected her. I had even stopped by the bank on the way to the grocery store to make sure that I had my supply of $4 bills. I walked in ready to embrace the cookie and there were none to be found. Crud! What do I do? Do I go on home and tell the lovely Miss Beverly that they were out of milk or that I forgot to go to the store to get milk; then “volunteer” to go back in a couple of hours?

I decided to be a grown up, get the milk, and hide the cereal when I got home so that I would have to come back in the afternoon. I paid for my milk and headed for the door when the l.e.d. cookie light caught my eye. Thank you Jesus, thank you, thank you Jesus! “I’ll take two boxes please.” After some good natured ribbing from a neighbor about how far I would have to ride to work those off, the Girl Scout and I had a wonderful conversation about her father’s practicing for the Boston Marathon, about bike riding and my goal of Ride Across INdiana in July; and how far her father and I were from reaching those goals with the winter we had had.

That’s right Girl Scout cookies now. Crocuses and snow drops pop up in a week or two. Tulips and daffodils are just around the corner. They will come. I just need to enjoy Thin Mints now.

Take care,

Roger