Only In ‘Murrica
First I want to say thanks to Chris DeVoss and all the other awesome bloggers here on A Long Awkward Pause. It’s always humbling to be invited to write by others, especially when they do it so much better than you. Chris sent me my first topic: Twinkies. My reply was something like, “WTF?” but here we are, and here we go.
What can you say about Twinkies? I mean really? Even before I transitioned to my rabbit food diet, I never liked the disgusting little turd-shaped… whatever they are. The package says they’re cakes, but I’m not convinced. Also, I have a problem with putting things in my mouth bearing the description, “cream-filled.” Not that there’s anything wrong with that, just not for me.
I was suffering through my sentence in Kabul, Afghanistan, when the epic news of the demise of the Twinkie broke. I watched with morbid fascination as people cleared the shelves of the cellphane-wrapped golden shitloafs, betting that the half-life (roughly 5.2 million years) of the ‘cakes’ would ensure their eventual fortune. I bet they keep them next to their unopened Star Wars figures and Beanie Babies.
Only in America can people lose their rabbit-ass minds over the discontinuation of something that, like some elements on the Periodic Table, would never exist in nature. In fact, I suspect Twinkies are actually made of some of them. What the hell is polysorbate-60? Did the 59 previous versions fail, or were they used in the 1970’s Twinkies? Yikes. And people are freaking eating them!
Somewhere, I read that it requires 38 different ingredients to make a Twinkie. Holy chemical death, batman. I love to cook as you all well know, and I can’t even make shit with that many ingredients. I often imagine that if you ate just one Twinkie a day for your entire life, you’d completely eliminate the need for your family to embalm you when you died. That point would likely be around 26 or 27 years of age, by the way.
But wait! All hope is not lost here in ‘Murrica! After months of tense union negotiations and bankruptcy administrivia, Hostess announced they’d resurrect the Twinkie – as if you can kill one. And if that’s not awesomesauce enough for you, they’re extending the shelf life half-life of this pseudo-food. Now assembled in Canada, we have something else to thank our cold friends to the north for in addition to the Beibs.
I watched this unfold from 8,000 miles away. In my mind, I could already see the hordes in sleeping bags outside the doors of Wal-Marts and Piggly Wigglys from coast to coast, trembling with the jonesing for their chemical fix. Serenity returned to ‘Murrica, and we shifted focus to spoiled starlets, Congress boning us down, and reality TV.
Related L.A.P. posts on Twinkies:
Omawarisan on Twinkies Justin Gawal on Twinkies Monk Monkey on Twinkies Christopher De Voss on Twinkies Mike Calahan on Twinkies Chowderhead on Twinkies
Several of my friends cleared those shelves and bought tons of twinkies. Sad thing is, on ebay they were going for hundreds of dollars! It was crazy! But now I bet the twinkie exchange has tanked. I heard at one time for 2 twinkies you could get 47 euros. That’s a good deal.
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A friend told me that in Greece you could buy a whole family with just the cream filling.
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I believe it.
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I often wonder what homefront shenanigans must look like to those of you out there taking care of us. “WTF” sums that up nicely. Thank you for preserving America’s freedom to consume mass quantities of preservatives. Or something. 🙂
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You’re welcome, HC, and yes – it’s a bizarre, twisted look from the outside.
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I haven’t been hanging out with the right blog-crowd to have seen you much recently. A propos of nothing, I just want to say that your blog-name impresses the hell out of an Anglophone Canadian who knows un peu de Francais. 😉
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Watch out for Archon. He’s cranky.
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Now, don’t go prematurely influencing the lady’s mind against me! Let her get to know me a while, before she decides on the restraining order.
The cognomen is an inspired bi-lingual word play, combining social situational values with pronunciation. Well worthy of Benny Hill, at his best, but, sadly, largely wasted on American readers. 😦
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Wow.
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Reblogged this on BrainRants and commented:
Please check out “Long Awkward Pause.” The idea of Chris DeVoss, I am now associated with him and five other outstanding bloggers. Today is my inaugural post among this esteemed and talented crowd.
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I work about a block away from both a Stop & Shop and a Shoprite. You’d have thought that Jesus had come down and announced that he was actually just messing with all the Christians…the TRUE way to get into heaven was to own a box of Twinkies. Luckily, I’m not only Wiccan but vegetarian, so none of this scenario (fake or otherwise) affected me personally. (For those who don’t know, the creme filling contains copious amounts of beef fat. Yum!)
Seriously, I saw people FIGHTING over these horrid “cakes”. It was truly something to behold. All I could think was, “If this is what untold years of evolution has wrought…something, somewhere went very wrong.”
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I’m not sure the cream stuff has anything remotely originating from an animal, unless test tubes are now free-range produced too.
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Lol, can you imagine?
All I know is that last time I read the mind-boggling list of ingredients, beef fat was the 2nd or 3rd thing on there. Admittedly, this was a year ago, so maybe they made it “vegetarian” like has happened with Oreos and Skittles in the past few years.
Or they changed “beef fat” to “gelatin” to cover it up…
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It’s all pretty scary. I found a web site with the 38 ingredients… the horror.
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It’s really atrocious, isn’t it? Reading ingredients (and finding out what certain ones truly refer to) has saved me from eating so many revolting and/or non-vegetarian things. I wonder how many people either don’t care…or just don’t want to know?
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True. I self-describe as a meatatarian, but I don’t like the processed stuff either.
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Nobody rants better than you. I was laughing so hard as you described the twurdkie. Yes, only here, can something like that happen.
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Thanks, 1j1, and I think you have an untapped talent for word creation.
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Why, that was nice of you to say. Thank you for that.
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No problem.
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Give me Tim Horton’s doughnuts any day. I’m not even sure I’ve ever had a Twinkie before. I think it’s more a nostalgia thing than a taste thing anyway (or am I wrong?)
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I have no idea, but I’ve of course eaten a Twinkie and I think they’re gross.
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I couldn’t have said it better.
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Awesome! Thanks, man.
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Rants, I’m sure you already know but I’ll humor you. 😉
“According to the “Journal of National Cancer Institute,” the “Journal of Nutrition” and the FAO Nutrition Meetings Report Series, polysorbate 60 can cause detrimental reproductive effects, organ toxicity and cancer in high doses.”
http://www.ehow.com/about_6109873_polysorbate-60_.html#ixzz2b0x79WyA
I’ve never liked Twinkies, even when I was a kid. Excellent rant.
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Thanks, Neuro. This explains a lot…
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Only you could write such hilarious, yet astute observations on this topic.
Someone once said a good reason for eating all the preservative loaded “food” was the hope the preservative overload to override the own body’s shelf life and preserve it as well as the Twinkies’
Fun post
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I think they will, but only after you die. Not much fun existing forever if you’re dead.
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yeah – look at all the mummies in museums. Not much fun there.
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Talk about bondage fetishes…
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keeping that under wraps
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Okay.
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I remember eating Twinkies as a kid..I think I preferred Ding Dongs… I’m sure they are disgusting, too..and they also had a cream filled middle.
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TOTALLY agree. At least Ding Dongs had chocolate. Now, Oreos on the other hand. My baby sister will testify in court to have seen me eat an entire package of Oreos when I was 17. On a Bible.
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I believe you! I loved Oreos as a kid! Nothing better with a glass of cold milk! And I bet you were a fun older brother to have!!
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We had contests to see how many Oreos we could fit in our mouth at once. I always won. Seven.
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hahaha
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He heh.
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With your arrival, perhaps Oma should put Twinkie, the Kid, on suicide watch.
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Perhaps. What would be gained by saving Twinkie the Kid? Have to ask.
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Hey don’t knock the collection of action figures, it’s far and above the collection of a dumb, yellow “cake” that will outlive roaches when the big war breaks out. I was shocked you lumped pure Geekiness with Twinkie obsession. Just not right.
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Over the top, perhaps. We do like our Star Trek and Star Wars and Firefly stuff… guilty.
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I am the proud owner of a decent size collection of X-Men stuff, focus is mostly on Storm figures…which are rather hard to find. She has been my hero since the 1980’s. and yes I’m a Geek.
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Your Geek member club card is in the mail.
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Woot! Joyous rapture ensues…sort of. Wait how do you know where I live? *panic* >.>
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Kansas at the moment. Stalk me?
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I typically shy away from stalking men who know how to shoot a gun….well, the exception is my husband oh and maybe Brad Pitt but Angelina looks like she could kick my arse and maybe Storm’s too.
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I shoot all kinds of guns. Oh well.
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Damn sweet!
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Ha! While I don’t “hate” twinkies, I also don’t understand the madness.
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I don’t either. I mean, they’re test-tube-born “cake,” right?
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And this is why I am a Brainrants junkie.
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Holy shit, I have Me Junkies. Wow. You rock.
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Twinkies scare me. Just like tinned hotdogs
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Tinned hotdogs!?! *shudder*
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I know someone who eats those vienna sausages…just look icky to me.
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Do not want.
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It is not at all an issue that Twinkies are outsourced to Canada. Outsourcing is only bad if people don’t look so much like us.
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You’re overlooking the Bieber connection. You think they should have sourced HIM to us?
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They got away with Celine Dion and those damned geese. Of course they’re going to send that turd to us. We need to fire back. I say we lob Kardashians over the border until they come get Bieber and the geese.
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I’m with you. We’ll need the other five… her ass is big, and we should send Kanye with her.
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WAIT!!! Before you plan on launching ANY and ALL Kardashians our way, may I just remind you who invented the whole “Honey Boo Boo” asspain and the Duggars?? Yeah. WE got nothin’ compared to y’all…or you’s…or whatevah….keep the Biebs and we’ll call it even. Our geese make it back themselves….
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No, retrieve the Biebs or I launch Kim.
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Ugh…how ’bout we catapult the twinkies over…with some beer….and our famous bacon…Biebs stays where he is for now. DEAL?
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It’s ham, not bacon.
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Semantics…
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No… ham.
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You can’t see me right now, but I’m sticking my tongue out at you. Nah…
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He heh..
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Of the two, I’m pretty sure Kabul was the safer place to be, at that time.
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Possibly. I’m still unamused.
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In the event of nuclear war, there will be two survivors—cockroaches and Twinkies.
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Yes, and blowing blue Wal-Mart bags.
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Oh crap. . .I forgot about those, and how could I, when they’re in the trees, and ditches, and caught on barbed wire fences. Take me back to the good old days of the damn paper bag please.
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They’re fine as retards don’t just strew them around, you know.
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I like my Twinkies deep-fried, then smothered in awesomesauce.
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This comment is awesomesauce.
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Never have I considered Twinkies edible. I think I tried one, once, as a kid. I figure I’m set for life. And by set, I mean, preserved. I hear they deep fry them, too, along with Snickers bars. Some people’s kids…sigh. Half-life, indeed! Bravo!
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All that is true, and you’re wise to avoid it!
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People love their snacks, don’t they?
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Very much judging by the size of some of them.
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Oh yeah!
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🙂
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