The weasely little corn-rowed guy with the mop and the yellow plastic "Wet Floor" sign always seemed to want to swab the deck around my table while I was trying to enjoy my daily late-afternoon Flame-Broiled Double Whopper® with Medium Fries and Large Coke®. I’m all for cleanliness and industrial hygiene, but this did dampen my appreciation of the ambiance just a bit. Thank God the food was so good. I mean, who cares about a little gastro-esophageal reflux, a little intestinal gas, a little weasely corn-rowed guy with a mop and an attitude, when you can look forward, every day, to a delicious, nutritious, succulent Flame-Broiled Double Whopper® with Medium Fries and Large Coke®? Lord knows, I didn’t always dine so handsomely. I used to eat a lot of junk, I’m sorry to say – oatmeal, bran muffins, leafy green vegetables, fruit, chicken, fish. Garbage like that. Just remembering it makes my stomach queasy. My favorite meal in those days consisted of wood chips, fat-free dried celery and diet water. I kept a framed picture of the Official Food Guide Pyramid® taped to the ceiling over my bed, so I’d be sure to see it last thing before lights-out at night and first thing at reveille in the morning. I just knew that, by sticking faithfully to the Gospel According to Today's Current Food-Crank Fad, I stood a good chance of adding a month or two to the life of my carcass – assuming I didn’t get mixed up in a nuclear war or a collision with an eighteen-wheeler.
I know, I know. I was misguided. I bought into all the stuff the Nutri-Nazis were ramming – literally – down our throats. All that stuff about how a little dab of real mayonnaise would make your coronary arteries clog up like a sink drain full of cat hair. Respectable citizens shunned people who abused their bodies this way, and cast them into outer darkness (with weeping and gnashing of teeth – can you blame them?) for even UTTERING the phrase "red meat." Doctors insisted the words alone were carcinogenic.
