Jul | 2016 | Head In A Blender

I recently bought a packet of Red Vines.

For the uninitiated (or ‘not American’) among you, these are what Red Vines look like:

I think they’re supposed to be cherry or strawberry flavoured (flavored) chewy sweets.

I have begun referring to them as ‘Plastic flavoured chewy plastic sticks’.

Now, for clarity, these aren’t to be confused with Twizzlers which look like this:

I call these ones ‘Chewy plastic flavoured plastic sticks’.

Anyway, today’s post isn’t about the variety and quality – or lack thereof – of American sweets (candy).

No, today’s post is about this:

I’m sorry, what?

How does this make any sense? Why not display the calories per bag, per half bag or (if common sense were even a factor in any way, shape or form) per stick??

I think the purpose of this laughable piece of information is to confuse, bewilder and appear somehow less calorific to the calorie-conscious of us pushing these into our faces like a log into a chipper..

By the way, it’s a total of 490 calories…in case you were wondering.

Surely it would just make more sense to display it as 123 calories per serving, with 4 servings per package?

But no; that would be too easy. Some dipshit thought 3.5 servings was the best way forward.

Then again, maybe it’s a smart move on the part of the government.

Maybe it’s a subtle attempt to increase the brainpower of the average American by surreptitiously posing mathematical equations on their junk food in a bid to sharpen their minds while they soften their waistlines.

…

Nah.

I’m currently sat in the waiting room of the physical therapy clinic whilst my wife undergoes another session following her double ACL knee surgery a few weeks back.

Whew, that was a long sentence.

Anyway, I’m sat here reading crap on my phone (as usual) when I felt the prescence of someone sit down three seats to my left.

A miniscule fraction of a nanosecond passed before I heard a southern American drawl aimed in my general direction.

“That’s a lot of tattoos”

I chose to pretend I hadn’t heard her and kept reading whatever bollocks I was reading on my phone, knowing full well she was talking to me.

How do I know? Well, because:

A) I have two full tattoo sleeves, and

B) I’m the only other person here.

I could feel her looking at me awaiting some sort of response, like a gormless child waiting for a firework display to begin; slack jawed and unblinking.

The act of ignoring someone does not come as easy to me as many would think, so I succumbed to literal peer pressure and looked up at her old, heavily tanned, heavily cheekboned (due to one surgical procedure too many) face.

I gave her a fake smile.

“A lot of tattoos huh?” she pointlessly asked, in case I hadn’t caught the gist of her last unwelcomed comment.

For a second I toyed with the cliché response of “Oh shit, where the fuck did THEY come from??”, but instead I lifted one arm, admired it for a moment and chuckled a friendly(ish) reply:

“Yeah. And a lot of pain too.”

That should be enough to end this unwanted conversation, I thought.

Wrong.

“Wow, gee whizz”, she continued with me now back to my phone, attempting to re-ignore her.

She then paused for a few seconds to, I assume, scan all my artwork.

Then she let out an audible shudder.

Have you ever heard someone audibly shudder?

What kind of reaction is that?

It’s impossible to describe the sound with the written word, but it was like she had spiders suddenly running up and down her sinewy but saggy, slightly hunched, leathery body.

Silent shudder.