The Bakery Delights of Hackers
Thin Mints. I have a weakness for Thin Mints. I am not sure when all of this started, but I recall Girl Scout Cookies way back in my past, back in the moldy, oldy 1970's, when huge lapels were in fashion, and people were getting acrophobia from their platform shoes.
As a small boy, I never understood while girls dressed in green were going door to door with huge colored charts and asking my mother for money. But I did know that my mother always ordered cookies, and weeks later (which, to a little kid, is like an eternity), those small, multicolored boxes would be waiting for me when I came home from school.
"I want one!" I begged, stating the obvious. I was addicted to refined sugar products as far back as I can remember. I came from a "nutritionally progressive" house that had no Kool-Aid, no sodas, no sugared cereals, and no butter, salt, ketchup, or any other "bad food." So naturally, when I could get sugar, I was like a riot-crazed Aborigine to make sure I was in on the feeding frenzy. I knew why the cookie monster ate so quickly. He must have had my father. To this day, I have this fear of... well, my father stealing the supply. Often, he would purloin whole boxes, and then blame me when my mother knew very well I didn't, because I wasn't the one with a bad tummy-ache. Why such a "4-4-3-2 Step" house allowing Girl Scout Cookies, you ask? It wasn't because my mother was really indulging herself in the latest nutritional fad passed out by the USDA, but she was a gourmet cook, and you know how they feel about ketchup! My mother emphasized subtlety of taste and texture, while I, a typical kid, wanted stubborn flavors that were stronger than burning flames and as familiar as a worn out Teddy Bear. I ate the same things day in and day out, would never experiment, because I knew what I liked and I stuck with it.
This is
where those cookies came in. It was my only source of the refined sugar
I was not getting normally from my own house. I had favorites: Thin
Mints, Tagalongs, and others. But as long as the back of the box said
"Contains: ...Sugar..." or some sugar substitute like corn syrup, I
would delve into it like a greedy treasure digger, until my very eyeballs
were jittering like a lab hamster. You have to understand, I didn't
even have a Coca Cola until I was
19 years old! Sad indeed. Neighbors often felt sorry for me
until they gave me sugar, and they found out why my mother did not. I
still owe Mrs. Wickland a new Magnolia Tree.
But I digress.
Girl Scout Cookies were my first introduction to the great world of
baked goodies. Later would follow Oreos, Reeces Peanut Butter Cups,
Mountain Dew, and other things that I kind of wished I hadn't found, but
every time a little girl in a green dress comes up to me and before she utters
a word from her tired lips I say:
"Gimme some boxes of those Thin Mints!"
"Uh, okay, sir... how many?" I get from a relieved face, a face weary of explaining the concept of Girl Scout Cookie from all the new ethnic people in our neighborhoods ("No, ma'am, my daughter is not selling herself, she is selling cookies for a Girl's Club"). I also order Tagalongs, Chalet Cremes, and those lovely shortbread Trefoils. Then my wife reminds me she already ordered some, and that little girl just bilked us for two orders. She doesn't know I already knew that. Hahahaha...!
I often write my best works high on "Little Brownie Baker"
sugar
.
I can snarf a whole box of Thin Mints in a matter of minutes, eating
them like potato chips, they are that good. And still $2.50 a box,
what a steal! Recently, I have found these cookies to be a secret stash
for hackers everywhere. So next time you think that the Girl Scouts
is sexist and should be banned, remember, removing the supply of these cookies
could mean the collapse of the Internet as we know it.