The Department of Bubblegum

BLOW YOUR LUNCH!

For some reason I feel compelled to pick out ridiculous gifts for my friends Holly and Jeremy.  One of my favorite places to shop for them is at Walgreens, where I search out bizarre and useless candy items.  I once bought them a lollipop shaped like a tongue, which protruded from a plastic face bearing the likeness of a zoo animal.  The degree of protrusion could be controlled by a plastic slide.  While visiting them in Grand Rapids a couple weeks ago, I came across some hot dog bubble gum in the bargain section of a local Walgreens, marked down from $1.29 to 32¢.

Everything about it cracks me up: the fact that the text covering the "hot dogs" reads: "BLOW YOUR LUNCH!"; that it's made to look like a package of Oscar Mayer lunch meat both disgusts and delights me; and that it's made in China for the Ford Gum Machine Company, Inc. of Akron, NY simply baffles me.   Someone ordered this gum to be shipped all the way from China, where it was made with the ingredients listed on the nutrition label (plus or minus who knows what), then packed into a shipping container and transported to Akron, NY, where it was distributed to a Walgreens in Grand Rapids, MI, and marked down to 32¢.  It's notable that the price tag marking it down is no shabby affair - it didn't come shooting out of a pricing gun, it was printed using a computer and a sheet of labels, and includes the dates that the sale price is good: 09/23-10-03/23/11. 

I bought three packages, but not before accidentally dropping one that split open upon impact with the floor and sent all six pieces of fruit flavored, hot dog-shaped bubble gum into tiny shards across the aisle, prompting M to say: "I can't take you anywhere."  Fortunately, nobody else seemed to be paying attention.

When we met up with Holly and Jeremy, I gleefully dug the purchase out to show them.  "You gave that to us before," Jeremy said, "twice."

That's okay, I'll just wait until Christmas and send it to them again.

INSPECTED BY DEPT. OF BUBBLEGUM