snaaaaacks.

I'm 100% convinced that everyone in the history of anyone has a work food fetish, with the exception of people in the sewage industry, armpit sniffers, and bovine artificial inseminators (no clue how I just came up with those...). I can only assume these people are gaunt skeletors because there's no way in hell you can have an appetite after sifting through pools of poo, let alone sniffing people's B.O. or hanging out behind a cow's ass all day. Just a thought. (But in all fairness, I admire anyone who does this kind of work--you're a better person than me.)

I digress... In my small opinion, collectively Americans' hypothalami are beginning to morph into obsessive dietary signalers, causing people to look more and more like fruit every day. Think about it... how many times a day do you see a pear walking around? I'm just waiting to see a Violet Beauregarde-esque figure rolling down the 16th Street Mall. Actually, strike that, I guarantee you'd never see something like that in Denver... but maybe, just mayyyybe in the South... aaaaand I just decided to move to Alabama.

So this brings me back to my original point: food at work. Literally every day since late winter, there has been a box of Girl Scout cookies in the kitchenette on my floor. I'm definitely not complaining about this because whoever invented the Girl Scout cookie phenomenon deserves a hug for his or her brilliant marketing scheme. These adorable little girls come to your doorstep wearing green vests and pigtails during the dead of late winter, which is undeniably the most depressing time of year. Who in their right mind wouldn't buy a box? Or two, or seven... and stash them in random places throughout their homes. Not only that, but there's a certain benign association attached to GS cookies that makes them irresistible, hence my firm belief that they don't belong in the office.

In the past week, I've taken note of every type of food that has graced the kitchen (don't judge): GS cookies, M&Ms/cashew mix, petit fours, breakfast burritos, Chunky (gross) Nestle bars, an entire ice cream cake, every type of mini candy bar imaginable, an apple, macaroons, more cookies, Jamba Juices, muffins, two jugs of OJ and a salad that literally could feed a family of 12.

You have got to be kidding me.

This morning I walked into my cube and what was sitting on my desk? Two brownies. So after I had looked around at a few other desks to see if anyone else was left a little surprise, I realized I was the only one. I would have been flattered with the exception that I prefer tulips to brownies. So I shoved them to the side, secretly bitter that someone in my department thinks that just because I'm the baby of the company means I eat like a child with an uncontrollable sweet tooth (God they already know me too well...). So about an hour later, my colleague came over to announce that there were burritos in the Food Cube. (Yeah, I didn't mention that part; we have an entire cube reserved for food. I should probably point out that for about my first 5 weeks of working there, I was too shy to actually go into the FC just in case someone walked by and saw me mowin down on some chips and guac. Unfortunately that little charade didn't last as I was slowly peer pressured into hanging out in the FC.) Then a few hours after the burrito announcement, I came back to my desk and what's sitting there? Oh, just a cookie from Paradise Bakery. Um. When it comes to Paradise cookies, I have the self control of a chubby 14-year-old girl (shaped like a muffin) whose best friends include Ben, Jerry, and Little Debbie.

The thing that's so funny to me about work food is that in all reality, it's pretty disgusting. There's always someone who will bring in a leftover that will be gone in under an hour. And why? Because for some reason, a little neuron fires in people's brains that says, "If you don't eat that cold bread pudding, stale pasta salad, or a Paradise cookie, you'll nevernevernever get a chance to eat it ever again." I blame Pavlov and his stupid bell-ringing dogs. This is getting out of control.