MODERN PACKAGING
By Johnny Bob
John Alm
I’ve promised myself a hundred times during the last couple of decades that I would equip my kitchen with a chopping block and sharp and heavy hatchet to be used defeating modern packaging. I believe I would very much prefer cleaning up any collateral mess made with my hatchet,, to battling modern, easy-to-open, resealable, hassle-free, and (This one’s laughable.) miracle packaging! The stuff doesn’t work. My family has learned to give me wide berth when I’m opening a package. “Kids!” my wife will desperately scream, “Get your safety glasses and your ear plugs. Pseudo’s gonna try to open the corn flakes!” Before I’m through,,,,,, chunks of cardboard coated in hot glue residue will be scattered about the kitchen. There may be broken glasses. Chunks of my flesh will be stuck to some of the corners of my cabinets. Bloody,, soaked in perspiration,, and hoarse from shouting obscenities,,,,,, I will be quietly pleased,, having defeated the cardboard box. (I do not believe in celebration dancing,, and will address that subject soon.)
Then,,,,,, as I tell my kids while on a road trip when asked if we’re almost there,,,,,, “We’re almost half way there!”
Inside the box will be a plastic bag full of cereal,, conveying its message silently, motionlessly, insidiously, “Good work Spasmo! If you want the goods,,, you’re gonna have to elevate your game.”
First I try the intellectual approach. (You and I both know by now [unless,, of course,, you haven’t been reading along,,,,,, You may have randomly opened to this page.] that I am ill-equipped intellectually.) I go all surgical,, brandishing my dollar store cheaters to increase resolution. (This is a move the insidious bag could never have anticipated.) I’m confident I’ve gained critical advantage. I probe the welded plastic seams in search of a weak spot or at least a spot where I might find enough excess plastic to get a firm grip.
“Give it up Poindexter!” the bag silently jeers. “You and I and anybody bored enough to have read this much of your drivel know full well that you are about to go Neanderthal!”
I begin tugging this way and that on the bag,, testing the strength of its corners and seams. Before long,,,,,, I must look like Joel Chandler Harris’s Brer Rabbit with his hands and legs engaged in the undoing of The Tar Baby! One small benefit (It’s the only benefit that comes to mind.) of the kind of labor Mike and I daily perform is that we’ve developed uncommonly strong hands. His are thick and powerful. Mine are small but with surprising grip strength. Eventually,, the frenzied battle abruptly ends with a violent rupture in the fabric of the plastic,, punctuated by a shower of corn flakes! If there are enough unpulverized flakes left in some remaining largish portion of the bag to fill a cereal bowl,,, I’ll catch my breath, eyeball the bag scraps (I’ll tell them they don’t look so tough to me.), grab a bowl, and pore.
I’ll grab a milk carton from the ‘fridge’. This has actually happened to me several times. The carton will be empty. My son, The Absent Minded Professor, will have used the last of the milk,, returning the empty to the ‘fridge’!
