Somewhat articulate

A letter I wrote to Ben & Jerry’s today

Dear Ben or Jerry (either one will do),

I was actually hoping to get the “thank you” department but all I saw was a complaint box.  I recently purchased a pint of Chunky Monkey ice cream in all of its banana-ee goodness.  About 2/3 of it was delicious.  As I sat in front of the TV, crying as I watched Oprah give away a Ford Fusion to a poor immigrant family whose father was dying of cancer he couldn’t treat since they don’t have any insurance, my blissful mouth shoveling came to an unexpected halt.  At the bottom of the container was a total absence of ice cream.  It seemed that an air pocket got in the way of the machine filling up the container to its full pint limit.

 I was actually hoping that either you, Ben or you, Jerry could have a polite watercooler conversation with the poor lever-puller who fills up the pint containers with 2/3 of a pint of actual ice cream.  He might be having a bad day.  He might not have finished his 2 year Associates Degree in lever pulling from the community college, which I hear is pretty mandatory to ensure a safe and accurate pint-filling.  Maybe he comes from a poor immigrant family whose father is dying from cancer that they can’t treat because Ben & Jerry’s (the organization, not you as individuals) doesn’t have very good health benefits.  It might be a nice little chat you can have with him before he punches the clock at the end of the day and drives home in his Ford Fusion.

So if you’re wondering what all this shower of praise is that I was referring to at the beginning of my letter, I really did want to say thank you for the 2/3 pint of ice cream.  Because I only got 2/3 of a pint, I’ve now been able to take a nice afternoon drive back to the Target I bought the ice cream from.  I first tried holding up my empty ice cream container and requesting a refill with a primal grunt.  To keep things honest, I was prepared to eat only 1/3 of the pint and then give it back to them.  When I was told that hygienically unethical to put back a 2/3 pint of ice cream back on the shelf, I went ahead and purchased another pint.  It made me feel good to stimulate this weak and fragile economy another $4 worth.  I’m sure that the severely challenged meth-addicted teenager bagging the groceries at the checkout was grateful that he had something to do with his hands as well.

So I wanted to say thank you Ben and Jerry for a lovely afternoon.  Although I spent a total of $8 in ice cream now, I’ve had a lovely afternoon.  You have given me an excuse to eat a full 1 2/3 pint of ice cream today and you also helped keep a meth-addicted teenager off the streets for an afternoon.  He’ll thank you someday when he’s on Oprah, I’m sure.

Sincerely,

James Pagel – Conroe TX