A junk food junkie’s lament: how the salty potato chip is the crunchy snack that’s too hard to resist
- Few can resist a big bag of potato chips, Andrew Sun will have you believe, and once you start, you cannot stop
- Would Einstein have been able to focus on relativity if he had a desk drawer full of Doritos and Calbee?
There are many evil things on this earth. One of them is potato chips! If Satan in his utter malevolence wanted a foolproof lure for our souls, he couldn’t find better temptation than a big bag of salty chips.
Few can resist them. And once you start, you cannot stop. Some people may claim, “Oh, I can stop whenever I want,” but even as they say those words, another family-sized bag of Lay’s sour cream and onion has been tragically abused and destroyed.
When you sober up, the evidence is everywhere. There are crumbs on your couch and clothes, and your sticky fingers are shamefully covered with flavouring powders. A look in the mirror clearly shows what you’ve been up to. Can someone look for the Munchies Anonymous hotline?
Over-snacking is one of those First World problems that humans never had to deal with before the modern age. Before the mid-20th century, just finding enough to eat was the worry. Between-meal nibbles wasn’t an option for most people.
Leonardo di Vinci wasn’t distracted from inventing by thoughts of a tasty can of Pringles. Einstein could focus on relativity because he didn’t have a desk drawer full of Doritos and Calbee. Society’s productivity loses when cookies, chocolate and chips invade the office pantry.
Our modern abundance not only made snacking a daily luxury, this new excess gave rise to a need for gyms, yoga class and Spanx.
