Expiration Dates

In my alternative career as an unpaid, unknown, unrequested, and unwanted consumer advocate, I’ve come across many unethical practices on the part of big business – soap dispensers whose pumps don’t reach the bottom of the bottle, boxes big enough to bury a human scarcely filled with product – and like everyone else I’ve gone along with these sham practices. But not this time.

This time, I have to speak up. I can no longer remain silent about the ubiquitous practice of branding product hides with dates that indicate the termination of their lifespan. Of course, I’m talking about the use of expiration dates. We come across them all the time on food and other items. Everything from milk to medicine, cookies to candy bars, yogurt to Yodels ™ has at least the year and month stamped on its package. This unscrupulous practice has to end.

Doing my part to fight this conspiracy, I’ve decided to break rank and do something radical: from this point on, I’m going to ignore these dates. So what if that bottle of Pepto-Bismol ™ is five years old and looks more gray than pink? Shake it up and slug it down. That milk with the funky smell? Pour it in a cuppa’ Joe and you’ll never notice the difference. The cheese with the mold? Cut around it. And those Yodels ™? Store them in your fallout shelter and wait for the end of the world. You’ll be fine.

Why do they do it? The only conclusion I can draw is this: it’s all one big scam. Forget the One World Government and the New World Order; expiration dates on a chocolate bar are the biggest conspiracy we face. The question of who killed JFK is nothing compared to the question of who’s terminating the life expectancy of our poor, defenseless cookies and cakes.

You do what you like. As for me, I’m going to eat a year-old Yodel ™ Want a bite?