Posted July 20, 2008

One reason the labels on foods are so complicated and boring is that, every year, fewer authors are choosing food labels as their genre.

In my opinion, the blame for this rests solely with the big supermarkets, whose labeling antics have left the consumer with a bad taste in her mouth, not unlike what one experiences when gargling with warm margarine.

I'm thinking specifically of the time when the supermarkets removed price stickers and replaced them with bar codes. The price is in there somewhere, but it is impossible to find without crossing your eyes, staring deep into the vertical lines and possibly winding up in a trance right in front of the Mallomars.

Absent a continuing supply of fresh talent that can turn the phrase "Sugar: 8g" into "Experience a sugar rush the size of 'Lord of the Rings,'" the number of food labels that will go unread in a typical year will soon achieve the level of a national disgrace. If all those unread food labels were, instead, read by children, the level of literacy in this country would rise ten thousand percent. If our future business and political leaders sat around dropping phrases such as "Ho, ho, that's rich in thiamine and vitamin B1," "my old man's hydrogenated palm and/or palm oil can beat your old man's hydrogenated palm and/or palm oil" or "you are so kosher for Passover" in their conversations, imagine what that would do for our confidence for the future of this country.

Not long ago, Hannaford Bros., a supermarket chain in our great northeast, raised the specter of resurgence in the field when it announced it would develop its own food labeling system. However, Hannaford apparently raised the specter on television and video games, because the little tyke turned out to be a disappointment to the literary family.

Shocking as it seems, Hannaford has forsaken the descriptive power of a language that, for the most part, was good enough for Shakespeare, to embrace the language of the film reviewer. Based on such things as calories, fats, sugar and the like, Hannaford now assigns one, two or three stars to the items on its shelves.

(Caution: It is important to keep the two star systems separate. Films that are turkeys get one star, but Hannaford turkeys get three stars. This could lead to some very strange viewing choices not to mention, under certain circumstances, permanent damage to your DVD player.)

Perhaps young authors think they are making some sort of protest statement by shunning food labels but, as youth is prone to do, it simply shot itself in the foot (guaranteeing, somewhat, a continuation of their prone position for at least six weeks). Unable to find writers willing to take on the challenge of wringing the wit out of "two stars," Hannaford turned the task of assigning stars over to a computer and to a team scientists who programmed it.

At first, these scientists, who, taken together, had over 300 letters after their names, sat in a room in New England, puffing on their pipes, sampling food and intoning important scientific things such as, "Too much sugar," "Too much salt," and "Too much rum and maple" (the latter was coughed more than intoned). At this point everyone put out his pipe and someone opened a window.

Then the scientists got down to business, as indicated by these entries in their recently-discovered laboratory notebook, which I have excerpted below.

Day 1: Scientists read the labels of 10,000 food items and recorded the sugar, salt, cholesterol and carbohydrate content of each item. Three scientists mistakenly read a bar code and all attempts to wake them proved futile.

Day 2: Scientists entered their program into the computer.

Day 3: Scientists waited anxiously for the results. One scientist, a bit too anxious, ate a box of Fruit Loops and wound up running faster than the computer.

Day 4: Scientists get their first results. Foods that are good for you, like meat, poultry, seafood, dairy and nuts also contain fat, oils and cholesterol and thus get zero stars. One scientist argues passionately that these foods really aren't good for you, citing research that can be summarized as "The computer wouldn't lie."

Day 5: Scientists return to the drawing board only to discover that, despite their Ivy League educations, none of them can draw.

Day 6: Drawing boards are replaced with desks.

Day 7: Scientists revise the program so that meat, poultry, seafood, dairy and nuts get 3 stars. They do this by applying the same technique used in middle school to solve problems such as "When was the War of 1812?" (Answer: Thursday.)

Day 8: Scientists discover that Cheez Whiz, Crisco and motor oil now also get 3 stars.

Day 9: Scientists revise the program again so meat, poultry, seafood, dairy and nuts get 3 stars "just because." Scientists defend their results by pointing out that now Cheez Whiz, Crisco and motor oil only get 2 stars.

Day 10: Hackers from Kraft break into the computer. Cheez Whiz now gets top rating on "American Idol."

Day 11: Scientists smuggle an 18-month-old toddler into the lab and measure how far she flings different foods from her high chair. Foods thrown the furthest got 3 stars. Meat, poultry, seafood, dairy and nuts no longer need a special exemption.

Days 12-191: No entries as scientists sit on their results for six months because no one ever won a Nobel Prize for solving a scientific problem in a week and a half. Not to mention they were paid a per diem.

Day 192: Scientists release their findings and set their sights on tackling new problems, like a bathroom hand drier that runs long enough to dry your hands.

Despite finding myself in the grip of nostalgia, the only advice I can offer a young author is to avoid food labels like the plague (as well as those food labels that seem nothing like the plague). There's no future in it anymore. Best to stick to something up and coming. Perhaps something computer related. See what you can do with "Missing or invalid object at line 9."

Maybe something like, "Sorry. I can't find what I need. Perhaps I left it at Frodo's house."

©2008 Jay Douglas