One must eat a free lunch, yes?

Lawrence Toppman

I'm going to speak to high school students about journalism this afternoon, and my reward (aside from their rapt attention) is the free box lunch from Jimmy John's that I'm eating right now: a veggie sub, a pickle, a bag of potato chips and a dilemma.

The last item is a chocolate chunk cookie. A big cookie. A cookie whose chips -- I am not making this up -- seem to be formed in the arc of a smile aimed at me. My lips say no, no, but my pleasure centers say yes, yes.

Now, like most kids raised in the late '50s and early '60s, I was taught never to throw food away. Kids were starving in Asia and would be glad to get the food at which I turned up my nose, etc., etc. (I never understood how my failure to eat lima beans would affect them.)

I suppose I could give this to a co-worker, but I earned it, dammit! Or I'm about to. Why aren't THEY making speeches to high school kids if they want giant cookies? And...er...wouldn't I be doing evil if they happened to be on diets and were tempted to eat this wagon wheel of sugar and chocolate? As I said, it's a dilemma. I'll let this sit on my desk for a while....