Special K Garbage Bars -- yet another reason to stay thin

I was a skinny kid back in my youth. I graduated high school at about 125 pounds and had managed to beef up to about 135 by the time I received my law degree a mere seven years later.

I hovered around 135 pounds until I hit my mid-30s and started to put on weight. Now, at my mid-40s, I find myself needing to lose about 40 pounds to avoid being labelled a "fat ass." They never warn you about that -- once you hit your mid-40s, you can pack on pounds just by looking at the stuff you used to eat in abundance as a youth.

And, here's another thing -- kicking a 30-year-old smokeless tobacco habit leads to weight gain, too.

I do wish people had warned me about sudden weight gain in time for me to avoid it. But, alas, it's too late and I wind up having to eat junk I hate on a regular basis.

My wife tells me that small snacks are important to appetite control, so I wound up with some junk called Special K Chewy Snack Bars. I wound up with the "salted pretzel chocolate" variety and they are so wretched that I have to wonder what's next. Perhaps the "gum wrapper and potato peels" flavor? How about the classic mix of egg shells and cobwebs?

Heck, Special K should have named this awful things "Garbage Bars" as there is a certain amount of honor attached to advertising things truthfully. These taste like they were made with stuff straight out of the trash and, honestly, probably belong in the trash rather than destroying your taste buds and stomach. In fact, you might be better off just throwing all the Garbage Bars in the trash and eating the box. What is in a Garbage Bar? You get oats, something sticky, trash, 100 gut-wrenching calories and a slightly nauseous feeling that curbs your desire to eat for at least an hour. Perhaps that's the point.

I've also learned that eating these things usually makes me good and angry. In fact, I noticed I could head directly to the Kellogg's Internet site and leave comments about the Garbage Bars. I resisted the temptation to head to the aforementioned site and post "Your product sucks and I hate you."

The lesson here is simple -- be careful about your diet and get plenty of exercise while you are young or you might wind up eating junk like these abominations foisted on the public by those Special K jackals.