I purchased a box of donuts a few weeks ago when I bought my groceries. I went shopping hungry, naturally, and the donuts called out to me like tiny glazed sirens. I immediately justified the purchase to myself with the rationale that I always skip breakfast and so here was something I could easily eat on the way to work in the morning. Actually, I don't think I even got that far, I imagine I started thinking, "I should buy those cause I always skip breakfast..." and ended the thought with "...mmm, raspberry filling."

Much to my dismay these donuts were not all that fantastic. Average or sub-par at best, lacking the tender doughyness that I expected and so very much craved. So, suffice it to say that I only ate three (so much for my breakfast scheme) and left the rest to contemplate their shortcomings as pastries.

After a couple of weeks, the donuts became quite stale. We're talking "chipped tooth" stale. With a few more boxes like these and a bucket of mortar I could probably make a homemade bombshelter. I could, except that I'm too lazy to do such a thing. Now, it is relatively evident that I had to dispose of the bricks nee donuts as they served little good now except as messy paperweights or doorstops (don't think I didn't try). And, gentle readers, you should understand that as a male bachelor living by himself, I have free reign to do all manner of things in my apartment without offending the gentle sensibilities of a woman or a roommate. And, before you get all sorts of ideas in your perverted little heads, no, I did not have sex with the donuts.

They had a headache.

Anyway, my trash at this point was quite full. Practically spilling over, it was. You see, taking out the trash ranks right up there with doing laundry in my book: it gets done when there is no other alternative. Unless the trash is creating a palpable funk in the apartment, I'm not going out in the freezing cold and trudging through the mud or snow to throw it in the dumpster. However, it was clear that attempting to put these three rock-hard pastries in the trash was not a very good option as their lack of compressibility would greatly hamper my efforts. I glanced over at my sink and decided it was time for some fun.

Have you ever filled a sink up with water and tossed in a few donuts? Would it surprise you to know they float? They're buoyant little S.O.B.'s, I tell you what. As I write this I am somewhat saddened that I didn't have the forethought to snap a little picture of them as they gleefully rode the ripples in their stainless steel swimming hole. Their day at the beach was short-lived, however, as I soon introduced them to my favorite appliance in the kitchen: the garbage disposal.

The garbage disposal is about the only thing in the kitchen that feels manly to me. The refrigerator is too passive, the stove too "1950's stereotypical mom", and the microwave too, well, I dunno, it's a microwave. But the garbage disposal, now that's cool, that's tough. I mean, it's basically a tunnel lined with spinning blades that at the flick of an electrical switch tears into whatever stumbles into its gaping maw. It's kinda like the Sarlacc in the Great Pit of Carkoon on Tatooine, except without the tentacles and underwhelming death of Boba Fett.

Having never owned (or had access to) a garbage disposal, it holds an additional appeal for me. It's the release to years of unquenched desires--the desire to chop, dice, and mutilate my leftovers into a fine slurry to be passed on to the water company. And oh how it calls my name! I use the disposal whenever possible and, more often than not, when it is unnecessary or even inappropriate. I justify its use by reasoning that 1) food that goes down the drain won't stink up the overflowing trash bin, and 2) food that goes down the drain is "recycled" and doesn't end up in a landfill. The first point is perfectly valid but the second one is probably naive and really just an excuse for me to grind up leftovers while intoning in a prim, mechanical voice, "In his belly, you will find a new definition of pain and suffering, as you are slowly digested over a thousand years."

But, even though the lure is strong, I respect the power of my disposal. In some ways it is like a great beast and I am just a simple peasant, offering unto it a sacrifice whenever possible to quench its thirst and keep it from feasting upon my livestock or supply of virgins. The day I moved in I located the switch on my kitchen wall. It is, as always, right next to an identical switch that controls the lights. Sometimes I wonder if builders get kickbacks from the folks that hand out the Darwin Awards. In my opinion, the disposal should have a safety switch to prevent anyone unwilling to face the consequences of their actions from activating the device. Something akin to the missile arm switch you'd see in the cockpit of an F-16, with the little red jacket preventing you from doing something ridiculously stupid. Since my apartment was lacking said switch, I improvised. There is a note taped just above, covering it completely so that one has no choice but to read it before engaging. It reads: "No."

Just in case I get a little punchy.

Tags: Donuts, Humor, Life