Tuesday, May 13, 2003

I have a bad habit

I have a bad habit of putting off important choices till the last moment.  I might be the first one to put down his menu at our table at a restaurant, but I’ll dawdle endlessly over the big stuff.  That’s why, for example, I never write my academy awards acceptance speech until the telecast begins, and I still haven’t hung the priceless art that’s been gathering dust around my palatial compound for so many months.  I freeze under the pressure of big decisions.

In a small step towards more responsible decisionmaking habits (and isn’t it sad that it’s come to this, my wanting my decisions to be more responsible, but anyway) I have anticipated a major decision which is looming on the midrange horizon.  I know it will leave me stammering, incapable of action if I let it unfold on its own - but this time I see it coming and thereby stand a decent chance of staving off this particular bout of the dithers.  I just have to overcome my neurosis and come up with a game plan before it’s too late.

To wit: I received not long ago a gift basket containing a variety of comestibles.  Some are lasting a long time, like the honey-roasted peanuts; some get et as soon as they’re opened, like the caramel corn and the chocolates.  Some items were promptly consigned to the compost, like the cheezefud and summir sosijje (neither of which seemed truly to be food to me).  But there are a few items that have a sort of intermediate staying power (not unlike myself).  These are cellophane bags of brightly colored candy of various sorts.  I open a bag and munch a piece or two every day or so; each bag lasts several weeks this way. 

I’m nearing the end of my antepenultimate bag, leaving me two bags remaining between which to choose my next selection.  I dread having to pick between them, but soon I’ll eat my last Super Sour Star (pentagram-shaped jellies, garrishly colored and encrusted in sugar).  They are plenty of fun to eat but all good things - especially candy - come to an end.  My Sour Stars are going the way of the white dwarf, collapsing to an identity, to exist only in the realm of theoretical physics.  So whether I want to or not, I will have to choose one, and only one, bag to open next.  I can’t have two open bags at once - I lack some basic inhibitory mechanisms and that much access to sweets would surely lead to glucose abuse.  And nobody wants to see that.

So help me out here: what should I open next - the Assorted Ultimate Beans, or the Fruit Flashers?  Honestly I can imagine a down side to either choice.  I’ve endured some pretty hearty beans in my day, and been flashed by more than my share of fruits.  The beans were a bit more intense over the short term, but the flashers really linger in my memory....