Salutations, readers! I come to you not just with salutations (which is easily the weirdest way to say hello), but with an introduction and a promise.
My name is Ryan and I am but one of the latest crash test dummies to climb aboard this speeding junk food juggernaut called The Impulsive Buy. As a denizen of Middle America, junk food is in my blood, and I mean more than just arteriosclerosis.
The flag of my great home state of Oklahoma proudly bears our state bird, the chicken fried steak, and we have an official state song from America’s favorite agriculture-themed musical, “Oklahoma!” At least that was the case until 2007, when our legislature changed the song to the audio from one of those YouTube supercuts of people falling out of motorized scooters. Last year, Oklahoma was second in the nation in number of fast food restaurants. Our 1,580 restaurants weren’t enough to pass the sprawling, value menu-festooned hills of Kentucky.
But it isn’t just that I grew up in the shadows of never-ending hamburger signage or that I was regularly shouted down by elementary school classmates for waxing at length about anthropomorphic cereal mascots. I was a latchkey kid of the late ’80s and early ’90s, the golden era of Happy Meal toys and merchandised junk food. Well into adulthood, even after all these years, I prefer my canned pasta X-Men-shaped, my berries Franken, my mummies tutti-frutti, and my Hostess pies mutagen-filled. I like my Shark Bites white, my Lunchables pizza, my ice cream gumball-eyed, devil’s food Snackwell’s, and Kool-Aid Sharkleberry Fin. Corporate marketing helped me understand my first natural talent — eating my feelings.
And thus, my promise to you, dear reader: when not on the campaign trail fighting for a pizza-based economy, I will write you the kind of honest, insightful, and profound reviews you’ve come to expect from an outlet like The Impulsive Buy.
I will write without cynicism.
And I will write with the zest of life only those prepared to embark on the journey of 1,000 empty calories truly know. And I will write with the passion and optimism of a man who holds out hope they will one day soon sell Cadbury Creme Egg filling by the half gallon.
Welcome, sir! You had me at pizza lunchables and devil’s food snackwell’s!! 🙂
And you had me at the thought of Cadbury Creme Egg filling be sold by the half gallon. My kind of guy.
Welcome to the fold, Ryan! Do you also like your cheeseballs in a can from Planter’s?
“Last year, Oklahoma was second in the nation in number of fast food restaurants.”
I assume you mean ‘per population’. There isn’t any possibility at all that Oklahoma has more total fast food places than California.