Big Brother's Freezer

I love food with holes. I love bagels... and cherish Lifesavers, Cheerios, and pitted olives. I relish peach rings, onion rings, and angel food cakes. But most of all, I'm enchanted by glazed yeast doughnuts. Those light and airy golden rings of heaven are a delicious symphony of candied, feather-pillowed bliss in my mouth. If I could control my oral urges better, I'd propose by slipping one of these sugary bands on the proposed's finger. Alas, that can't happen because the engagement would be off in the morning when my new fiance finds a lightly crumbed plate and dear john note on the night stand. It would read something like, "I just couldn't help it..." This is where we introduce MsBlonde.

MsBlonde is my daily companion in the remote and glacial northern reaches of the New Hampshire woods. With a firecracker personality exploding from an array of various caffeinated white pills, weekend parties of tight, brightly colored disco clothes, and impassioned soirees in the library book stacks, MsBlonde was my colorful, unscrupulous scamp. She too, loved eating round, syrup rimmed foods. We often made multiple late night dashes across the back wood tundra to the local upper valley Dunkin' Doughnuts.

It's 4:20am, April 20th, and I need a sugar fix to sustain the all-night cramming necessary for the upcoming two weeks of college exams. In a short e-mail exchange with MsBlonde, we decide to make a mad dash for a little obese and diabetic goodness.

Entering the bright and cozy bakery from the damp and crisp darkness, we place our order for gallons of high octane coffee, a few scalloped muffins, and an army of fresh doughnuts. We notice that the DoughnutBoy is more than convivial, so we ask if we can see how the doughnuts are made if we give him some of our "jungle mix". He agrees with a broad smile and tells us to enter through the side.

Stumbling in, he instructs us to sit on a Volkswagen sized sack of flour. While imbibing himself in our offering, someone comes up to the drive through. He listens to their muffled order over his headset, "I want three sugar free doughnuts, one latte grandé with half and half, two shots hazelnut and caramel. I also want one breakfast sandwich, no cheese with bacon and double eggs, two small coffees, one blueberry bagel with cream cheese, and napkins." Starting our journey into the heart of darkness, the Jungle begins affecting our senses. MsBlonde and I watch in awe as DoughnutBoy ingests more, stops, repeats the order back verbatim, and then exhales with a large smile. We break out into silly, boisterous laughter at his performance.

DoughnutBoy tells us to quiet down as he goes up front to fulfill the order. MsBlonde, the mischievous munchkin, stands up and starts sniffing around the back, with me in tow. We come across a large metal door labeled "Freezer".

Slipping inside, we explore the cavernous confines of the refrigerated dough mausoleum. Everywhere around us are various floured, buttered, and sugared pastry carcases ready for the doughnut baking crematorium. I encounter a second door inside and enter a dark room known as "Super Freezer". MsBlonde looses me among the catalogued articles of fossilized glazes and icings.

Leaving Super Freezer, I encounter an ancient button which I push and hear a small click and rumble. I become locked inside the Arctic icebox and start banging ferociously on the door for what seemed like hours. Fortunately for my cyanizing hands, MsBlonde opens the door, then falls to the floor in fits of laughter. "HAHAHA, BP! The door was never locked! I was holding it shut and made it sound like something locked on you." I start to fume, but MsBlonde abruptly stops laughing. She points to the wall and petrifies, hinting me to look at the government camera installed on the wall.

My eyes go big as my nostrils flare outward. My ears pull back like a scared puppy, and my mouth forms a gaping cave on my lackluster face. Going white as a sheet, my arms slump to my sides, and my neck becomes a wet noodle as I collapse to the floor atop MsBlonde (reinactment here). Conspiringly, I tell MsBlonde on the ground, "Do you think they're watching us? I think if we stay here on the ground, they won't find us." We remain frozen and motionless door stops.

DoughnutBoy comes around the corner, gives us a quizzical look and asks what we're doing. All we can do is widely eye the wall mounted video camera. Lieing belly down on the floor, and crawling to us in military fashion, he whispers, "Psst! You know what? Those cameras in here don't work."