No tarts.

I eat Pop-Tarts while reading fitness magazines. As I munch, I daydream about my rocking figure. Hmm. Just ten minutes a day to a better body? “I can spare ten minutes a day,” I think, as the second Pop Tart slips into the toaster.

According to the nutritional panel, a single Pop Tart serving is one pastry. Really? Kellogg’s wouldn’t package Pop Tarts in pairs if you weren’t supposed to eat them that way, the same rationale the Girl Scouts use to package Thin Mint cookies into two sleeves. Kellogg’s is not reducing packaging waste to save the environment. Actually, I’m somewhat surprised they haven’t tried that marketing ploy. Pop Tarts go green! Package all eight together. I’d just keep toasting and eating them until the box is empty. I can barely control myself enough to just devour two at a time.

I didn’t know Pop Tarts were supposed to be toasted until I was in college. My mother considered toasting Pop Tarts cooking, and she hated to cook. So, she doled them out raw.  It’s baffling that toasting them never occurred to me. During the prime of my childhood the Pop Tarts mascot was none other than Milton the Toaster.  He was so busy yapping away giving friendly advice I didn’t notice the Pop Tarts popping up. The silent Eggo Waffle Toasters, that for some reason never had two slots, were far more effective at pitching technique. Sadly, my ignorance goes a step further. I always drew Milton to enter Kellogg’s Annual Children’s Art Contest. My feeble artistic skills were more suited to the toaster than the tiger. Hours spent drawing and coloring Milton never clued me in. In my defense though, Milton never popped tarts in pictures.

My first toasted Pop Tart was a delicacy. Now they are simply staples. Reminding me I’d better get off this chair and start my ten-minute a day regimen, just as soon as the sugar high and crash subside.