“Waiter, my menu’s been redacted.”

It’s come to me over a three-decade period. I’ve been a child of divorce, an employee, a taxpayer, a voter, a student, a homeowner, a boyfriend, a customer, a punching bag, and somewhere in between, a human being; but I’ve found that, ultimately, the one label I can truly attach to myself is this:

I am a peanut.

One way or another, by whatever means necessary, I am little more than a nut to be cracked and ground into a sticky paste that will be combined with jelly, and only jelly, between two slices of bread, to fulfill my so-called biological purpose.

Say the voices in the paper, on the Internet and the public address system Non-Plasma CRT Happy-Box: “It’s fantastic to live where we’re free to put whatever we want between two slices of bread… but, seriously, fuck you and your deviant taste buds. In the name of liberty, the lines have been drawn accordingly in the fight to save the Perfect Salty/Sweet, Stable, Balanced Flavor of Peanut Butter and Jelly from all who seek to upset it.”

These people have a very good point: What kind of unreasonable jerk would I be to go to my local greasy spoon then go around to each table telling people they and their children are required to share my appetite for Reubens or they’re an enemy? Better yet, how about I go an extra step and have all who oppose me ejected from the establishment and/or scapegoated when the place fails its next health inspection?

Why, that would make me more than unreasonable; that would make me a total douche! I’m so glad we’ve got the Peanut Butter and Jelly Squad handy to forcibly impose their correct dietary standards on everybody so some asshole can’t impose their–

Never mind.

As Surgeon General nominee Holsinger might say, there was one case somewhere that involved a guy eating a Peanut Butter and Light Bulb sandwich, which caused severe injury to his entire digestive system, so you’d best stick to jelly unless you want to end up in the emergency room and subsequently used to paste together some anti-gay Bush crony’s junk science piece.

I’ll see you at the buffet. Bring your camera.