There is something truly healthy about Peeps. No, don't gasp, and don't read the ingredients. Just read on...

Peeps are those wonderous lumps of pseudo-marshmallow coated in chemically dyed sugar that almost, but not really, resemble chickies. I remember as a child piercing the plastic wrapper and ignoring them for a week, waiting for them to mature into a stale, solid mass. "Ripening" we called it, much like Mom's summer ritual of placing tomatoes on the windowsill. Today, however, technology has advanced so well that even three months of sitting in a hot car, opened, will not stale them. I speak from experience.

One profound health benefit of Peeps is, of course, their arrival in stores. During those dull days of March, Peeps are as much an omen of spring as the robin or crocus. Gazing at the shelves of artificial pink, blue, purple and, of course, yellow, one can easily forget the uncertaincy of the weather outside. How can one not feel the emotional benefits of gazing upon those rows of brown dots serving as eyes?

The second important health benefit is the consumption of these Peeps. One cannot simply stop at one Peep! Five is the normal consumption rate, coinciding with the number of Peeps in a single row. Yet as one feels the taste of that last Peep fading into memory, one is accompanied by teeth tingling, ears buzzing, and fingers shaking from the sugar and corn syrup consumed at twice the suggested serving size. This is accompanied by the brain understanding the nature of the universe and the soul vocallizing such wise prose as you read now.

But the most significant health benefit of Peeps is not in their arrival nor their digestion. It is the simple and only acceptable ritual for eating them. One carefully pries a Peeps from its neighbor, gazes into those lovingly crafted brown eyes...

 

 

...and bites the sucker's head off.

11 March 2004