I mentioned in a post earlier this week that I grew up in a small town. I actually got emails about that! Apparently, my sophisticated, cosmopolitan mannerisms seem at odds with a small town background. While I admit to having adapted to big city life remarkably well, my small town past helped make me what I am today. Namely, a paranoid neurotic with a nearly painful physical addiction to every legal stimulant and a few marketed as "Herbal Energy Boosters" that slip (for now) under the radar of the FDA.
I grew up in Post, Texas, which had a population of less than 4,000. Post is named for its founder C.W. Post, who is known mostly today for Cocoa Pebbles. Back in the day, C.W. Post was a breakfast visionary. He invented Elijah's Manna (which was later renamed Post Toasties) and Grape Nuts, which were probably named between a couple of Mr. Post's frequent visits to the Sanitarium. Talked to him, the Grape Nuts did. They told him things. Things about the end times.
Before his apparent suicide in 1914, C.W. Post also invented a breakfast drink called Postum. It is a (shudder) caffeine-free "coffee alternative" even available today, though the ingredients are different. On store shelves today, Postum contains wheat and molasses, mostly, but the original formula was reported to contain these with the addition of cocaine and a couple of rain forest opiates -- All in the interest of eliminating caffeine. The marketing even featured a caffeine-fueled super villain with a jet pack:
"Mr. Coffee Nerves" was apparently (if these comics are to be believed) responsible for the complete destruction of many, many families.
Whatever Mr. Coffee Nerves was really about, C.W. Post founded what he envisioned a "Caffeine-free Utopia" in the West Texas desert. And that is where I grew up. In hindsight, I suppose that may explain a lot.
Please feel free to email me any and all questions about my various psychological issues. I'm comfortable enough answering just about anything thanks to the power of caffeine. Let's get better together, dear readers. Dr. Phil would be so proud.
1 comment:
Texas gets all the cool conspiracies.
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