Keep It Simple, Stupid: An Adventure in Peanut Butter

When I was younger, definitely before I was 10, I read an article in one of those National Geographic kids magazines (it could've been "3-2-1 Contact," but I forget) concerning a child inventor and his invention that would solve a great problem in society: how to get the peanut butter that sticks to the bottom of the jar out of the jar.

Now, this is going to sound silly, but to a kid who was less than 10, it was profound. Basically, this brat inventor in question developed a peanut butter jar that had lids on both sides of the jar. This, obviously, allows the sandwich-maker to get to the hard-to-reach sandwich topping.

Excellent solution to a clear problem, right? I thought so. And I thought so for damn near the next 20 years. In fact, I'd often mosey through a grocery store wondering why in the Hell these jars weren't on the shelves.

Leave it to my mother to burst my balloon (she does that... all mothers receive pre-natal instruction in bursting balloons, I think).

A couple of years ago I was home visiting the parents when I saw my mother making peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for my niece and nephew (actually, she might've been making them for me, but I will never admit such a thing). I could tell by the sound of the knife that the peanut butter was almost gone, and the memory of that boy's invention jumped back into the forefront of my mind.

Hah, I thought, I bet mom wishes she had one of those jars right about now. Hehehe. 

Yes, you've interpreted the tone in that thought process correctly: secretly, I wanted to revel in the fact that my mother was about to suffer from the same bane that's blighted me for decades. A small one, sure, but a bane nonetheless (and never mind that she's, no doubt, been dealing with peanut butter jars a lot longer than I have... this is about me, dammit).

And then she did it. The unthinkable. She produced a solution right before my very eyes.

She used a spoon.

The moral of this tale is, well, simple. When we over-think things (cough, politicians, cough), we can wind up solving problems that didn't exist, or creating problems that won't get solved. Or something like that.

Nah... the moral of this tale is to buy peanut butter in pouches.