SWEET CRISIS
By D. Reed
Kreeme
August 13, 2012
PLAIN PLAINS, IN
– Last night, in a controversial and much-debated piece of legislation, the
Plain Plains city council passed a law outlawing frozen custard. The ordinance forbids any sale or
ingestion of custard products in the town. The penalty for violating the new sanction is a thousand
dollar fine and up to a month in jail.
The law will be
implemented on Monday, August 15, leaving the city’s custard stands little time
to close up shop. It is
anticipated that most of the custard sellers will close their doors
permanently, although some may begin selling other, legal, products.
“What
has this town come to?” exclaimed Nathan, putting down the newspaper. “I couldn’t possibly imagine a more
useless, inane law.” He had
obviously forgotten about last summer’s illegal honey debacle.
Nathan
shook his head in disbelief. Then,
in a moment of realization, his eyes grew wide. “No more custard.”
His emotions began to spiral out of control, leaping from sorrow to
anger to depression and back to sorrow again, all before settling on a
conflated and convoluted mix of disbelief and mourning.
“I
think the only thing to do is drown my sorrows by binging on some delicious
custard.” He paused, as the fact
set in that he would never be able to do this again in two days. Then Nathan began to bawl.
After
recovering after a few minutes of healthy crying, Nathan wiped his eyes. “Well, I better take advantage of what
I can get now.” With this newfound
determination, he set out to buy himself some delectable custard.
The
best thing about Plain Plains was the variety of custard stores. One could be found at every street
corner, but the demand was so high that they all were successful. The only downside: it made choosing which custard store to
visit a challenge. However, as Nathan
wandered through the downtown area, he noticed that every custard store was
already closed. It seemed that the
owners decided to throw in the ice cream scoop immediately upon receiving the
bad news. Nathan went to every
shop he could think of, but every single one was closed.
Dejected,
Nathan began to mope back to his home.
But then he remembered that there was one last stand he hadn’t yet
tried: Cream Dreams, located in
the town’s main park. It was just
a small, portable stand, but their custard was to die for. And it seemed like people might
actually die for it, based on the size of the crowd gathered around the stand
when Nathan arrived. Turns out
there was one last custard stand still open in their quaint town of silly
rules.
When
Nathan was about halfway through the line, a grumbling mumble slowly erupted
from the front of the line. The
sighs of disappointment wafted over the rest of the line, carrying with them an
unshakeable melancholy. Cream
Dreams had run out of custard. And
now that it was going to be illegal, they would not be able to restock in time
to sell more.
Most
large groups of people angered by unfortunate news would form a mob and riot
against the people angering them.
Luckily for the custard stand owners, the creamy dessert lovers knew the
shop owners were not to blame. So
instead of rioting, the still growing mass of townsfolk hungry for custard
decided to form a demonstration.
What’s the difference between rioting and demonstrating? Absolutely nothing, but let’s give the
poor people of Plain Plains a little benefit of the doubt, shall we?
The
custard-deprived masses decided to form a human wall between the remaining
custard stand and the officials that would surely come in two days’ time to
shut down the fine establishment.
And that is precisely what they did (both the demonstrators and the
enforcers of this absurd statute).
Early
Monday morning, after two days of little sleep or food but plenty of
camaraderie, the custard defenders awoke to find strangers trying to maneuver
their way through the townspeople to get to the custard stand. Immediately, the throngs of dessert
lovers began pushing back, successfully ridding their camp of the interlopers. But it was only a momentary victory,
because the enforcers returned minutes later with backup. Now it was an even match: hordes of average citizens who only
wanted to have the freedom to eat custard versus the representatives of
lawmakers who have too much idle time so they issue edicts of questionable
sense and morality.
To
make a short story shorter, both sides fought fiercely. But in the end, despite the custard
protectors’ most valiant efforts, they fell at the villainous hands of the
creamy concoction removers. On
that day, August 15, 2012, the quiet town of Plain Plains lost a valuable
institution: custard. The whole town mourned.
Except
for the lactose intolerant folk.
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