Larceny. Grand theft. Petty theft. Infidelity. Violence. Stalking. Pursuit. Addiction. Fraud.
These are not the dark, gritty contents of today’s Tucson Beach police blotter.
And, no, it’s not the script for tonight’s episode of CSI Bakersfield or Law and Order PMS.
It’s much more sinister than that.
These terms represent the inner workings of a cereal commercial. The carefully orchestrated structure for mayhem that is employed to keep us addicted to carefully crafted recipes containing sugar, flour, canola, fructose, maltodextrin, dextrose, salt, soy, lecithin, guano, trisodium phosphate, BHT, retsyn, diopepthane duodenum, Red Dye Number 51, and artificial flavoring.
Every weekend we witness Barney Rubble as he dons the dark, cloaked clothing of a petty larcenist to sneak into Fred Flinstone’s architecturally-challenged home to pilfer the coveted Cocoa Pebbles. Fred, who inadvertently stumbles onto Barney’s treacherous thievery, angrily pursues a wily Barney only to fail to capture what is rightfully his. Each traumatically-imprinted episodic experience ends with Fred helplessly yelling “Barney!”
After twenty-some odd years of this inveterate thievery, you would think Fred would make the necessary adjustments to maintain his sanity and his property. How about installing an alarm system? How about getting a meth-addicted Rottweiler to guard his property. Or hire a few neighborhood gangsters to make Barney “an offer he can’t refuse”?
Or he could do what most married couples do … send Wilma over to talk to Betty. A few weeks of romantic deprivation might be fuel enough to distract Barney from his larcenistic ways.
Across the airwaves, we witness another dramatic event.
Imagine the troubled, desperate life of the Trix Rabbit, who spends every waking moment falling victim to his addiction. With passing every second, his craving for Trix cereal forces him to forgo gainful employment, miss out on romantic opportunities, and only focus his attention acquiring the bane of his cravings. It is clear that the rabbit has fallen into the slavery of addiction, only to be tormented and ridiculed by the evil little masochistic children who laugh maniacally at the rabbit’s addiction and chant “Silly rabbit, Trix are for kids.”
Someday the rabbit is going to snap! He is going to march into the studio, A-Team style, and point an M1 carbine into the Trix-wielding audience and demand that his cold, callous, petty little tormentors hand over the Trix treasure to him at once!
An event worthy of CNN’s attention and coverage, I’m sure, no?
Maybe after the event Trix Rabbit could hook with Bambi and seek out the person responsible for his mother’s homicide. No, wait … that would be Felix Salten. We don’t want people to start going after authors, do we? 
And then there’s Lucky, the Lucky Charm guy. Every week this poor guy endures constant harassment and stalking. When he runs, his tenacious juvenile pursuers hound him like a pack of ravenous hyenas, chasing him faster and faster until he is forced to seek refuge by hiding, which ultimately ends in his capture and with Lucky yielding the cereal to his captors.
Lucky, you really need to file a restraining order. Or a police report. Or team up with Fred and the two of you can pitch in and hire a security detail.
Upon ingesting a heaping bowl of Frosted Krystal Meths with milk, orange juice, and toast (as “part of this nutritious breakfast”) my mind again wonders about Lucky Charms. If I didn’t know better, I could swear that the whole Lucky Charms ideology is really a sexual metaphor or a sexual pun of some sort.
It must be the chemical reaction of the sugar, flour, canola, fructose, maltodextrin, dextrose, salt, soy, lecithin, guano, trisodium phosphate, BHT, retsyn, diopepthane duodenum, and artificial flavoring interacting in a way to have me experience twisted thoughts.
Yes. That must be it!
Ooh, look. There’s a toy inside!
PS. Did you ever notice how the letters in Alpha Bits look like ransom notes? (Note to self … I need to stop watching crime dramas while writing blog postings.)