1. My next door neighbors and I have one of those extremely coveted neighborly relationships where we borrow things from each other’s houses, take care of each other’s animals, and preheat each other’s ovens. (I have yet to require my oven to be preheated but I do offer this service for them, and have done so before.) They also babysit my child, and sometimes just for 10 minutes while it’s pouring down rain so I can run to the store without dragging a wet child around.

One item that they request pretty often is brown sugar-cinnamon Pop-Tarts, usually around 8:30 at night. Since I’m a pajama-laden hermit, I usually just put them on the porch and text back with a friendly “PORCH” so as not to interact with anyone unnecessarily. I have started buying them expressly for the neighbors because if that’s the price I pay for 10 minute thunderstorm babysitting then I WILL BUY THE POP-TARTS.

Two days ago one of them came over with a grocery bag. “We’re replacing your Pop-Tarts!” she said. That was sweet, but unnecessary; if we’re going to start paying each other back or replacing the things we borrow that’s just going to throw this whole operation off.

I shouldn’t have worried. Today she texted and asked, “Do you have any Pop-Tarts I can borrow?”

2.
Brown sugar-cinnamon (frosted)
Blueberry (frosted)
Strawberry (frosted)
NOTHING ELSE

3. Because I’ve been a toaster pastry enthusiast for a while now, back in, I don’t know, 1991 or so there was a promotion where if you sent in some Pop-Tarts box tops you could get some Pop-Tarts merchandise. T-shirts, frisbees, you know, really great Pop-Tarts related material. The thing that I wanted, and that which required the fewest number of Pop-Tarts box tops, was a POP-TARTS COMEDY VIDEO. Oh yeah, baby. Give me that sweet, hot VHS comedy goodness! So I ate the hell out of some Pop-Tarts and I collected those box tops and I mailed them in and one day, my POP-TARTS COMEDY VIDEO came in the mail, just as promised! I “popped” it in (GET IT) and oh. OH. Y’all. Guess what? Paula Poundstone tells jokes about Pop Tarts. She claims to just really fucking love Pop-Tarts. She says she eats a box a day. There’s a BOX OF POP-TARTS sitting next to her. The one thing I did think was funny is that she’s like “hey, the Pop-Tart eaters are watching this,” and before then I just never considered myself in a category like that before. Pop-Tart eater. There’s no arguing there.

So, because the internet won’t allow anything to exist only in our memories, enjoy.