Whatever happened to McDonaldland cookies? You know the ones I mean. They were in a little square box with cartoons on it and inside the box, inside a vacuum-sealed bag, were the Hamburglar, Mayor McCheese, and Grimace. And they were nearly the color of shortbread and sweet and buttery but they also had a kind of bite. I’ve never found anything quite like them. And I don’t see them in McDonald’s anymore.

They disappeared about the same time as McDonald’s ill-conceived pizza. Now, I can understand why McDonald’s pizza was discontinued. It took them too long. In an industry about speed, it didn’t make a lot of sense. Sadly, I really liked McDonald’s pizza. I was one of the idiots that would go to McDonald’s and wait the extra six minutes for the pizza. It was covered in this sheen of grease and was ever so delightfully crunchy. When I had eaten most of the pizza, my favorite part was the rogue crispy crunchy bits still at the bottom of the box. I’m the same with French fries. I love the crunchy little bits. Fries at McDonald’s don’t have crunchy little bits. I understand why McDonald’s pizza went away and I can live without it. But sometimes I still get a craving, a serious, gut-wrenching craving for McDonaldland cookies. I’ve got one now. The craving I mean, not a single cookie. And I’m left to wander supermarkets to find something, anything like them. Oh, I’ve tried. Believe me I’ve tried. Since they disappeared, I buy random cookies looking for the taste. But nothing compares to the sumptuous taste. Whatever series of taste buds those cookies sent firing are still waiting, still trembling from withdrawal and some disastrously hopeful, perhaps preposterous, ambition.

Is it true that you can still get them in the States? I don’t think they have them in Canada anymore. And if both of those things are true, that’s just very odd. I love Canada. But McDonaldland cookies might make an ex-pat out of me. There’s probably a smarter solution. Maybe I could get a dealer. Yeah, that’s it. But that could get bad. Very bad. Crack-Silas waiting for his cookie fix. Before the mailman comes, I get the shakes. Not a milkshake. Withdrawal palsy. Then my dealer, perhaps altruistic at first, gets shifty and starts charging me more. To get me to pay it, he sends me only Grimace’s head. Which I eat without dignity. Like smoking somebody’s cigarette butt. Yes, I could certainly become an addict looking for my McDonaldland cookie fix. One cookie would be worse than nothing at all. One box would be worse than one cookie. I’d want more. I have enough bad habits.

Still, I should like to write a letter to McDonald’s Canada and find out when and why they were discontinued and how I could get my greedy hands on them.

Meanwhile, the remembered taste. So distracting. I can’t put the taste out of my head. Come on. I want to bite Hamburglar’s tasty head off. I want to take a bite out of Grimace’s wide girth. I want my McDonaldland cookies.

SS