Expiration date

As I looked through my usually empty kitchen cabinets earlier this evening, I was happily surprised to find a TV dinner, just when I was debating which of my healthy and nutritious meal options to opt for (go hungry, order pizza, or suck on some mustard packets).

The TV dinner's history is divided into two distinctive epochs: pre and post- convenience store. The former began sometime between its arrival at the convenience store, and an unknown point in time after the big bang. The latter ended a few moments ago, and started when, sometime last year, I picked up the TV dinner at said convenience store on my way to work. Somehow, it ended up in a remote corner of an unused drawer, where its existence soon faded from my mind. A few weeks ago, it again saw the light as I was cleaning my desk, and I decided too bring it home for later examination. Again, I threw it in yet another unused drawer -this time in the kitchen, and soon forgot about it.

This time, when I found it, noticed something I usually never look for -the expiration date, which in this case happened to be 03/29/07. I firmly believe that expiration dates are set with a generous margin of safety to minimize unpleasant legal complications, but this one was pushing the envelope. In the interest of science, I decided to test my theory.

It was actually much better than I expected -I would say that it was even borderline pleasant- and what it lacked in quality, it made up for in quantity -not much, but more than the mustard packets.

So far, I feel OK.