Cindy

Droog

Read Cindy's bio and previous columns

December 31, 2007

The Cookie Monster is Everywhere

Cookies are everywhere. It seems that lately they’ve infiltrated my life in ways I never predicted they could.

It starts with my current – and purely psychological, of course – competition with Cookie Monster. You see, when I pick my son up from daycare, he’s always excited to see me. He runs to the door, his little arms stretched open, and that moment is – without a doubt – the highlight of my day.

But when he sees Cookie Monster, it’s an entirely different story. First, his whole body shakes with laughter. Then, he repeatedly yells “cookie man,” and is so overwhelmed with happiness, that he often falls to the floor.

I seem to be losing this matchup.

Cookie Monster and his cohorts are also staging a takeover of my work meetings. Just the other day, in true working mom fashion, I went to retrieve a pen from my bag and the plastic letter “D” and number 4 from one of my son’s toys fell out onto the table.

I felt like I was about to lead an episode of Sesame Street, not a creative brainstorm on how to present our latest advertising campaign. “Fellow coworkers, today’s letter is ‘D’. D is for doggie, drum and, perhaps in my case, demotion.”

There are also those pesky cookie crumbs. From the sheer number of them on the floor of my family room and my car, you would think my son was on some special cookies-only diet. In fact, he only gets to eat a cookie as a special treat about twice a week. But when he gets one, he goes on the attack, shoving it into his mouth with rarely seen resolve.

He eats other snacks in the car and family room. Granola bars. Yogurt sticks. Cheese. Apple slices. Yet even after a solid midnight vacuuming effort – even using the extender tube to get into the difficult corners – I will inevitably find cookie crumbs.

The same rings true when I get into my car. Nearly every time I do, I can’t help but be thankful that I no longer work in sales. Back then, it was a normal day to have a passenger in my car. Maybe a client that I’d picked up to take to attend a chamber meeting. Or a coworker with whom I was making an off-site presentation.

Today, I find myself avoiding inviting work friends to lunch for fear they might ask me to drive. My pre-children weekly trips to the car wash have been replaced with 20 extra minutes to spend with my sons, and I wouldn’t trade that for the world. Or for the chance to take a cubicle mate out for a sandwich.

It’s occurred to me that cookies won’t even leave me alone when I’m innocently checking my email. I don’t know how the computer experts of the world knew that cookies were haunting me, but I don’t believe it’s a pure coincidence that they named those little mini-stalkers that send your server information to shopping web sites “cookies.”

How appropriate. Sure, they’re harmless enough. But once you browse or click on something that catches your eye, the next thing you know, you’re getting a daily email from Yoakum County Gift Baskets. You waste time deleting it, first from your inbox, then from your trash.

Your productivity is less, and as a working mom, I’ve no time for reduced productivity.

Wikipedia says that computer cookies are “simple pieces of data unable to perform any operation by themselves.” Yeah, right. Just like the small, round treats you eat, and the lovable blue monsters that are named for them, I think there is more to all things “cookie” than meets the eye. 

© 2007 North Star Writers Group. May not be republished without permission.

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