We are all very busy. I am way too busy to read every single news story out there. I rely on the headlines to keep me up to date with things. Especially the Olympics-all I need to see is, for instance, JORDAN CHILES MUST RETURN OLYMPIC BRONZE AFTER COURT RULING to know all I need to know. I feel for her, but I don’t want to soak myself in the whole traumatic story. That is enough.
But just a few minutes ago, I saw this headline: WOMAN STEALS 1.4 MILLION DOLLARS WORTH OF CHICKEN WINGS FROM SCHOOL DISTRICT. Really? I went to get a quick glass of water, and when I came back to my Google feed, the story had disappeared, to be replaced with other more newsworthy items, like 100 YEAR OLDS SHARE WHAT THEY ALWAYS EAT. I know the answer to that; it’s kale.
But back to the chicken wings. Try as I might, I can’t figure out why anybody would want that many chicken wings. Wouldn’t this woman’s family get sick of them after, say, $100 worth? And my God, how many chicken wings add up to 1.4 million dollars? Chicken wings are inexpensive. I buy two packages whenever I make noodle soup, and they run me about six dollars for a dozen wings. So I can’t wrap my head around fitting 1.4 million dollars worth in the trunk of my car.
So, okay, you are saying. She stole them over time. Of course she did. Again, how many years does it take to steal that many wings? Ten, maybe? And back to her family–still eating the damn wings, for ten long years? How many ways can a woman cook wings, anyway? You say, No. She sold them. Who did she sell them to? How? Door to door? Her neighbors would get suspicious, wondering why Ethel (I made up her name; the headline didn’t identify her) pedaled wings all the time. I mean, I can see it if she decided to become a drug dealer, but to my thinking, there is just not that much demand for chicken wings. But of course, school lunch rooms don’t serve cocaine, so I guess Ethel’s choices of things to purloin and then sell were limited.
Ethel must have had a plan. But what was it? She couldn’t sell them to restaurants–what restaurant would buy wings from some random woman who showed up at the kitchen door with bags full of them? There might be a dive in some shady neighborhood, but again, we are talking 1.4 million dollars worth of wings.Ok, then. Did Ethel have big parties? Really big parties? I can just see her friends, rolling their eyes and saying, “My God, Ethel just invited us over for the Fourth. But I cannot stomach another chicken wing.”
Could Ethel have an addiction problem? The kind where at first, ten wings a week, nicely barbecued, were enough, but then ten weren’t enough, so Ethel had to increase the amount of wings just to achieve the same wing high? Like from ten a week to twenty, and it went from there? I did the math. If Ethel ate 20 per week, that is 1,042 wings a year. For just Ethel. Now if her family is factored in, as sick of wings as they would get, then maybe Ethel’s fam could ingest four thousand a week? Not possible. Ethel couldn’t cook that many wings a week.
So what is Ethel’s game? Your guess is as good as mine. But her wing spree is over, because as the headline said, Ethel was caught. I can just picture the other lunch ladies sending anonymous emails to the Superintendent of Schools, noting the lumpiness of the pockets in Ethel’s aprons every day on her way out of work, and perhaps seeing an errant wing escaping from her purse. It’s a mystery.
I wonder how many years in jail Ethel will have to serve. Knowing her type, Ethel will become a kingpin in prison, the head of a chicken wing smuggling ring. The food in prisons is terrible, due to most accounts, so hot wings would be a luxury. Those inmates would not mess with Ethel. A good wing is hard to come by in the slammer.
