The Cheeseburger!
This has annoyed me for more than 10 years.
I read an interview in 1995 in a Sunday newspaper supplement or somewhere- a bunch of kids interviewing people they might be interested in. Zoo employees or dinosaur experts or whatever. In this case they were interviewing someone from the McDonalds corporate office, which might seem strange, but kids are inevitably interested in McDonalds, and they had many questions. One of them was: What is the most popular item at McDonalds? The answer- and I could feel the disingenuousness, the lying, the evil seeping through the newsprint as I read it- “the cheeseburger!” The exclamation point stood in for the woman’s forced smile and feigned enthusiasm. Enthusiasm for a LIE.
But first, let’s face facts. The way the question was asked (by a bunch of 8 year olds) the answer can be slippery. Popular? Maybe that means the one people like the best. (Of course she knew full well it meant which one sold the most). And cheeseburger? Well technically the Big Mac and the Quarter Pounder with Cheese and a bunch of others are cheeseburgers, right?
Well, bullshit. If you go to McDonalds and order “a cheeseburger” they don’t ask which one you mean, they give you a cheeseburger. And she didn’t say a cheeseburger- she said THE cheeseburger. And there is no way the cheeseburger is the most popular item- outside of Happy Meals does anyone ever buy them? It’s down by the Fishwich.
So why the lie? I don’t know. My guess is the most popular item is something unexciting like a 12 ounce Diet Coke. Plus, they want to answer that question with something eternal- not the McDLT or something that will be gone in a year. Still- it haunts me.
I read an interview in 1995 in a Sunday newspaper supplement or somewhere- a bunch of kids interviewing people they might be interested in. Zoo employees or dinosaur experts or whatever. In this case they were interviewing someone from the McDonalds corporate office, which might seem strange, but kids are inevitably interested in McDonalds, and they had many questions. One of them was: What is the most popular item at McDonalds? The answer- and I could feel the disingenuousness, the lying, the evil seeping through the newsprint as I read it- “the cheeseburger!” The exclamation point stood in for the woman’s forced smile and feigned enthusiasm. Enthusiasm for a LIE.
But first, let’s face facts. The way the question was asked (by a bunch of 8 year olds) the answer can be slippery. Popular? Maybe that means the one people like the best. (Of course she knew full well it meant which one sold the most). And cheeseburger? Well technically the Big Mac and the Quarter Pounder with Cheese and a bunch of others are cheeseburgers, right?
Well, bullshit. If you go to McDonalds and order “a cheeseburger” they don’t ask which one you mean, they give you a cheeseburger. And she didn’t say a cheeseburger- she said THE cheeseburger. And there is no way the cheeseburger is the most popular item- outside of Happy Meals does anyone ever buy them? It’s down by the Fishwich.
So why the lie? I don’t know. My guess is the most popular item is something unexciting like a 12 ounce Diet Coke. Plus, they want to answer that question with something eternal- not the McDLT or something that will be gone in a year. Still- it haunts me.
posted by Door Hinge at 12:04 AM
5 Comments:
You're haunted by cheeseburgers?
WwwwoooOOOOOooooo... I'm a cheeEEEEeesebuuuuurgeeeer.... WooOOOOooo!!!
I think he's haunted by the Hamburgler. If I had to guess, I'd say the most popular item is the Shamrock Shake. I love those things.
Here are some links that I believe will be interested
Here are some links that I believe will be interested
I like it! Good job. Go on.
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