The headline on the paper screamed out about 48 newly trained Iraqi soldiers being slaughtered by insurgents, along with 380 tons of explosives that kinda went missing over there as well.  Stories about the Red Sox, Lance Armstrong's wristbands, and the few remaining undecided voters in the upcoming election fleshed out the front page.  I opened the box, and as I pulled open the plastic lining, that blueberry flavored goodness made my soul smile.  I poured a bowl, poured in some milked, and dug in with my spoon.  Heaven is a sugary place.

Hellbent on finishing the entire box, I joked with friends about seeing if I could do it in fifteen minutes.  After savoring the first two bowls, I knew that goal was unattainable, and I was only on page five reading about the Pentagon investigating some Halliburton Iraq deals.  By the time I got to the editorial page and some local blonde stalwart wrote in defending fellow blondes Paris Hilton and Britney Spears, I was on my fourth bowl, and made a major strategic error - I drank some big gulps of milk without any cereal.  All of a sudden, I was in trouble.

Yup, my body has developed a serious distaste for dairy products over the past few years.  Not that there's any major side affects, but anytime I've sat down to a bowl of cereal, or enjoy a tall glass of chocolate milk, without fail my stomach turns to knots and aches.  And so it was happening again.  With the mother of all stomach aches poised to ruin my day, I trudged forward, knowing I was only at the halfway point and just got down with the Metro/State section of the paper. 

Next up was sports, which may have contributed to my indigestion - I mean, the Boston Red Sox may be winning a world series?  In my lifetime?  Not that I really care that much, and as I was riding my bike yesterday, I decided most things in life are ineveitable anyway, but to remove that cloud of misery that hangs over a perfectly deserving city like Boston just seems unfair.  I skipped through barely glancing at any of the football recaps or UT post-postgame analysis.  I don't have time for that stuff.

Yet the bowls started moving slower.  I lost count of bowls around 5, but some were refills, so it would have been hard to judge anyway.  The box said there were 11 servings, 120 calories each, so I was a good 3/4 of the way through, stomach needing a break, but my spirits still high, mostly taunted by the new and poorly designed Boo Berry character that appears on the boxes these days. 

I finally reached the homeland, the final stretch that would finish things off.   I had also reached the Life & Arts section, meaning a half page of arts listings, along with three pages of womanly gossip and then two pages of comics.  With my last bowl poured, the Starlight Mints CD that I put on started its final track, it was now time to rev up the sugar buzz.  It's been a time honored ritual in all my days as a purveyor of fine sugar-laden cereals to ceremoniously pour out the sugary dust that collects at the bottom of the box into my final bowl.