THE 40-YEAR-OLD TWINKIE

In 1976, chemistry teacher Roger Bennatti took a freshly unwrapped Twinkie and placed it on top of a chalkboard in his classroom so he and his students could see how long it would take to decompose. 40 years later, the Twinkie is still around, although Mr. Bennatti has long since retired. The Twinkie sits in a glass case on a shelf in the office of Libby Rosemeier, George Stevens Academy’s dean of students. It’s a little shriveled and paler than a fresh Twinkie, and there are a few crumbs, but it is not moldy and is recognizable as a Twinkie. Rosemeier said kids ask her if they can take a bite. She says, “The most remarkable thing to me is that this is a piece of food that is 40 years old and the shape is basically unchanged. Preservatives work, I guess, to some extent. I think it is dusty more than anything.”
* Just like Cloris Leachman.
* Is this technically food or is it just a complex molecule?
* Reminds me of Easter Peeps. Not so much food as something you’d make with a chemistry set.
* It’s like Seinfeld says about Pop Tarts: They can’t get stale because they were never fresh.
* The closest this got to fresh is when it was freshly unwrapped.
* The only change is that the Twinkie is now 3-feet long and it’s throbbing.
* Oh, and it’s beginning to divide into two Twinkies.
* Imagine staring up at a Twinkie during class. That had to be hell on the stoners.