DEATH BY SNACKS

After dinner, my wife and I luxuriated in a couple of Arrested Development reruns, marveling at the genius of Mitchell Hurwitz and Ron Howard. The show, an absurdist ode to familial dysfunction, felt decades ahead of its time—sharp enough to leave paper cuts on your brain. During the opening credits, I rose from the couch with noble intentions: I was off to fetch my so-called “satiety apple,” a modest, virtuous snack that allegedly curbs my post-dinner cravings without derailing my calorie count.

But as I crossed the kitchen, fate—or treachery—beckoned me toward the microwave. There it sat: a pie box, faintly glowing, practically humming a siren song of buttery crust and spiced filling. One peek inside, and there it was—the last slice of Thanksgiving pie, radiating the kind of allure that no apple could ever muster.

Before I knew it, I was hunched over the sink, inhaling that pie like a feral animal who’d just discovered civilization’s baked goods. Crumbs flew. Filling dripped. I was mid-bite, fully in beast mode, when my daughter Alison walked in. She stopped, surveyed the scene, and with surgical precision, dropped her line: “When’s the last time you were on a diet?”

I froze mid-chew, my cheeks puffed out like a chipmunk caught in a raid. “A single slice of pie hardly merits such harsh judgment,” I said, wiping a smear of whipped cream off my chin.

“Don’t be so defensive,” she said, her voice carrying the kind of condescension only a teenage girl can master. “I’m just asking—when was the last time you were on a diet?”

“I didn’t realize you were the official historian of my weight management strategies,” I shot back, trying to maintain some shred of dignity.

“What strategy?” she deadpanned, her tone as flat as the pie tin now sitting empty in the sink.

I opened my mouth in an exaggerated display of mock offense, as if her words had wounded me so deeply that I could only respond with silence. We laughed, but the truth landed like a sucker punch: despite my heroic kettlebell workouts and high-protein meal plans, my daughter saw me for what I really was—a fat slob, undone by my inability to resist the siren song of leftover pie.

My conversation with my daughter hit a nerve: my relationship with food is less of a partnership and more of a chaotic entanglement worthy of a reality show. I’m living with a chronic condition others have dubbed food noise—the relentless, mind-consuming obsession with food. It’s not just a passing craving; it’s a full-time occupation. Food noise is that little gremlin in your head planning tomorrow’s breakfast while you’re still wiping pie crumbs off your shirt from dinner. It’s exhausting, intrusive, and, frankly, a massive pain in the ass.

I’ve tried all the supposed solutions. High-protein meals? Check. Fiber-packed fruits and veggies? Done. Permission to eat favorite foods to deflate their psychological power? Sure, why not. Listening to my so-called “hunger cues”? Please, those cues have been drowned out by a symphony of appetite louder than a Wagner opera. The truth is, my love of food has nothing to do with hunger. This isn’t about survival—it’s about passion.

I crave food the way a musician craves music, except instead of performing Beethoven’s Ninth, I’m inhaling pie and serenading a protein bar like it’s my muse. Eating isn’t just sustenance; it’s a full-body euphoria, a never-ending sonata of chewing that I never want to end.

So here I am, a helpless Snack Serenader, crooning over every dish like it’s the centerpiece of my magnum opus. Pie, pasta, cereal, or steak—it doesn’t matter. They’re all part of the eternal love song I sing to food, even as it steamrolls my willpower and expands my waistline. And while it may sound romantic, let’s be honest: it’s less about joy and more about imprisonment. I don’t just eat food; I worship it. I’m not hungry for a meal; I’m desperate for an encore. Just as a Beethoven superfan can lose themselves in the ninth symphony on repeat, I want to marinate in a bottomless jacuzzi of flavor, chewing my way through life’s buffet like a one-man marching band of mastication.

As a Snack Serenader, I croon love songs to everything from pie to chicken shawarma. That Thanksgiving slice of pie wasn’t dessert; it was a crescendo. A bag of chips isn’t a snack; it’s an aria. And here I am, the tragic hero, swooning over leftovers as my waistline rolls its eyes and mutters, “You’re killing me.”

The irony isn’t lost on me that I began this post with Arrested Development while chronicling my sink-side pie binge—a man-child devouring apple pie like it was the elixir of life, all under the unimpressed gaze of my daughter. Uncontrolled eating, it seems, is less about hunger and more about a deep-seated infantilization for which there’s no cure, just a lifetime subscription.