Happy Birthday, Krispy Kreme!

Today is the 79th birthday of the Krispy Kreme doughnut. This is an auspicious occasion in my life. Even at my advanced age, it's hard to remember a time when Krispy Kreme was not a part of my life (they were in NC before they were much of anywhere else), including some fairly momentous occasions. Witness the following examples:

• We sold them by the dozen as a fundraiser for my Cub Scout pack when I was around 10 years old. Yes, I was that young once...
• In college there would often be midnight runs for hot doughnuts. Sometimes I delivered them to friends and sometimes we all piled into tiny cars and went together. One of those nights was the first time I ever met my future wife Marilyn.
• Stopping by the local 24 hour KK was a regular part of my youth group's Rec Around the Clock event for many years in many places. I particularly remember a large group standing outside the one in High Point, NC and watching the hot doughnuts roll off the conveyor belt at 5 am as we ate them by the box full.
• I once served hot glazed doughnuts and OJ as communion on a youth group beach retreat we took from Springfield Friends Meeting. There's a lot in that statement to process, since Quakers don't traditionally practice communion at all...
• I have eaten hot glazed doughnuts for LUNCH with a friend- and I am not ashamed to admit it!
• Before the KK opened in Kissimmee, FL I would sometimes drive to Orlando on Tuesday mornings so we could have fresh doughnuts for our Breakfast Club. It made me a hero to those youth brave enough to get up early for the meeting!
• I have purchased hundreds of dozens of hot doughnuts from the KK in North Myrtle Beach, SC over they years and delivered then to the Betsy B, often risking my life to get them in the house before people started ripping boxes from my arms!

There are few things in life that conjure up as many fond memories for me as Krispy Kreme doughnuts. I have eaten more than my share of chocolate cream filled and chocolate

glazed, of blueberry and of jelly filled. But there is nothing like seeing this sign, snarfing down fresh manna from heaven and licking that glorious icing off my fingers. Even now, as a diabetic, there are times when they are just totally worth the cheat. There's only one problem with today's big birthday deal, featured in the ad at the top of this post. If I got a dozen hot glazed right this minute and had them here all by myself, I would eat every stinkin' one of them! And be very, VERY happy! So go get some doughnuts today. Make your own memories. And tell them Carl sent you!