I lit a cigar, was maybe ten puffs in, minding my own business, wondering how many days in a row I could write about cereal when I stumbled across the root cause of one of society’s most vexing problems, childhood obesity. It turns out the little fatsos have been eating Honey Nut Cheerios a couple of times a week. Problem solved! I’m glad it’s over. If we can just dial back consumption of those fuckin’ O’s we can have a pizza and get on with our skinny lives.

Honey Nut Cheerios is America’s best-selling cereal. You probably knew that. It’s been that way for a while now and last year people bought 151 million boxes. Frosted Flakes are typically second on the list followed by old favorites like (in no particular order) Froot Loops, Lucky Charms, Frosted Mini-Wheats, Cinnamon Toast Crunch and Special K. They used to be called Cheerioats. Now, I never eat Honey Nut Cheerios myself because they have almonds. Actually, there are no almonds in there at all just almond flavor, but that’s close enough for me, if I wanna eat nuts I’ll open a tub of Beer Nuts like most Americans.

Anyway, the Honey Nut variety has nine times more sugar than basic Cheerios. Duh, that’s why people buy it. Common sense. Still, according to the New York Times, this is controversial, devastating shit. They report that something called an Environmental Working Group analysis says that cereals like Honey Nut Cheerios are linked to the “nation’s childhood obesity epidemic.” And the same group found that, brace yourselves, one cup of the cereal had more sugar than three Chips Ahoy cookies! Three cookies! How could anyone eat three whole cookies in one sitting, no wonder junior’s so tubby. It’s a bunch of crap. If kids can’t have any sugar how are they supposed to learn how to handle dental pain? And what do Honey Nut Cheerios have to do with the environment and why is anyone working on this. So this is why the earth is getting hotter by the second, because the Environmental Working Group is preoccupied with Tony the Tiger and that little Cheerios bee that’s flying around covering everything in honey.

The article goes on to say the Center for Science in the Public Interest has sued General Mills over the claims it makes about its cereals. Me and you are the public, right? Tell me why it’s in our interest to have federal agencies spending science dollars to study cereal? Here’s a science revelation, if you don’t put sugar on cereal, people will just do it themselves. When people eat Special K or Cheerios or Corn Flakes they do it with the sugar bowl sitting right next to them.

A bowl of cereal is probably the healthiest thing the average kid will eat all day. There’s nothing wrong with a little sugar. I once lost fifty-five pounds on a candy and beer diet. Kids get fat for the same reasons we all do, they don’t move enough and they eat too much. In fact, the sugar rush provided by Honey Nut Cheerios is probably responsible for the only exercise these little bastards ever get.

After learning of the high sugar content of Honey Nut Cheerios, the article’s author states that he is going to stop buying the cereal for his kid. What a weenie. He says instead of low-fat oats, he’s gonna start making his son steak and eggs for breakfast, because he’s worried about obesity and that sugar on the cereal can be a real killer.