As an ardent video gamer and human being, I’m very familiar with what gamers like to call a “fetch quest”. If you are not familiar, it’s basically the way a game will extend a mission, make a game longer. In real life, it’s just a way of making your life more frustrating. The definition is a seemingly easy quest that turns tedious and frustrating and hard for a reward that is way less. (Some people would call that their everyday job.)

Here’s an example. In a video game you run into a character. This character says, “Oh no, my chicken escaped from their coop. Will you help me coral them? If you do so, I will give you a dozen eggs.” Since you are easily distractible and your main quest sounds hard, you decide to help. So they tell you that you have to find a certain herb, which will attract the chickens back to the coop. So you go try to buy herb at a store, but they are sold out, and the store owner says he will get you the herb, but you have to do something for him. You have to brave the forbidden forest and fight five bats and collect their wings, which will power his computer, which will allow him to buy the herb, which will attract the chicken, which will allow the chickens to make eggs.

So on and so forth. By the end of your 30 hour journey of getting people things, you finally get the chickens in the coop and realize that all this fetching was for a dozen eggs. In the beginning, the only reason you did it was because you thought it would be a simple task and the reward seemed equal to the ease of your task. (Starting to sound like your job now?)

A couple of weeks ago, I started my own fetch quest. My wife was helping me with my lunches for the week and to make it easier, and so my sandwiches didn’t go bad, she put some of our leftover mayo packets from fast food restaurants in the box. She did that for a couple of weeks until we ran out. We had three for the week, but for the last two days, we were out. I figured that would be no problem. I would just go to some fast food restaurant, walk in, grab some packets and be out like a cub scout.

So at lunch, my seemingly simple fetch quest began. I went to Chik-Fil-A to grab some packets. Since they are always super busy, it was a bit of a quest. I had to weave in and out of traffic, avoid the drive thru line that blocks traffic and find a spot. Then I had to avoid all the people and cars and try to find the condom, uh I mean condiment area. At the end of the rainbow, there was no pot of gold. Just mustard and ketchup. Fools gold.

I proceeded to three other fine dining fast food establishments in the area and had even less luck. I started to wonder if in fact these simple, yet absolutely necessary packets even existed. Had they become extinct? Had the supply of mayo packets dwindled in the last few months? Had people realized their rarity and started collecting them to sell on Mercari? Were they now way more tasty? I started to wonder if I should have kept the ones I had for a zombie apocalypse, since they might be the only thing that would slow zombies down.

Now my quest started to ramp up. I started drawing maps of the area. I scouted every fast food restaurant, started collecting phone numbers and data, and tried to bribe employees for information. No mayonnaise packets existed. Would this be the end of civilization? The zombies will not be able to be stopped, because mayo packs are nowhere to be found.

I gave up hope. I told my wife I would just have to switch to peanut butter. Life was hopeless.

Days later, we were out running errands and needed to stop for food. My son and I got Wendy’s, but my wife and daughter wanted chicken. As we got to the window, my wife just happened to ask, “Do you have any mayonnaise packets?” The voice on the other side of the box said, “Sure. How many do you want?”

How many do I want?, I thought. I want ALL the mayonnaise packets. Every last one you have in the store. Everyone you’ve ever produced. I need ALL of them!

“Could we just get three?” my wife said.

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

And thus ended my desire to exist in this world. The zombies can just take me.

Speaking of giving up, here is Bitter Friday Giftures…

When my quest started…

But then I entered the Chik-Fil-A…

And then I started wondering…

What is this place?…

How did I get here?…

But most of all…

This is becoming…

Way too much…

All these workouts…

Just for some stupid mayonnaise…

That’s it…

I just….

Because when life give you mayo, make mayonnaise.

ARRRRRRGGGGGHHHHHHHH

Bitter Mayonnaise Ben