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Are Endless Salad and Bread Sticks really endless?


by marzipan

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     After a long hiatus from my Neopian writing career, I decided to restart it by attempting an important and nigh impossible feat: to once and for all determine whether Endless Salad and Bread Sticks truly lives up to its moniker.

           My first step was to purchase this item from an unsuspecting and random user via the Shop Wizard. Asking the fur ball wizard for help, I was soon confronted with a list of prices for this supposedly infinite item. The cheapest price? Fifty my finest Neopoints.

     Surely, this was a deal that was too good to be true.

     If the salad and bread sticks were truly endless, no one would have to buy any other food item again. Ever. Why had the Neopian food economy not crashed on the fateful day this item was released, 26 August, 2006? It is now almost the thirteenth anniversary of this incredible feat of light dining engineering, a food that could conceivably feed the masses, end Neopian hunger, allow the Soup Faerie to retire, bankrupt all Neopian cuisine shops and render the Food Shop in Neopian Central to nothing more than a gathering spot for gourmet club enthusiasts.

     And yet - here we are, still paying daily visits to the Giant Omelette and the Giant [REDACTED] to get our free daily portions of omelette and [REDACTED], the Soup Faerie still has a sizable queue in front of her kitchen, none of the food stalls across Neopia have gone out of business, and the Food Shop in Neopia Central is cleaned out on an hourly basis. All of this, despite the existence of a supposedly infinite food.

     So if this is the case - surely the item title is misleading? A case of false advertisement. It can’t really be endless if Neopians are still asking the Soup Faerie to feed them. Can it?

     PREPARATIONS - DAY 0

     Bought one (1) Endless Salad and Bread Sticks.

     -50 NP.

     My Kacheek, Marselle, is joining me in this highly scientific and important study.

     Our investigation begins tomorrow.

     EXPERIMENT COMMENCES

     DAY 1, MEAL 1 - Breakfast

     Marselle and I pull the salad and bread sticks out of the fridge. We set it down and each take a portion for breakfast. The bowl suspiciously remains full.

     The bread sticks are fine, I guess? I mean I would like some olive oil and vinegar on them, but it’s endless so I shouldn’t complain too much.

     The salad is fairly decent but lacking in substance. No cheese, eggs, or meat of any kind. Just leaves and tomatoes.

     Meal 1 down and we are already feeling healthy.

     DAY 1, MEAL 2 - Lunch

     Marselle is already complaining about having salad and bread sticks again. It is only our second meal of this endlessness, and I live in fear of the endless complaints that will accompany the infinite salad and bread sticks.

     DAY 1, MEAL 3 - Dinner

     Marselle is no longer partaking in this investigation, and has instead made herself a Peanut Butter and Jam Sandwich. I would quote what she said to me, but that is unfit for publication. Suffice to say, she decided that this pursuit was silly and a waste of time, and is now filling her stomach with sugar.

     I would also be lying if I stated that I wasn’t jealous of that Peanut Butter and Jam Sandwich.

     I heave a heavy sigh as I begin my third portion of salad and bread sticks.

           DAY 2, MEAL 1 - Breakfast

     The grooves on this bread stick I am about to consume appear to be arranged to vaguely resemble a face. I am slightly unsettled as I continue to eat my days old yet still not stale bread stick.

     DAY 2, MEAL 2 - Lunch

     I pick up another bread stick which bears a similar resemblance to facial features. A small piece of lettuce flutters from their head, and I pick it up and place it back into place. This makes the bread stick more human, as it appears that they have dyed their hair green and gone punk.

     I don’t actually remember eating any of my salad and bread sticks at this point.

     DAY 2, MEAL 3 - Dinner

     Some tomato juice has stained each side of the bottom of the bread stick, making it appear to have red shoes. How adorable!

     DAY 3, MEAL 1 - Breakfast

     See the little bread stick see its little feet. See its little lettuce-wig, isn’t the bread stick sweet.

     DAY 3, MEAL 2 - Lunch

     This breadstick has become my friend, I can’t possibly eat it. I’ll call you Winston. Yes, Winston. For no apparent reason nor allusion to anything at all.

     After Marselle abandoned me in this investigation, I needed a new friend. Who needs real friends when you can simply make yourself one out of bread stick, lettuce, and tomato juice?

     DAY 6, MEAL ???

     Time has passed but we are no longer privy to its secrets. How much time has passed? At what speed has time passed us? All of these questions remain unanswered. It’s just you and me on this island, Winston. We have to build a raft to leave it. Luckily we have an endless supply of salad and bread sticks. If we shred the lettuce we can use it as rope to tie bread sticks together in order to sail off into the wide open ocean, back to civilisation. You’d like civilisation, Winston. You haven’t seen any of it, having been born and bre(a)d on this island, but you’ll like it. They got all sorts out there, like jam and peanut butter and... more jam. Just you wait.

     DAY 9, MEAL ???

     We’re finally making a break for it, Winston. We’re going to leave this island and-

     Winston no! Bread overboard! Bread overboard! Winston you’re taking on water too quickly! You’re going to go down Winston! Rise Winston, rise! No Winston... I can’t lose you, not now, not now that we’ve made the first step to see civilisation again...

     [INTERMISSION]

     Hi friends. It appears that I have had what can only be described as a fever dream in the previous entries of my investigation log. I have spent the past few weeks recovering from Endless Salad and Bread Stick poisoning in the hospital, which I was admitted to when Marselle found me sitting on a bread stick raft too small for me, gently cradling a wet bread stick with a lettuce leaf on its head and referring to it as ‘Winston’.

     The practicing physician informed me that attempting to finish Endless Salad and Bread Sticks is a not uncommon occurrence among unsupervised children (not me) and adults with a large amount of hubris (me). It should not be attempted under most circumstances, and I also learnt that the primary use of Endless Salad and Bread Sticks is actually at the Food Club, where the organisers occasionally need a ‘filler food’ in between the main dishes. I would like to take this opportunity to inform everyone reading that the Food Club is populated with highly experienced professionals who know what they’re doing, and indeed there is a supervising physician on site in case anything gets out of hand.

     I have kept most of the passages in my investigation log in order to serve as a cautionary tale, although I did have to cut out several nonsensical passages, a few of which were merely doodles and scribbles of bread stick anatomy. There are numerous perils we face in life, many of which are not immediately obvious to us. By the time the danger becomes clear, we are often too far gone to see what has befallen of us. I implore every reader to remember and give appreciation to the loved ones around them, as they are the ones who take care of us in times of need and time of crises.

     In any case, what have we learnt here? This investigation first set out to ask the question: can Endless Salad and Bread Sticks solve Neopian hunger? And the answer to that is: in theory, yes. Are Endless Salad and Bread Sticks also used a torture tool with which one breaks the will of their enemies? Also, yes.

     And there you have it. While Endless Salad and Bread Sticks can feed the masses, it really shouldn’t. No one apart from the most vile of criminals should ever be subjected to this terror on a regular basis, and I believe most frequenters of light dining in modestly decorated restaurants do not fall under that category.

 
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