Volume 3, Entry 35: Chipotlewaiting Game
The red-hot inversion of delayed gratification
On October 7, 2009, South Park aired the eighth episode of its thirteenth season. Titled “Dead Celebrities”, the episode revolves around the paranormal: Kyle’s little brother, Ike, is haunted by the ghosts of recently deceased entertainers. This leads the boys to recruit paranormal investigators to assist but also leads to hijinks involving possession, Michael Jackson, and a child beauty pageant.
That I had to look up that summary might make this next statement seem odd, but it remains the truth: “Dead Celebrities” was instantly iconic to me for a silly reason: it featured a parody of Billy Mays, the enthusiastic and earnest pitchman for OxiClean who had passed away a few months earlier. The episode’s over-the-top impression of Mays in the episode left me in stitches but also stuck in my head. The next summer, I emulated it at the AVID Summer Institute in what might be the most out-of-character thing I’d ever done to that point, and some readers might also remember the impression’s cameo introducing the Fundamental Theorem of Calculus lesson during Calculus AB. It suffices to say: my affection grew for Mays after the episode aired and his memory became a part of my developing charisma.
As he did in his ubiquitous TV infomercial work, the Billy Mays on South Park was depicted hawking a product: Chipotleway, a tool for dealing with the aftermath of eating at Chipotle.
Had the episode aired two years earlier, I might not have understood the reference. My first visit to Chipotle was in 2007 when Matt and I ate there after a drive back from Davis. I ordered a taco basket with red hot salsa and, my not-yet-trained mouth burning, I fell in love. The flavor was otherworldly; the burn on my tongue was fiery stimulation that never obscured the rich textures and fantastic taste.
After that first visit, Chipotle became a staple in my rotation of restaurants, a place I’d visit once or twice a month and speak highly enough of to receive gift cards for. I’m not sure I ever would have named it one of my favorite places, but, despite the long lines, it consistently delivered one of my favorite meals. That said, I still might go so far as to say I have a storied history with the burrito place: this very newsletter was born over lunch with Dorothy at the Chipotle on Laguna.
Waxing poetically about the Chipotle experience like this obscures the reality of the restaurant chain, though. Chipotle makes good food with wonderful heat, it’s not outlandishly expensive for how filling it is—one burrito can definitely last two days for most people—and a potent combo of mobile ordering and additional stores in our area have fixed the biggest problems that once plagued the chain. Indeed: Chipotle is great.
…
Ahem.
Fine.
Chipotle is great…for a few hours.
There’s a reason “Dead Celebrities” hooked me so completely: Billy Mays’ impression rocked but his ghost also hawked Chipotleway. And, while that was a fictional product bathed in hyperbole, I laughed because I understood the monetary cost for a burrito, chips, and drink pales in comparison to the digestive cost of consuming that meal.
I write this now home after a five mile run characterized by the sensation of a smoldering cement ball sloshing around my gut. There’s been no heartburn—thank you, Alka-Seltzer Relief Chews—but my stomach has gurgled and broiled since the moment I hopped out of bed. It’s like my pH balance has been shredded as thoroughly as the extra cheese I ordered; it’s as if the fire of the salsa has teamed up with my stomach acid in an attempted mutiny against my digestive tract. To say I feel sick would be inappropriate, but it’s also not wrong; molten lava churns through me as we speak. My body clearly doesn’t love it.
I had three potential topics in mind for this week (including this one) and I told myself I would decide in the morning which trail to follow based on how I felt. But I think I knew where I’d land hours before because I know how I would feel. To make what should be obvious to you already explicit:
My dinner last night was Chipotle.
Chipotle landed on my plate because of a fundraiser for the sophomore class. I hadn’t had Chipotle in nearly a year, the last time being a dinner with Amiel. That aversion probably exacerbated the rise of Mordor in my intestines, but it also reflects my increased dietary discipline. I eat too much when I get Chipotle which makes my exercise routine more arduous, but I also go in knowing that the joy in consuming that burrito will be forgotten in eight hours’ time. I made multiple jokes about that fact yesterday while helping advertising the fundraiser. I pre-medicated with laughter, knowing that the digestive discomfort was en route.
But yet: I bought Chipotle. I savored every delicious bite of my burrito. Hell: I bought extra salsa and chips to pair with a less explosive meal tonight. I love eating Chipotle, despite its cost.
And that is a very unique thing for me. I am a person who does most everything else according to a strict adherence to delayed gratification. I exercise in the morning so I can relax and enjoy dessert later. I grind through work now so that I can gain freedom from it later. I eat the stuff I dislike first to end on the best parts, I struggle to open gifts unwilling to exchange present amusement for the potential of joy later, and I’ve read exactly one yearbook message from my teaching career, dead set on waiting until the end to finally see. It extends to video games as well: the Yooka-Laylee sequel and Pokémon Legends: Arceus each remain unopened boxes on my shelf awaiting a moment when I have earned the right to cash in my waiting for a taste of the fun they have long promised and tempted me with.
I do this with almost everything.
I can’t pinpoint exactly when this mindset took over, but it’s been some time. Looking back on my younger years, I can see it starting with Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, the sequel I refused to let myself read until I finished all of my AP summer work in 2003. I’d already been organizing meals according the principle—hell: everyone who eats dessert last already kinda does—but that seems like the moment when the pattern moved from subconscious to something almost controlling. I had to earn my right to a pleasure I’d anxiously awaited; joy was a hollow distraction unless it capped or celebrated finishing something with less joy. I sought a pure joy impregnable against the guilt of less fun stuff hanging over my head.
It’s not difficult to see the danger in this mindset. To someone with a damaged self-image and low self-worth, the moment of earning that pleasure or fun or joy risks never arriving. Nothing done is ever enough; there’s always something else that could be completed or finished or built in order to earn the rights to enjoying something. This is “One more, Coach” but taken to its toxic extreme because I’m never good enough to call it a day. I could always benefit from one more rep. I keep paying my dues now so that I can perform better later regardless of whether I’m already at peak performance.
Reflecting on this mindset only highlights further the uniqueness of my affection for Chipotle. Eating Chipotle stands among the only activities I undertake in which I willingly sacrifice future agony for pleasure in the present. I know that I will enjoy every bite of my burrito but rue every burning morsel hours later. But yet: I buy it. I eat it. I savor it. I can convince myself to push back opening a box of baseball cards for years in pursuit of maximizing my future fun at an unspecified date or walk nearly forty miles before lunch so that the exhaustion lets me justify a sugary dessert or a plate of Flaming Nacho Doritos that night, but Chipotle is among the only exceptions where I celebrate today and suffer tomorrow.
In a perfect world, I would surely strive to embrace present pleasure over joy deferred more often. There’s a danger in always eating dessert last: if an extinction-level event occurs mid-meal, you’ll never get to relish the sweetness of treating yourself. Moreover, even I can see how treacherous the slope is thinking this way and how seemingly trivial it would be to slip into putting off entire meals or the like. This is to say: I harbor no illusions that my manner of doing things is ideal. It isn’t; it’s not by any stretch of the imagination. I’m actively working to change it, trying to regularly push aside the relentless pull of work to spend time with friends, to bake, or to work on a project of my own (including this newsletter).
But Chipotle does a terrible job of motivating that shift in approach. I would take my moaning stomach in exchange for an hour of dinner with Nate and Bria any day of the week, but there’s nevertheless a clear message sent when, 36 hours later, my gut continues to grumble and I still feel like my stomach is one wrong step from unraveling. To undo an unhealthy obsession with delayed gratification, I have to be reminded that early gratification doesn’t lead to imminent disaster.
Unfortunately, my burrito with red hot chili salsa has done nothing to convince me that is the case. My bloated abdomen weeps from my carpe diem decision-making last night.
Change is as challenging as digesting Chipotle.
Well: I thought I would have a release date ready for you today, but plans changed after a fiasco with the team I hired for formatting. I hope that next week will feature that information—and an essay that doesn’t heavily feature fast food!
