Last night was Beggars’ Night, and we bought too much candy. (We had no trick-or-treaters at all visit our new house, so any candy would have been too much.) Kish’s edict was unequivocal: get the candy out of the house, immediately! So, to the office and the counter next to the fifth floor coffee station it went. By 8 a.m., another of my office mates, who had a cool witch serving bowl, also had weighed in with her extras, and the coffee station was ready for the inevitable onslaught. I’m guessing that this same scene was duplicated in countless offices around the country.
By 1:30 the hungry denizens of the fifth floor had made an appreciably large dent in the candy supplies. The Snickers bars were the first to go, followed by M&Ms and Milky Ways, and the Three Musketeers bars were bringing up the rear. There was a huge post-lunch, “its-kind-of-like-a-dessert-so-its-OK-for-me-to-have-one-or-two” rush on the candy, and one grateful consumer left a nice thank-you note.
By 4 p.m., the human tide had subsided. Only a few lonely, somewhat pathetic-looking candies remained in the witch’s straw bowl. The plate had been removed entirely, and the jar was empty. Even the boring Three Musketeers bars had been consumed by the chocolate-craving occupants of the fifth floor — if not by colleagues on other floors who heard through the grapevine that there were good candy pickins on 5.
How much candy do you suppose is consumed in offices on the day after Beggars’ Night, anyway?
Webner House 