Cereal Thriller - Day 33

Today I was part of a research study on cereal. I signed up years ago after someone at a party told me how they had made a crapload of cash being a guinea pig. Being as financial ties have bound me, I signed up and waited. Constantly let off the hook since I didn't measure up - usually as soon as the term "single" was spoken - I was thrilled when I had a chance to try a new cereal.

It was a raisin bran kind of cereal with trail mix supposedly involved. You pick up the box, eat the cereal as instructed, usually over a certain number of days, and then come back to be questioned for two hours.

What I didn't know was that they get more test subjects than they need and only some get to scrutinize the cereal for the group and the other half get to go home. Either way you get more than $100. Cool deal. Especially when they sent me home.

Like jury duty, I wondered what was wrong with me, and like the same, I was happy to leave and get paid.

My two cents about the cereal: I liked the bran flakes plain since they were soggy in milk. I loved the raisins, though the almonds were few and far between (so much so that when I filled out the booklet they gave me and everytime I saw the word "almond" I was like "oh yeah, I saw a sliver"). What I didn't like were the yogurt clusters - which apparently had big fans in the other rejects that sat with me waiting for our checks.

They were old hats at this. Women, mid 40s to say late 50s who complained. Well most of them did, especially the one across from me. I was sort of happy she had to do the project while I got to scram.

The cereal wasn't much to look at, but I love the bowls I eat cereal from. I got them at Target years ago for a dollar a piece and have used them ever since for anything from morning foods, to dips to soups and even as a place to store my grape tomatoes.