Expensive as Chips

I have just finished the task of eating chips. This is a fact, and any attempt to prevaricate on the matter will I'm sure result in greater ramifications in the future. I should clarify to you the nature of these chips, however. These are chips of the potato, not the poker, variety, and they are certainly not of the computing variety. To eat computer chips would be dangerous, unsatisfying and counterproductive to man's technological development.

This fascinating twist in events began with the recognition that, having quite literally no food in my possession of any sort (I did consider gobbling down a batch of vitamin C pills, I must confess), I decided something must be done to placate the faint corrosion in my core. Impelled by the monopolistic market conditions obtaining in my immediate vicinity in the early hours of the morning, I decided to bite the bullet - though at the time I did not realise this metaphor would soon attain not only a figurative but a literal validity - and make my spindly way to the resident tub of grease.

The horror of which I speak is a kind of locomotive purveyor of any foodstuff - any foodstuff that is liable to cause premature heart failure, I should add. It sits, static and brooding, much like the trapdoor spider from which it takes its inspiration, cloaked in innocuous sheets of metal whilst secretly harbouring its invidious fare, which it hurls on passing drunkards in the pursuit of its capitalist ambitions.

OK - this is all unimportant, one might assume, because the food at such places is inexpensive. I thought so too, until I was forced, by my unhelpful inability to refrain from purchasing things once in a spider's nest, to spend two of my finest, British, fair and just pounds sterling on what can only be described as a Pandora's box of plant derivation. I was quizzed of an evening by a stern man as to whether I would prefer my chips to be salted and vinegared. I acceded to his kind offer - though little did I know it was an involuted masking procedure, designed to screen from my disgust the horrors of the shambles (to quote the immortal Shelley). Having sprayed this arachnidian admixture upon the polystyrene casket in which my culinary hopes were inhumed, he passed the time bomb to me and pocketed my two pound coin, the outer ring of which adopted, in that exchange, a halolike and transcendent quality. Much like a blacksmith pacifying the beauty of a throbbing brand, he submerged the weeping coin into the innermost recesses of his infernal attire, and an audible hiss of anguish erupted from the depths.

I shall now essay to assay the quality of these chips. Drowned in this sickly emiction, which to me was entirely redolent of Marmite and suppurating cheddar, sat an extremely dejected bunch of hollowed-out witchetty grubs (one of these, I found to my horror, was not properly emptied), looks of futility seared into their squashy aspects, as if to convey some immense disappointment at the fact that their lives amounted to this - the production of low-grade potato substitute. The taste was comparable, again, to that of Marmite and suppurating cheddar, and the texture brought a yielding decomposition to the party. I felt as if the demoniac figure from behind the counter had conferred on me the gift of cannibalism, and here I was snatching up little humans from a regrettably-hued allotment and grinding them between my terrific maws. I took great joy in shearing the starchy, foul integuments from their hosts and sanctioning the resident souls to the various rings of hell. 'Gluttony for you, my child! I hope you enjoy eternal privation!' I cry, cackling wildly and spilling the untried upon the floor of my burning chamber. 'I will deal with you later!' I gobble, convulsing in sheer joy. I am Minos, I have unquestionable power, I am sovereign in this realm.

Look, I have no problem with paying two pounds for some decent food. I have done so in the past, and I daresay I will venture to do so again. But two pounds for this necropolitan oddity? Two pounds? Two pounds?! I pay less than that at a proper shop, with legitimate costs to factor in. In stark contrast, what I was dealing with now was effectively a frying pan on wheels. Where are the overheads? Are furry rear-view mirror dice tax deductible? Was this the most inefficient business the world had ever seen? I wondered whether perhaps, in the bowels of one of the fryers, a highly-skilled cadre of ferrets, on generous salaries with free private health care, curated a collection of fast food memorabilia. Rudimentary spatulas, rusted pans and soiled aprons would lie preserved in state, depending from above in solid gold cages, like royal prisoners.

Lastly, I have spoken of the quality of these foul digits but I have left the subject of quantity unforgivably neglected. I can only say of the portion handed to me that it was the atom of the food world, the smallest possible division of anything such that it can remain edible to the human race. Luckily for me, I happen to have a laboratory-grade photon microscope in my room, and was able to locate my meal in under four hours, placing it neatly over two grateful taste buds.

I now sit here, all sullen and impecunious, gazing on the polystyrene, erstwhile host of those blasted things, and I am being fondled by the strange urge to lift the vessel to my face and devour it utterly. The scent is far more agreeable than that of the charge contained within, resembling only faintly that of rotting entrails. Let this be a great lesson - packaging is the future mode of sustenance! And it really is cheap as chips, unlike chips.