Fortune Cookies

Ok, so here’s the deal. The other night me and my family (for you English majors out there, My family and I…my apologies), had Panda Express for dinner. Think what you want about Panda Express, but I think it is one of the best fine dining establishments in the good ol’ United States of America—Right behind Taco Bell, Great Mex, and Chipotle (Man I love Mexican Food). Anyways, the food itself was fantastic—I mean, orange chicken, Beijing beef, and enough rice to feed a small population just hits the spot—but something after the messy goodness of the food got to me. I opened a fortune cookie.

Now let me make something clear to you: I do not eat cookies, especially fortune cookies. With that said, I love to read my “fortunes” inside of them. The problem is, either I am having bad luck with fortune cookies, or someone is doing a little bit of false advertising. Allow me to explain.

The last time I opened a fortune cookie, there was nothing in it—literally. I took this to be a fortune that said I had nothing left to live for, and after hours of going hysterical, I calmed down and convinced myself the nice fortune cookie guys just forgot to put one in there. But enough of that, what really is getting me all worked up about this fortune cookie crap is there is no fortune in these cookies whatsoever. Fortunes are supposed to predict the future—and that’s why I open fortune cookies, to find out what is going to happen in my life. But instead of telling me I am going to make a lot of money in the near future, or that I will find the love of my life at sunrise, or that I am going to make a decision that will alienate my friends and cause me to be a loner for the rest of my life (that fortune would suck, but at least it would prepare me), I am getting “fortunes” that tell me what to do. Now I don’t know about you, but ain’t no one that tells me what to do. I live by my own rules, which just happen to also be the rules of the people with higher authority over me, but that’s no biggie.

If I wanted to have someone tell me what to do or how to live my life, I would go have a conversation with my mom and then do the exact opposite of the advice I was given, just to test the waters. But to have a “fortune” cookie tell me to go do this or that is just unacceptable. I don’t want advice cookies, I want a freaking fortune cookie. And to take matters to an even higher level, some “fortune” cookies give me sound moral advice—which is great, but not something I’m in dire need of. Moral advice is good, but I can get it from other places. Fortunes, not so much. I like to think of it this way: I think of myself as a decent human being, so I don’t want to know I should treat other people as I would want to be treated, but I do want to know my freaking fortune.

So I guess the whole point of this stupid little rant is “fortune” cookies aren’t really fortune cookies and that really bugs me. They should not be advertised as fortune cookies if they don’t predict the future, end of story. So, to all you brilliant marketing executives of the “fortune” cookie industry out there, you have two options before I start a headhunt for your jobs: Either give me a dang fortune (I sound like such a nerd because I don’t cuss, so it really doesn’t get my point across like I would like it too, but that’s another story for another day), or change the name of the cookies. I am tired of being misled and falling for the same trick over and over again with the hope that maybe, just maybe, this next fortune cookie will have a fortune for me. I’m tired in living in this web of lies.

All I want to know is what is going to happen next, is that so much to ask?