today i read an article about a girl scout who sold 17,328 boxes of cookies.
you guys.
seventeen thousand, three hundred and twenty eight boxes of girl scout cookies.
that is INSANE. it reminds me of the time in elementary school where our teacher demonstrated what “one million” constitutes by printing out zillions of sheets of stars and lining us up around the playground. i don’t really think i grasped a million, but i *did* grasp that standing next to a boy was really, really annoying.
i wish i knew if that was enough cookies to take us to the moon, cos i love stats like that.
what i also want to know is where they stored all of those cookies, cos a living room can only hold so much. just ask my mom.
note the messages on the boxes, meant to inspire the workers inside the cookie sweatshop.
apparently, fifteen year old jennifer sharpe accomplished this feat by selling cookies on a street corner.
“Sharpe sold cookies every day on a street corner with help from her mother and troop leader, Pam Sharpe. ‘We were always there; we never closed,’ Pam Sharpe said. ‘At one point, Jenny got really sick and we did shut down early, and we heard about it the next day.’”
ok, WHAT?
first of all, back in my day, there was none of this “corner” selling. we weren’t drug pushers, we were little girls who nervously went around the neighborhood with our moms and prayed that no large dogs jumped out from behind front doors. sometimes i got lucky, and my dad would sell a few boxes for me at his office, but that’s about it. nowadays, i can’t exit walgreens without moms (and occasionally the girl scouts themselves) asking me if i want to buy some cookies. one of my friends (selina?) told me that she even saw some cookie pushers OUTSIDE OF HER GYM. you guys. that is a “troop beverly hills” plot point, not a real life strategy.
second of all, who are these people that complained when jennifer was out sick? seriously, are we talking about cookie fans or crack addicts? i’m having “the wire” flashbacks. jennifer, you better watch out for omar little, cos he’s gonna break up yr cookie monopoly and TAKE YOU DOWN.
with all of that said, i still love girl scout cookies, even though i didn’t buy any this year. after reading the article, i decided to check out the current flavors, just to give my tummy a little nostalgia.
uh, ok, i don’t recognize HALF of these cookies. esp. cos they all have new names!! it’s like my favorite cookies have entered the witness protection program.
the REAL name of samoas is actually “caramel delights,” and i have NEVER heard the peanut butter sandwich cookies referred to as “do-si-dos.” that’s just really dumb. i could not sell that cookie with a straight face, not even if you gave me a patch for it.
and i don’t think we called the peanut butter chocolate ones “tagalongs,” but they were always too rich for my taste, so i don’t really care about the name.
i’m happy to see that “thin mints” have remained true to themselves. they were always my favorite; in fact, i still have some from last year in my freezer, because i’m an only child, and i hoard.
when i was doing a search for cookie images, i found this info-graphic from “the onion”:
jennifer sharpe is so hardcore, i bet she could even sell prune shingles on her corner. those addicts will buy anything.
LINKS
have you seen the trailer for the new zach galifianakis movie, “visioneers”? two words: judy greer.
olivia and erin, yr worst nightmare is now taking over japan. and it is seriously crow-eepy (was that too much? yeah, it was, wasn’t it).
you guys!! COOKIES ON STICKS!!!!!
so draco malfoy makes music now. which is weird. now i kinda want harry, hermione and ron to form a band and take him on.
it’s a green puppy!!!! a cute, v. neon green puppy!!
Dude, two words: Aleksei Stakhanov.
I assumed for years that the girl scouts baked the cookies themselves, hence the name ‘girl scout cookies’. I was fairly shocked when I realised they’re just cookies made in some factory somewhere that happen to be SOLD by girl scouts.
Don’t laugh. Irish girl scouts don’t sell cookies. Or biscuits, for that matter.
I’ve noticed this disconnect in Girl Scout cookie naming before. It seems to vary by region. Growing up in Dallas, I remember the same names as in the image above.
And while “Do-Si-Dos” does in fact sound weak, it doesn’t matter, because so are the cookies — they’re crap. If I wanted a lousy, chocolate-less sandwich cookie, I’d make one myself!
But honestly, you prefer “Caramel deLites” (I believe the preferred, ridiculous form) over “Samoas”? “Samoas” is fierce, fierce like Samoans, or perhaps like the combination of coconut and caramel. C’mon! And anyone who thinks Tagalongs are “too rich” really ought to think about getting out of the Little Brownie kitchen. (Yeah, that’s right, I said it!)
HOLY CRAP SARAH! What are you trying to do to me?? (First you diss Life on Mars and The Boosh, now this?? Am I going to have to watch myself this weekend? Are you out to get me?)
Second, I always called them tagalongs, dosidos and samoas. In fact, they changed Samoas to Caramel Delights when I was like 15, and I was all WTF IS THIS?
Ah, girl scout cookie time. How I remember well the nervous shuffle to the front step, hoping and praying that Mister Denton, who was old and senile and mean, wouldn’t actually be home to open the door. And then I could say that I’d *tried* and gave it my best and all that stuff my parents kept saying I had to do if I wanted to get anywhere in life.
Now I do my best to avoid Girl Scouts and their cheerful green uniforms. Because you may be onto something with your reference to The Wire - Thin Mints are so completely my crack. I can, and have, eaten an entire box. In one sitting. For breakfast. There’s just something about that chocolatey-minty-crumbly cookie, all cold from the freezer and melting ever so slightly on the tongue . . . mmm thin mints.
I thought they were samoas first and someone got offended so they had to change it to Caramel Delites. Samoas sounds better to me too. It’s like what Carlin said about the softening of our language. Caramel Delites is to Samoas as Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder is to Shell Shock.
As a former girl scout cookie selling diva, the original names were Samoas, Do-si-dos, Trefoils and Tagalongs. I’m glad they’ve changed them back.
To be honest though, I’m not a big fan anymore. I bought like three boxes of caramel delights and I’ve eaten maybe one of them. How sad. I feel like a little piece of my soul is gone.
Sarah, obviously your memory IS going, because like Erin, Moody and Talena, I grew up with them as Samoas, Trefoils, Tagalongs and Do-Si-Dos. Plus, just an FYI, that the types of cookies they sell are based on what region you are in. Different parts of the US have different cookie suppliers and therefor different cookies.
I really like the shortbread ones. It makes me happy to see that I get more of those per box than people who buy some of the other kinds.
How do you pronounce that? Is the accent on “Tre” or “foils”?
TREfoils
treFOILS
Maybe it’s French. tray-fua
I also recently started enjoying the lemon ones. Where they put the lemon icing on the bottom of the cookie.
My 13-year old sister is a Girl Scout, so every year around this time I receive a box in the mail containing the following beloved treats: Peanut Butter Sandwich Cookies, Caramel Delights and (of course) Thin Mints. It’s like Christmas for my mouth.
And is it just me or does anyone else’s mind immediately go to “Troop Beverly Hills” at the thought of selling cookies? Remember when they did the song and dance (”Cookie Time”) in front of the shops in Beverly Hills and the one girl wore the Tina Turner wig? I freaking love that movie; I’ll have to rent it to watch while inhaling my Thin Mints.
Here’s a link to that scene in case you all were curious:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=HJhchLeR1X0
hey now. HEY NOW. let’s not forget i grew up in louisiana, a state that is always, well, a little behind the times. so those of you from TEXAS may have sold samoas, but me and my cajun sisters sold caramel delights.
i agree with you talena, most of the cookies no longer hold a real appeal for me. but the thin mints?!! erin, i feel you.
and erin d., i wrote a post about troop beverly hills a while back, after i watched it for the 147th time. “khaki riches and cookie dreams!!”
Am I the only one who likes Do-Si-Dos? Oatmeal and peanut butter, two great tastes that taste great together! Samoas are sooo chewy delicious, and Thin Mints definitively rule the school. Sarah, I totally 100% agree–Tagalongs are way too rich. Blech.
Why do Girl Scouts need to become insanely overworked cookie pushers? Junkies like myself will always seek them out. Although the Walgreens technique is pretty brilliant, as I find myself thinking, “I should get some new mascara. And Girl Scout Cookies! Forward ho to Walgreens!”
Thin mints are the best. Frozen - I could sit down and eat the whole row. Did you know that there is Girl Scout ICE CREAM?!? I bought the thin mint kind once. Yumminess in a bowl. The last time I had a Girl Scount cookie was fabulous…I gave blood and some donor (read: parent who bought cases of Girl Scout cookies for their daughter and didn’t know what to do with 500 boxes) gave them to the blood center. I GOT AN ENTIRE BOX - just for trying to save a life. Good times. Good times.
Wait, Sarah… you grew up in Louisiana? Why don’t I remember that?
The girl scouts that usually sell cookies outside the Blockbusters near my dad’s house are nowhere to be found…. what’s going on?
I grew up in Colorado and that’s what the names were up there, so I don’t think that it is an excuse… Have you double checked with your mom??
oh man, Erin Who Isn’t Me, how I love that movie. I was so hoping that my own girl scout experience would be like Troop Beverly Hills. But it never was. (And speaking of TBH, it took me an embarassingly long time to realize that they were referring to TBH in that Rilo Kiley song, The Frug. Well, I take that back; I assumed they were, because it was the only place I’d ever seen The Freddy performed, but I didn’t at the time realize that Jenny Lewis was actually little Jenny Lewis of TBH fame. So I just thought they were being awesome and referencing TBH for the hell of it.)
sarah, may I remind you that by your own admission, you have the world’s worst memory? So maybe you should accept that you are wrong, and all of us are totally right. I say with love.