If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it

As is my habit, I listen to (as opposed to watch, because, to me, that involves sitting) the “Today Show” in the mornings as I work my magic before leaving the house. One day last week I heard a piece on Hershey’s chocolate, and it was so disturbing that I hit rewind on the DVR and watched it.

There’s a woman in the blogosphere, Cybele May, who, according to her, eats and blogs about chocolate everyday. And she began to notice that her candy didn’t taste like it used to, so she investigated the candy labels.

Sure enough, she found that certain Hershey’s milk chocolate candies have been changed. Hershey’s reportedly has switched to less expensive ingredients to keep their profits the same. As a result, the chocolate in Mr. Goodbars, Milk Duds, and other items now contain vegetable oil instead of cocoa butter. And, according to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, if milk chocolate doesn’t contain cocoa butter, which makes it creamy and, well, yummy, it’s not milk chocolate.

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So, you caught all the fanfare about this switch Hershey’s has made, right? That “New Coke”-type ad campaign? No? Huh.

Maybe that’s because they just quietly changed the labels from “milk chocolate” to simply “chocolate,” hoping, in my opinion, that no one would notice.

And how did that go over? Well, in the case of Almond Joy, not so well. According to the morning program, Hershey’s received so many complaints about the taste of that candy after cocoa butter was removed, they’ve already put it back in.

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Now, the folks at Hershey’s haven’t completely lost their minds. They’ve left Kisses, Hershey bars, and Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups alone. I’d like to think that, when it came to these classics, Hershey’s didn’t just try to fix what wasn’t broken, but I can’t. I’m not a chocoholic, but I do like milk chocolate. My Hershey’s choice? Mr. Goodbars. And Mr. Goodbar wasn’t broke and didn’t need to be fixed.

I feel a little cheated.

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Regarding fall, did you know that…

…it was Benjamin Franklin who initially suggested daylight savings time (in 1784)?

…the on the autumnal equinox, which marks the first day of fall, the position of the sun is such that the length of day and night are equal?

…the full moon that occurs closest to the autumnal equinox is the harvest moon?

…and the first full moon following the harvest moon is the hunter’s moon?

…the first jack-o’-lanterns were carved from turnips?

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Ok, I was going to call it a column with the above trivia, but I caught the conniption fit David Letterman threw on his Wednesday show because John McCain canceled his appearance, and is briefly suspending his presidential campaign, to, of all things, tend to his senatorial duties.

And I’ve just got to say that Both McCain and Barack Obama are U.S. Senators. That’s their title. That’s their job, or at least their day job. And that is what their paychecks are for.

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I just think it’s cool that McCain hasn’t forgotten that.