They're Probably Not

“Fig Newtons are made with bananas?”  -Anonymous Co-Worker


It should be relatively well known at this point that Jeremy is a self-repeatedly-proclaimed genius.  He also works with geniuses.  On occasion, genius runs into some stumbling blocks along the way.  Have a seat, and Jeremy will regale us with an entirely true story from the office.    


So, not long ago, I was sitting in a meeting at work.  This particular meeting is a recurring meeting, every week at the same time, and it's pretty long.  It's long enough that is fairly often devolves into some sort of nonsense, and often singing.  


Jeremy gets paid for this stuff...


Another feature of this meeting is the snacks.  On occasion, cookies, candies, or other goodies make an appearance for the team to enjoy during the productive times.  Recently, due in no small part to laziness on everyone's part, this too has devolved into the treats being Tic Tacs.  (Not a sponsor...but, you know...you can be, Tic Tacs.  Give me a call)  Tic Tacs are ostensibly breath mints, but come in such a variety of fruit flavors that they can be substituted for candy in a pinch.


At some point, this really does get around to Fig Newtons, I swear.  Also, not a sponsor.  


Not long ago, we were provided with banana flavored Tic Tacs.  They were at least reasonably tasty and I assume made my breath smell okay, so we went with it.

Well, this week, once again, the snack patrol (of which I am totally a member) slacked off, leaving us with wintergreen Tic Tacs as the treat of the day.  Not nearly as tasty, but probably did a better job with the whole breath thing, since that's what they're made for.  Anyway, this led to some good-natured ribbing of the Tic Tac provider that we had mints instead of a more appropriate candy for the meeting.  One person lamenting this fact by pointing out that we recently had the banana flavored version, and that we had no banana this week.  As you might imagine, this devolved into song, singing the song "Yes!  We Have No Bananas." 


Here's a Fun Fact!  That song is way older than you think.  It was written in 1922 by Frank Silver and Irving Cohn for the Broadway show "Make It Snappy."  


The song was also made famous more recently by being featured in a commercial.  Everyone in the meeting remembered this fact, but not what it was a commercial for.  The meeting continued.  During this time, a certain genius engineer took it upon himself to Google what commercial it was which used that song for its soundtrack.  So, a few minutes after the meeting had resumed, I randomly blurted out, "It was for Fig Newtons."  The commercial featured a monkey examining all of the new fruit flavored offerings of Newton-style cookies, but lamenting the fact that there were no banana flavored Newtons.

Only mildly confused, but certainly understanding of the interruption, a co-worker asked what was Fig Newtons, to which everyone else, who had begun laughing at this point, explained that it was the Bananas song we had sung minutes earlier.  To which, the anonymous co-worker asked, "Fig Newtons are made with bananas?" 

The meeting ended on time.