Xanthan Gum
"I'm a bit hungry."
"I am too. D'you want to get something?"
"Yeah. What are you in the mood for?"
<silence>
"Probably not the Olive Garden, which somehow in the last 10 years became Satan's restaurant."
"Satan's restaurant?"
"I used to like them, probably up until maybe 1996 or 1997 even. Then, somehow, everything started to suck. Or my taste got better. I don't know."
"It seems like there could be a few steps between those facts and the assertion that they're directly affiliated with the Father of All Lies."
"Have you seen the commercials where they try to pass off their Italian bona fides?"
"That's just Madison Avenue talking. It should be about the food. There's no other reason to go to a restaurant."
"I think they have composed entire dishes out of xanthan gum."
<silence, considering>
"That would be pretty evil, as things go."
"Funny how easy it is to prove there's a devil, huh? People ask all the time how there could be a God, if the world is the way it is, but nobody talks about how the same sort of logic would be practically self-evidence of a devil."
<silence again>
"We don't have to eat at the Olive Garden."
"Thanks."
"But maybe I am in the mood for something with just a bit of xanthan gum."