Although I try to resist, protesting that I'm on a diet and that I will not be tempted, the longest I've gone without McDonald's so far in 2018 is a paltry 11 days. I went travelling in Dublin, Lisbon and... uh, Manchester, and at all three of these locations, delicious french fries met lips, and all manner of greasy food was shoved down my throat. No regrets.
You're probably a lot like me in that respect.
You head under the Golden Arches like other people might head to church; taking your seat at your usual place, and smiling at the congregated masses inside. Your sermon is the moment they read out your order number; your hymns of praise the groans of ecstasy that escape your voicebox as you bite into your meal of choice.
True bliss.
Like quite a few people, your go-to McDonald's meal might be the cheeseburger and fries; simple, manageable, delicious. But what's your tithe for such a culinary journey - how much would you be willing to pay for a cheeseburger and fries? Especially a cheeseburger and fries made back in the year 2012?
If that question piques your curiosity, you might be interested to learn that this isn't a hypothetical question - you can legitimately try your hand at buying a six-year-old cheeseburger and fries from McDonald's. A time where Barack Obama had just secured four more years in the White House, the first Avengers film was fresh in the mind and we were about 20 percent sure that the world was going to end at some point in December. Good times.
Dave Alexander is the man in possession of this fast food fossil, boasting that the McDonald's burger and fries he bought all those years ago "surprisingly decent looking still". A rural farmer by trade, the man from Ontario, Canada, told Robyn Bresnahan, the guest host of Canadian interview show As It Happens that his meal looks "very sellable".
Um... okay buddy.
"The fries are stunningly good looking. The fries look like they were purchased this morning," Alexander revealed on the radio show, also revealing that he'd set a starting bid of $29.99. "The burger itself has darkened a little bit. The bun is about as hard as a hockey puck, but it looks just like it's brand new cosmetically."
Alexander says he asked his daughter to buy the meal on June 7, 2012, as an experiment. He'd heard the rumours about the burgers refused to rot, and wanted to do some good old-fashioned mythbusting. He was pleasantly surprised. "We live in the country and we've never seen a fly land on it. Ever," he boasted.
Even better (worse), he made his own burger and fries at home to see how they'd match up, and the answer is: not quite as well. "The cheese on the homemade one, especially the french fries, the potatoes, just look like little bits of charcoal right now," Alexander explained, and I don't know about you, but I've completely lost my appetite for lunch now.
So, what would you spend on an archaic cheeseburger and fries? What would you do with it - sit it on a mantelpiece? Sell it off again? Eat it? Sadly, you might never get a chance to try - eBay ended up pulling the items from their listing, explaining that any and all food items need "a clearly marked expiration or use by date," and can "not be altered or changed in any way". Boo. Spoilsports.
David Alexander is "just stunned". "I can't fathom what these people are thinking," he lamented, but at least he gets to keep that McDonald's cheeseburger in his possession for just that little bit longer. What a... privilege.