The Great Combo™ Caper

Why you don't take/give Combos™ from/to strangers ...

So I was on the train and saw this odd scene that demanded documentation.

There's a couple with a child in a stroller. They are sitting at the end of the ... (what are subway seats called, sub-seats?). Standing above them is a stranger, holding on to one of those... (what are those hanging things we hold on to called, sub-hangers?). The stranger is eating Combos™, ... out the bag no less (so low-brow, everyone knows you eat combos with only the finest of silverware, a sterling silver toothpick, and/or crystal plates).

So the baby is sitting in the stroller and is apparently telepathically communicating with the stranger, because all of a sudden, out of the blue, without any conspicuous prompting, the stranger gives the child a Combo™.

And then to my further surprise, the parents allow the child to take it. This baby is all of a year old, tops, well short of the legal age for Combo-eating. I don't consider myself a prude, but I was tempted to call Social Services on these people. I mean I know a Combo™ has riboflavin. And perhaps their new flavors/editions have been enriched with essential vitamins and nutrients, making it passable as some sort of ghetto multi-vitamin. But who allows their baby to take one from a stranger on the train??? Ewww. And she didn't even offer the combo with a sterling silver toothpick or anything, no, it was right out of her nasty, grubby, just-finished-fondling-the-escalator-handrail hands. The parents were so laissez-faire, I suspect they would have still allowed it even if she offered to chew it up and regurgitate it back into the baby's mouth.

But now here's the twist, the baby then took the Combo™, played with it for a while, feigned putting it into its mouth, and then proceeded to hand the combo off to the father. At which point I began feeling empathy for the Combo eater. Look like she was suckered by some sort of Combo™ Con, where hungry parents use their child to lure unknowing strangers into giving them nacho-cheese pretzel nuggets.

I waited to see if the stranger would demand the father return the Combo to her, that would have brought the odd scene full circle. But alas the stranger made no move, and after playing like he wasn't going to do anything with it, the father eventually ate the Combo.

I don't know who I want to judge more, the stranger who would have the gumption to give a Combo to a strange baby on the train. Or the Bonny & Clyde Combo™ Criminal Team. What I do know is I'm not taking or giving any Combos™ on the train ever. It's just too risky.