A Word About Ice Cream Cones

First, an admission: I have never understood the concept of ordering a sundae. Sure, some Ben & Jerry's is good at home, but given the option, why settle for pure ice cream with toppings when you could be enjoying that perfect balance of crunchy waffle texture and sweet dairy goodness that is an ice cream cone? Sure, they can be a little drippy, but the challenge is part of the fun.

Now, those cake cones, the light-colored ones (1) with the flat bottoms and small grinning child-mascot? Not acceptable. You might as well just fashion the cone from thin cardboard, or communion wafer dough. I prefer actual texture, thank you. On the other hand, the so-called "waffle cone" (2) (also light-colored, and usually the largest cone option) is kind of large. Which is why I prefer the darker, smaller sugar cone (3). You know, your basic ice cream cone with the pointy end? Yeah, those.

I like ice cream cones, even if there's no ice cream involved. Emory's dining services, for instance, has soft serve, which is a perfectly acceptable alternative. Provided, that is, that the cone is of the right kind. They are, however, all out of sugar cones of late, and I was in need of an ice cream cone today. I refused to settle for the cake cone, and a styrofoam bowl with a spoon was out of the question. Which meant it was waffle cone or nothing. Okay, I thought. I'll just ask for the waffle cone with less ice cream. That should work.

Two minutes later, I am handed a waffle cone filled to the point where the soft serve towers precariously four inches above the edge of the cone, chocolate jimmies (4) already diving off the edges like sailors on a burning ship. I look at the cone. I look at the server. I am a nonconfrontational person. I turn and walk away.

Leaving me, of course, with a rather annoying quandary. I had wanted the ice cream for eating cone + ice cream, not eating two cups of soft serve before getting to the cone. But I can't eat all of this, and the heck if I'm going to eat just the top and throw away the crunchy goodness of the bottom third. So, where to dispose of ice cream? And how?

surreptitiously, I go upstairs and find a relatively secluded trash can, only to realize I have no means of removing said ice cream from cone. Perhaps I can break off a piece of the top of the cone and scrape off some ice cream, I think. Surely this will... oh. Oh, dear. That's not working at all, is it? Indeed it was not. Ice cream all over my fingers, but the mountain-o'-chocolate remained where it was. The hell with it, then. What's the worst that can happen here? My fingers can't get any more sticky.

*cough*

...There are, I am now convinced, few things more embarrassing than trying not to meet the eye of passerby as you're standing over a trash can with an ice cream cone in one hand, and the equivalent of a scoop and a half of soft serve in the other.

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(1) In some parts of the US, also called a sugar cone or waffle cone.
(2) Usually always called a waffle cone, unless (1) or (3) are called waffle cones, in which case often referred to as a large waffle cone.
(3) In some parts of the US, also called a waffle cone or cake cone.
(4) They're jimmies! Jimmies, dammit! Sprinkles are for meteorologists and five year olds playing make-believe with fairy dust!