The "The Time You Have In Jelly Beans!" Story

It was an ordinary day.  Preparing for the arrival of the Easter Bunny at our household.  Our grandkids are all as tall as my wife, but she insists that we have an egg hunt so they can hunt for plastic eggs that are hid in our back yard.  And, what's funny is the grandkids still enjoy and expect us to have the egg hunt.  Could be all the candy and treats, as well as the dollar bills, that we put in the plastic eggs.  The 50 to 60 eggs are hid under bushes, behind fences, under flower pots, and around the rear porch.  Every summer I always seem to mow over one or two that had not been found during the egg hunt.  So, what do we put in the eggs?  Why, sugar treats, naturally!  All the good things that their parents don't want them to have.  Small pre-packaged bags as well as a variety of other treats and naturally jelly beans.  

Everyone knows I will be placing jelly beans in the eggs I prepare, since they are one of my favorite sweets.  For Christmas I usually get a container or two of cashews as well as a container or two of jelly beans.  Used to be Jelly Belly brand, but when they found they can buy store brand jelly beans at Costco and BJs stores, they opted for them.  And, I can't tell the difference anyway.  And the flavors; I just love the variety of flavors that come in those big containers.  They even put photos of the different varieties so I can guess and see if I'm right.  Do you know the origin of the jelly bean?  Seems it is a bit of a mystery.  Some believe it is a combination of the soft, chewy Middle Eastern sweet called Turkish Delight that was around for thousands of years and the hard candy shell of Jordan Almonds which are a product of the 17th Century.  Candy maker William Schrafft advertised that people should send his treat called a jelly bean to Union Soldiers fighting in the Civil War.  When penny candy was popular at the candy store, containers of jelly beans were one of the treats you could get for a penny.  Then someone decided to push the jelly bean during Easter season and our culture thought it to be a great idea.  The fact that they are shaped like an egg made sense to most who already associated the egg shape with Easter.  Then on Febuary 7, 1964 the Beatles landed on US soil and someone got the idea they loved jelly beans.  Their real treat was called a jelly baby which was much softer than the hard jelly bean. Fans began to throw jelly beans at them during concerts, not realizing how much it must have hurt when they landed on them.  And in the 1960s Ronald Reagan took to eating the treat to help him wean himself from smoking.  Worked and for his 1981 presidential inauguration, the Jelly Belly company sent him 5,000 pounds of jelly beans as a gift.  They were all colored red, white and blue.  Too bad someone didn't ask him his favorite, since the black licorice jellybean was it.  Well, I will make sure that after I have filled the colored Easter eggs, I will have a couple of handfuls left for myself to snack on for a few days.   While searching for a few facts about the jelly bean, I came across an amazing YouTube video titled "The Time You Have - In Jelly Beans".  The video, created by Ze Frank, depicts the average lifespan of a human being, which is 28,835 days, in jelly beans.  You don't have to love jelly beans to enjoy it, but it helps.  It was another extraordinary day in the life of an ordinary guy.