Combinations of Skittles^TM
(A 10-Minute Diversion on an Evening Spent Alone)

By Jim Flood

Purple, Green, Yellow
Reminds me of a tie-dyed t-shirt I had in college. One day when I wasn’t stoned, I realized how ugly that shirt was and threw it out the window.

2 Greens
They stare back at me contentedly, concealing murderous tendencies, these eyes of a candy tiger.

1 Red, all by itself
It sits in my palm ominously. I push on it, pretending it’s the Self Destruct Button. This sets off an imaginary chain reaction that collapses the known universe into an unfathomably dense ball of matter the size of a Skittle.

Purple, Green, Yellow, Orange, Red
A perfectly balanced, rainbowlike assortment, the kind you might expect to see in an advertisement for Skittles. It would be one of those ads that appeal to gay people without straight people realizing it.

2 Orange, 1 Red
Snapshot of a spunky family: single parent Red and the twins are making it just fine on their own. They’re better off without that deadbeat Yellow.

2 Reds, 2 Greens
Makes me feel generous, like Christmas. I eat them myself though, as there’s no one else around to give them to.

Yellow, Yellow, Yellow
Ouch. The handful-of-Skittles equivalent of a fortune cookie that tells you, “Because you are a coward, no one will ever respect you.”

1 Green, 1 Orange
Like the tricolor flag of Ireland. ‘But where’s the third color, the white?’ you might be thinking. Look closer—the little S on each Skittle is white. If you wanted to, you could even think of it not as a letter S, but rather a depiction of one of the snakes that St. Patrick drove out of Ireland. But you’d have to be kind of a freak.

Green, Yellow, Red
After first eating the green one, I’ll still be able to keep going. However, once I’ve had the yellow, my enthusiasm for Skittle-eating will start to abate, then after the red I’ll decide I’m oversweeted and must stop.