I tried finding something to eat for breakfast today, and I discovered that my newest cereal is an Apple Jacks trial size they sent in the mail last year. Someone had opened it and let it go soft. Now that I think about it, I don’t think I’ve ever actually finished a box of cereal — it either goes soft or I get really sick of it. The worst are those huge three-packs of cereal at Price Club. You eat one box and then you say, “”I really don’t like Frosted Flakes any more. I thought I did, but now I don’t.””

Another thing they have at Price Club are those variety packs of cereal, but then someone ends up eating all the good ones, and you wake up one day, and you’re deciding between Special K and Cheerios. I tried Grape Nuts once because the people eating Grape Nuts on the commercials seemed to be having a good time, and then I discovered that Grape Nuts has no grape flavor and contains no nuts. I seriously should consult my lawyer about that. It was basically just a bunch of wheat health crap; it tasted horrible. I wouldn’t eat another bowl of that if you paid me.

Ever notice how some people don’t quite grasp the concept of putting cereal in milk? You go to their house and all they do is eat dry cereal and watch Jerry Springer. “”You want to go see a movie?”” “”Shh, It’s `My Girlfriend is a Demonic Star Wars Freak’ Return Visit. Have some Golden Grahams.””

My favorite is those people that are convinced that their cereal is good for them: “”I eat Wheaties. One day I’ll be able to get into a fight and come out alive!”” One glance at the ingredients would tell them that a bowl fulfills 80 percent of their daily intake of sugar. Take Honey Bunches of Oats, for example. Someone with an IQ under 75 might mistakenly believe that it has some nutritional value. I mean, it tastes pretty good, but I’m not under some delusion that it’s any better than Sugar Coated Sugar Cubes.

One cereal I really liked was this one with little ice cream cones. There were actually little ice cream cones with artificial vanilla-flavored ice cream on top. You could only find it at Pic-N-Save though, because the FDA probably pulled it out of the market a week after it came out. I don’t remember what it was called, but it probably had “”Product of Mexico”” stamped all over the box.

If you’re ever eating Cookie Crisp and you find four or five of those things melted together, don’t eat it. I’ve had very bad experiences with masses of Cookie Crisp. Cookie Crisp is also a very expensive cereal. It’s something like $4 for a box. But if I was down at Fedco or wherever it is where they have the generic cereals, I’d still get it over “”Cookie-Like Bits.”” It’s hilarious — they have Cheerios right next to “”Oat Loops””, and you know some stupid parent is gonna buy “”Oat Loops”” to save $3, bring it home, and the kid’s gonna say, “”Where’s the Cheerios? What the hell is this crap? I want Cheerios!””

I never realized how much the cereal companies were ripping me off with the prizes until I was about 17. I remember I’d go down the cereal aisle choosing which prizes I wanted. The cereal didn’t matter; I wasn’t going to eat half of it anyway. Then we’d get home and I’d open up the box and dig for the prize. It was always at the very bottom and you got all these crumbs all over your hand while you were digging for it. Wow! A Secret Decoder Ring!

That’s why I don’t understand how Kix survived. They actually advertise that they don’t have a prize. That’s almost as stupid as those Sprite commercials. Sprite commercials make fun of all the techniques that their parent company, Coca-Cola, uses. Imagine if they ran both ads in a row.

The biggest rip-off I can remember was the time Wheaties had a $1,000,000 contest. Buying Wheaties was like buying a lottery ticket. And we wonder why America has a gambling addiction.

Another thing I don’t like about cereal is how soggy it gets. By the time you finish pouring the milk, half the cereal in it can no longer be classified as crispy. Even Chex gets soggy. I distinctly remember leaving a bowl of Chex for about two minutes and coming back very disappointed. And what’s with those people who add sugar to their cereal? That’s like adding MSG to Chinese takeout.

The award for worst cereal of all time goes to Shredded Wheat. Don’t get me wrong — Bite-Sized Frosted Shredded Wheat is great — but Shredded Wheat alone is the stupidest cereal I’ve ever seen. How can you expect people to break it into spoon-sized pieces? You know some kid is just going to break it in half and choke trying to swallow one of those things. It’s just a lawsuit waiting to happen. Maybe all of their sales are based on elementary schools dying it green and making it into really cheesy Christmas tree ornaments.

Cap’n Crunch sticks to your mouth after eating enough of it. The Crunch berries taste really artificial after a certain period of time and you start to wonder what’s really in them.

Then there’s Raisin Bran. If you live in any normal household, by the time you get to the Raisin Bran, someone has painstakingly taken out all of the Raisins and you’re left with crappy bran.

Cocoa Pebbles are pretty good, but after a while you look at your milk and you say, “”This isn’t milk. It looks like mud.”” And you start thinking about all the Cocoa Pebbles commercials and for all intensive purposes, when Fred and Barney are in the jungle, it is mud. You’re drinking mud. That’s why I don’t eat Cocoa Pebbles, or any cocoa product for that matter.

Is there anyone who actually eats the complete breakfast they always show on the box? On the box, they have eggs and toast and a tall glass of milk. If they’re going to be unrealistic, why don’t they just put onion soup and escargot and a glass of wine? That would look a whole lot better.

They could seriously brainwash you on the back of those cereal boxes. What do you do when you’re eating cereal? What can you do? I always end up reading the back and the sides of the cereal box because I’m too lazy to go find a paperback. I can probably recite the nutrition facts for most Post products.

I think the real problem is that I rarely eat breakfast any more. Or, I couldn’t really consider what I eat to be breakfast. I dunno, what’s a bowl of cereal, a bagel, a pack of fruit gushers and corned beef brisket at 6 p.m.? That’s about as close to breakfast as the carne asada at Cotixan is to actual meat for human consumption.