I have become hopelessly addicted to Einstein Bros. Power Bagels (not toasted, thank you) with peanut butter and grape jelly (light on the peanut butter, please).

Those damn hand-held seductresses, with their sweet nectar oozing out the sides with each rapturous bite, have me in a grip from which I cannot escape. Their siren song compels me from my path each morning to indulge in their hearty, dense flesh, imbued with the sweetness of raisins and dried cranberries, a cinnamon bouquet redolent of Ceylon, and the piquant nuttiness of….well…nuts. I arrive at work late, reeking of peanut butter, trousers stained with large dollops of grape jelly, acting hyper-normal in hopes that my coworkers won’t notice anything abnormal about my abnormal behavior.

“What?” says a friend, as I pass. “Einstein’s again?”

I glance down at the 32 oz. Diet Coke (with lemon) in my hand, the cup emblazoned with the Einstein Bros. logo (two little men peering into my soul through bagel monocles). “Uh, yeah,” I fumble, trying furiously to think of something that might explain a normal person’s serial dining habits. “It’s, um, it’s right on my way to work…”

“Well, you must really like it,” he offers.

I smile the half-smile of a man who is no longer a part of this world. A man who has turned himself over, body and soul, to his wanton lust for tasty baked goods. Some may pity me, but this is a culinary prison from which I have no desire to be freed. If this is hell, I have no need for a heaven.

Behold, The Holy Land Experience!

“Themed costuming, shops, craftsmen, dramatic enactments and music, even themed landscaping and food and beverages throughout the facility take guests out of the 21st century and transport them on a memorable journey that is unequalled anywhere in the world,” explained Bill Coan, whose firm, ITEC, was responsible for the design and production of The Holy Land Experience.

But after glancing at the map of exhibits, I have a couple of thoughts:

• Can a Wilderness Tabernacle be adjacent to an interstate highway?
• To avoid any possible distraction, you should probably visit Calvary’s Garden Tomb when the wind isn’t wafting over from Dromedary Depot.
• I would avoid the Jaffa Hot Dog in favor of the Bedouin Beef.

I managed to leave my Wenger Swiss Military Field watch in my pants pocket when I did the laundry last night. It didn’t make it through the washer and dryer alive.

I loved that watch. It had a rugged simplicity that I saw as an analogue of my own. Now that it appears to have had mere simplicity, I’m having to consider that I, too, might just be simple.

Perhaps I was expecting too much of the watch. With it’s military origins, I had assumed that it would be capable of withstanding tough military conditions, but then it occurred to me: how rugged does a watch created for the Swiss Army really have to be? The Swiss Army doesn’t actually do anything. They just sit around being neutral. A Swiss Army watch probably needs to be able to withstand the rigors of vigorous café debates about the qualities of various chocolates. It could also be scraped against a stone counter top while filling out a Swiss bank account deposit slip, but that’s about the worst action it would see.

Once again, I think I’ve been the victim of clever marketing. Damn the Swiss and their holey cheese!

In 1987 Estée Lauder introduced a new fragrance for men called Metropolis. The Encyclopedia of World Perfumes provides the following “olfactive description” for the fragrance:

Sage Lavender Basil Mandarine Spicy (Clove, Cinnamon) Neroli Sandalwood Patchouli Vetiver Mossy Ambery

In 1988, Metropolis won a Fragrance Foundation Recognition Award, often referred to as “The FiFi” (no, I am not making this up), and it is still considered by many to be one of the best men’s fragrances ever produced.

I loved that cologne. It was my cologne. Everyone who knew me associated the smell of Metropolis with me. It’s not that I reeked of the stuff, but people loved the smell of Metropolis and, by association, they loved me, too.

But, today, if you were to go to an Estée Lauder counter and ask for Metropolis, the personal aesthetic consultants behind the counter would most likely stare at you blankly and offer to hose you down with either Lauder Pleasures for Men or the new Lauder Intuition for Men. I doubt that most of them have even heard of Metropolis.

Why? Because Liza Minelli killed it years ago. Over a decade ago, Estée Lauder spent an obscene amount of money to advertise Metropolis with a series of ill-conceived television ads that (if memory serves) featured Liza Minelli in all her sequined glory, ballroom dancing with various anonymous, tuxedoed hunks as she intoned the wonders of Metropolis.

It bombed…big time. It was one of the most disastrous advertising campaigns in history. Most experts look back and say that the problem was that they never made it clear that Metropolis was a men’s fragrance. I would contest that it wouldn’t have mattered if they did.

Q. How many men are going to buy a cologne because Liza Minelli tells them that it’s fabulous? Let me rephrase that: How many straight men are going to buy a cologne because Liza Minelli tells them that it’s fabulous?

A. None. (OK, I bought it, but I started wearing it before I saw the commercials.)

Q. How many gay men are going to buy a cologne because Liza Minelli tells them that it’s fabulous?

A. Blessed few…at least not in 1988. After all, we’re not talking about the 1972 Cabaret Liza here. We’re talking about the 1988 Rent-A-Cop/Arthur 2: On The Rocks Liza.

And this is well after Calvin Klein’s Obsession ads had fundamentally changed fragrance advertising. It’s hard to imagine what the folks at Estée Lauder could have been thinking? But, it doesn’t matter now. Metropolis is gone. It’s gone and I’ve searched the world for over a decade without finding anything to fill the void.

It’s no wonder no one loves me. Damn that woman…

As long as we’re on the subject of fragrance ads…OK, as long as I’m on the subject of fragrance ads…I think the latest compaign for Ralph Lauren’s Romance is an interesting example of women’s and men’s differing ideas of what “romance” really is.

The advertisement for Romance for Women is a gorgeous black-and-white photograph of two beautiful people caught in a moment of quiet intimacy:

They stood facing each other. Neither spoke. He reached up with his strong, capable hands and slid her crisp, white blouse off her shoulders and down her arms, binding her wrists delicately behind her. His fingertips traced their way back up her arms. He took her gently by the shoulders and pressed his forehead to hers. She looked down, her eyes gazing first at his chest, then down past his rippling stomach, to where his tanned, supple skin constrasted against the white of his jeans. She closed her eyes, afraid that the moment might vanish, but the warmth of his breath on her soft eyelids told her that this moment — this man — was indeed real.

Her haltered top restrained her heaving bosom but it could barely contain her beating heart. She leaned into him, arching her back slightly to maintain contact. He reached up and lifted her chin. She almost couldn’t bear to look at his face for fear losing herself forever in his deep brown eyes. He slid his hand onto the back of her neck and pulled her softly, gently, toward him…pausing just as their lips were about to touch.

“I will love you forever,” he whispered as the rest of her world melted away.

…or something along those lines. <pause> Whew! <dab forehead> Is it hot in here? Pardon me, I’m feeling a little light-headed. <clear throat> Anyway…

Contrast that with the ad for Romance for Men.

It, too, is in black-and-white, but the tones are much darker. And this is an action shot: the picture is slightly blurred, hair is flying, and the guy has spun around to reveal a chain tatoo on his bulging bicep. As for the woman, you can’t even tell what she looks like anymore, but that’s OK because this ad is all about the guy. Yes, this is a man who is in command of himself and the situation:

He grabbed her roughly and spun her around, pulling her toward him and thrusting his tongue into her mouth.

Now that’s romance. At least men think so…or at least Ralph Lauren thinks that men think so.

I’m not sure what it says about me as a man but, while I think the ad for Romance for Men is perfectly O.K., the Romance for Women advertisement is absolutely amazing.