Watch out for fingers in your fast food chili

The Misanthrope by ETHAN CHATAGINER

We’ve all been on the receiving end of bad service in a fast food joint, but a San Jose Wendy’s restaurant gave a customer the finger last week, literally.

The woman who bit into that finger will probably never enjoy a bowl of chili again.

Not surprisingly, the lady doesn’t want to be named and forever thought of as the finger eater. But since we’ve got no other name, let’s call her the Finger Eater.

Those who still claim there’s no such thing as bad publicity will be hard pressed to explain this case. This one doesn’t look good for anyone. Meanwhile, the search continues for the source of the finger. It seems as obvious as shouting, “Whose hand is incomplete?” Unfortunately, no one has stepped forward to answer that cry, and after a thorough investigation, it turned out that all of the Wendy’s employees were sporting all 10 digits.

The trail may lead back to the food processing company that supplies Wendy’s. But the Occupational Safety and Health Administration has no record of a finger loss complaint, so the fingerless woman remains anonymous. Investigators have suggested that the finger belonged to a woman because of the long, manicured nail on it.

Steering away from how gross that is, let’s hope that there is still someone out there missing the finger that the Finger Eater bit into. Otherwise, we have to start worrying about where the rest of the body belonging to it is.

Authorities are now fingerprinting the disembodied appendage, so if it’s from a felon or a public school teacher, we’ll know soon. If it’s from the larger mass of un-fingerprinted public, then it may stay unknown forever.

We can search as long as we want for the person to point the finger at, but the more important lesson to take away from this incident is how little we know about what goes into the food we eat.

Upton Sinclair’s novel “The Jungle” frightened consumers away from processed food in its day and just a few years ago “Fast Food Nation” turned friends of mine vegetarian.

While those two books required research to unearth the sordid details of the food industry, it didn’t take more than a spoonful for our friend the Finger Eater. This is only the fingertip of the iceberg, folks. So be careful what you bite into. It’s easy to think it’s safe, but we never know all the ingredients.