Lady Doritos died like they lived — on Twitter. And here's that story.
Stand down — there will not be a new product called Lady Doritos.
What are Lady Doritos?
To be honest when I first heard the phrase I thought Lady Doritos was an obscure member of the royal family. As in, “Lady Doritos will receive you in the parlor. Lady Doritos will retire to her cool ranch in the summer. Lady Doritos has an audience with The Queen.” You know, that sort of thing.
No. Lady Doritos became national news because Indra Nooyi, chief executive of PepsiCo, who owns Frito-Lays, who makes Doritos, did an interview on the “Freakonomics Radio” podcast.
She mentioned during the interview that research shows women eat Doritos differently than men. “They don’t like to crunch too loudly in public,” she said. “And they don’t lick their fingers generously, and they don’t like to pour the little broken pieces and the flavor into their mouth.”
This led to Nooyi disclosing that some sort of purse-friendly snack that tasted like a Dorito but didn’t leave orange napalm on your fingers was in the works. The internet dubbed them Lady Doritos and it was off to the races!
No one, I mean no one, liked the idea of Lady Doritos. It became such an uproar that Doritos was forced to officially shut down the Lady Doritos dust-up with this tweet. “We already have Doritos for women — they’re called Doritos, and they’re loved by millions.”
Lady Doritos died like they lived — on Twitter. Lady Doritos were, in fact, poppycock! (I imagine lords and ladies of the court say poppycock.) When balanced against all the world’s problems, obstacles to female Dorito consumption is surely on the lowest rung; it’s the absolute bottom feeder of world issues.
But speaking of bottom feeding… let’s talk about the marbled crayfish.
Do not worry about Lady Doritos, ladies and gentlemen. Instead, worry about the female marbled crayfish.
There are no male marbled crayfish, yet they’re reproducing at horror movie levels.
Experts say the marbled crayfish is the result of a genetic accident in Germany that escaped a tank back in the 1990s.
The marbled crayfish is now going forth and multiplying. She doesn’t need a man, she just clones herself and can survive almost anywhere.
She’s thriving from Madagascar to Sweden and from Japan to Germany.
So, put down your Lady Doritos outrage.
This time next year we could all be enslaved to invasive marbled crayfish overladies. Scientists say they’re spreading rapidly, and they’re taking over the ecosystems they invade.
Other scientists say, cool! Let’s study them to see if they can show us how cancerous tumors grow. That’s the upside.
But still, we don’t know what she wants, this marbled crayfish. And we don’t know how to stop her. If it’s female engineered Doritos she’s after, we’re all doomed.
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Rebecca Regnier is an award-winning journalist and content creator. Visit her at RebeccaRegnier.com.