Good thing it’s the end of the school year, because I see there’s a conspiracy afoot to make me waste money.

My daughter loves having a bagel and cream cheese when I send her with cold lunch. This requires a knife. Since I don’t want to lose the real cutlery in some elementary school mishap, I buy disposable plastic knives. I also buy disposable plastic spoons for things like apple sauce and pudding in her lunch.

I don’t buy plastic forks because I don’t need them and don’t want to stockpile them. If there is a zombie apocalypse, alien invasion or nuclear holocaust, I’m pretty sure I’m not going to be saying, “Damn, I’m SO glad I have 5,000 plastic forks in the barn. Those will really help in fending off the undead/extraterrestrial commandos/rampaging rapist-cannibals.”

So, I don’t buy the picnic-oriented packs with all three utensils. That’s just an invitation to end up with unused and unusable plastic forks, and then next thing I know I’ll be featured on “Hoarders” or some similar TV show.

Yet I go to Walmart several days ago and try to buy a new box of knives, only to find no sign of them.

Spoons only? Yes! Forks only? Yes, but who cares? Knives only? Well…ummm…no.

I thought maybe they were just out of stock, but it didn’t seem as though there was a space for them anymore.

Today, I stop into the local grocery store to get fixings to make my wife and son breakfast burritos this morning. I decide to stop into the paper plate/plastic-ware aisle, and find that even there, I see neither knife-only boxes nor a spot for them anymore.

What’s up with this? Is it like the whole over-the-counter allergy medicine shit? A few assholes make meth with the allergy meds that have decongestants, and the rest of us have to show ID and be rationed because of that? What…are schoolkids suddenly stabbing each other in the eyes with plastic knives at lunchtime in some sort of pseudo-gang violence and now the rest of us must pay the price?

Besides, local stores, haven’t you considered the most basic fact?

Plastic knives will be much more useful in the apocalypse. Get on that. Now. Reorder and restock.

Or I’ll start stabbing your execs and your purchasing people with all my leftover plastic forks.