It was Friday, and I was making my weekly Taco Bell trip to delve into the land of beef and nacho cheese: paradise in a taco shell. Taco Bell is what gets me out of bed in the morning, and after a long sleepless week, a bite out of a freshly assembled Chalupa is like a little bite of heaven. This day, as I scurried onto the smooth linoleum floor of Taco Bell, I faced myself with the same question I face every trip: Baja Chalupa or Cheesy Gordita Crunch?

However, as I played with this question in my head, my attention was drawn to an entirely new Taco Bell creation I had never seen before. It was called the Bacon Cheddar Gordita Crunch (BCGC), and as I pronounced the name over in my head, a brilliant light shined through the window illuminating the BCGC’s valiant figure and a heavenly hymn sounded in my ears. The 600-calorie dish was comprised of a fluffy gordita shell stuck to a crunchy taco shell with cheddar and bacon bits. Inside the shell was glorious Taco Bell beef topped with a zesty southwest cheddar sauce, lettuce and more cheese. A charge of $2.49 seemed a fair price to pay for happiness.

Now many of you question why I would think that bacon would be a great addition to Taco Bell’s forte. The answer is I have had bacon, and it is good. I have also had many Cheesy Gordita Crunches, and they are great. In my mind, the combination of good and great makes awesome. But the BCGC was far less than awesome.

As the Taco Bell employee placed the BCGC on the counter I quickly snatched it away and unraveled its wrapper on the way to the car. I took a bite and curiously furrowed my brow. The car seemed to be rolling over hundreds of speed bumps shaking my stomach. I took another bite, and suddenly I felt as if Richard Simmons was massaging my thighs with baby oil. How discomforting.

The bacon was not your typical bacon. It was preservative heavy and tasted a lot like crappy beef jerky doused in cheese. The salty taste of bacon overpowered all things wonderful about the Cheesy Gordita Crunch, and the combination of bacon, cheese and beef was much less tasty than it was uncomfortable.

I took another involuntary bite, groaned and stared at my BCGC. “You are a disgrace,” I thought. I could not bear to force another bite of this jerky taco down my throat, but my father’s voice rang in my ears reminding me of poor African children who would kill each other for a BCGC. Thinking of bony children, I forced myself to bite into it again, and bacon bits mingled with beef stuck to my teeth.

“Be heroic Mark!” my father cheered. “We didn’t raise you on Taco Bell for nothing!”

I stared my BCGC in the face. What a disappointment. There had been nothing at Taco Bell I had not been able to finish before. The fluffy gordita shell was now dry and peeled away from the inner taco to reveal the bacon bits that had ruined my dreams.

I could not do it. I was so upset I could not even look at it. I am not one to litter, but the BCGC was not worthy of my grasp or a trashcan. I tossed it out the window and said good riddance as a nearby Honda Civic trampled its cowardly figure.

Any item that is thrown under a compact sedan to be trampled, like the Bacon Cheddar Gordita Crunch, is a disgrace to Taco Bell and a disappointment to Taco Bell aficionados around the world. So do not break your bank on a BCGC, you will be better off with a regular Cheesy Gordita Crunch.