Girl Scout Cookies: What's Your Favorite Flavor?

The time has arrived. Their time has come. Every year, you see them, hear them, and sometimes smell them in your neighborhood, uniformly tempting you and your neighbors with irresistible products that sometimes cause feelings of guilt, shame, and overall breaking of resolutions.

The Girl Scouts are here. And they brought cookies.

I'm a full supporter. I always have been. I've never been one to turn away at least two boxes of Thin Mints each year because, you see, I prepare. I work out all year long and even extra in October to prepare for the holiday season. In January, I work out even more. Why?

Thin mints, that's why! How can you resist those thin mints, especially when you put them in your freezer for 20 minutes and just let one melt in your mouth? Or the Samoas, combining chocolate and coconut into a deadly morsel of cellulite doom? And don't even get started on the Tagalongs....oh, man.

Yes, Girl Scout Cookies are an American tradition, but there is an actual purpose for selling them other than young children aspiring to poison the veins of will-less souls. All the proceeds collected do contribute to Girl Scouts of America, an organization designed to promote leadership and confidence of young women around the nation. The Girl Scouts regularly do fundraisers for charity or provide projects for girls to do like camping, building crafts, learning manners, and self-confidence projects.

For every box of cookies sold (they go for $3.50 a box now), 60 cents goes directly back to the troop of the girl selling them. People have regularly volunteered to help Girl Scouts since 1912. They grew from 18 members back then to over 3.5 million today, with 236,000 troops and almost one million volunteers! The Girl Scouts have even expanded their reach to other countries, reaching over 90 across the world.

That troop usually takes the funds from the Girl Scout cookies and uses them to rent buses for field trips or they buy craft supplies, patches and such. Often there are special functions like Favorite Fella where a girl takes her dad to a special event. They cost money, but funds from selling cookies offset those costs.